In his helpful book, The City: a global history, Joel Kotkin traces the rise and fall of the great cities of history. In his analysis he detects common factors that make or break a city. Whether it is the ancient city of Ur in Mesopotamia or the modern metropolis of Manhattan, New York, all thriving cities are safe, sacred, and busy. He writes:
Three critical factors have determined the overall health of cities—the sacredness of place, the ability to provide security and project power, and last, the animating role of commerce. Where these factors are present, urban culture flourishes. When these elements weaken, cities dissipate and eventually recede out of historyâ€(xxi).
If we are to build and renew thriving cities, we will have to engage these three spheres of urban life—security (safe), economy (busy), and religion (sacred). Kotkin has given us a great template for urban renewal—safe, sacred, and busy. Are you engaging your city on these levels? What role should the church play in taking up this template? How the sacred, safe, and busy interplay can be awfully complex, but gospel of Christ call us to think of the city as a whole, not just in evangelical bits and pieces. Only then, can the church recover the bold reputation of the early Christians who made cities better not worse.
This recent sermon, Renew the City (part 5), takes Kotkin’s template and runs it through a Gospel Grid.
