Mission Strategy In The City

This book was written to suggest an appropriate mission strategy by identifying key issues that impact urban ethnicities through an urban socioanthropological lens. This book is based on the author's sixteen years of living in China, where he conducted missionary work in urban areas. The book discusses the author's interactions with enclaves of ethnic minorities who had recently arrived in the city after migrating from rural areas. The minorities' struggles to balance cultural assimilation and tradition preservation are highlighted throughout. The book explains that similar phenomena occur within Korean American communities in Los Angeles as well. Based on these observations, the author states that immigrants in many cities face similar social issues and find similar resolutions to them. Though there are many negative aspects to urban areas, readers will see some positive features of cities that can contribute to effective evangelism. The book highlights three main points: (1) Ethnic urban dwellers evolve into many more diverse ways than commonly thought. (2) Ethnic groups are actively choosing the future of their community types. (3) Modern cities create many new communication channels interethnically and also across social strata within ethnicities.

Rapid urbanization and globalization processes worldwide have changed the landscape of our times. In Asia and Africa the number of urban dwellers increases by an average of one million per week, according to the United Nations. More than half of the globe’s seven billion human beings now live in cities. These realities have far reaching implications for mission in urban contexts at the start of the third millennium. Reaching the City: Reflections on Urban Mission for the Twenty-first Century seeks to address the missiological challenges associated with this new world order. Each author in this collection respectfully builds upon the significant contributions of seminal writers such as Ray Bakke, Jacques Ellul, Basil of Caesarea and others, while making new and creative proposals for urban mission in our world today. Beginning with the bigger picture of the global challenges of urbanization, and moving through theological, historical, and educational perspectives, this volume concludes with a rich bevy of case studies engaging these new realities of both North American and international cities to encourage a missional thrust to reach these communities.

As cities continue to expand, Christ calls the church to bring the gospel to these centers of population, culture, and political power.

Practical and Gospel-centered thoughts on how to have a fruitful ministry by one of America's leading and most beloved pastor. Many church leaders are struggling to adapt to a culture that values individuality above loyalty to a group or institution. There have been so many "church growth" and "effective ministry" books in the past few decades that it's hard to know where to start or which ones will provide useful and honest insight. Based on over twenty years of ministry in New York City, Timothy Keller takes a unique approach that measures a ministry's success neither by numbers nor purely by the faithfulness of its leaders, but on the biblical grounds of fruitfulness. Center Church outlines a balanced theological vision for ministry organized around three core commitments: Gospel-centered: The gospel of grace in Jesus Christ changes everything, from our hearts to our community to the world. It completely reshapes the content, tone, and strategy of all that we do. City-centered: With a positive approach toward our culture, we learn to affirm that cities are wonderful, strategic, and under-served places for gospel ministry. Movement-centered: Instead of building our own tribe, we seek the prosperity and peace of our community as we are led by the Holy Spirit. "Between a pastor's doctrinal beliefs and ministry practices should be a well-conceived vision for how to bring the gospel to bear on the particular cultural setting and historical moment. This is something more practical than just doctrine but much more theological than "how-to steps" for carrying out a ministry. Once this vision is in place, it leads church leaders to make good decisions on how to worship, disciple, evangelize, serve, and engage culture in their field of ministry—whether in a city, suburb, or small town." — Tim Keller, Core Church

Jesus' admonition to "go and make disciples of all nations" (Matthew 28:19, NIV) resonates in the hearts of those who love Him supremely. Every individual must be given the opportunity to choose between life and death. This volume is a call to action-a plea for believers to work for their Savior by bringing the gospel to the millions of people in the city, strategies, methods, selecting and training workers, and lessons from Scripture. Yes, the work will require much effort, especially in our day and age. But Ellen G. White doesnÆt mince words: ôDo not hover over the churches to repeat over and over again the same truths to the people, while the cities are left in ignorance and sin, unwarned and unlabored forö (The Upward Look, p. 274). Book jacket.

In this addition to the highly acclaimed Encountering Mission series, two leading missionary scholars offer an up-to-date discussion of missionary strategy that is designed for a global audience. The authors focus on the biblical, missiological, historical, cultural, and practical issues that inform and guide the development of an effective missions strategy. The book includes all the features that have made other series volumes useful classroom tools, such as figures, sidebars, and case studies. Students of global or domestic mission work and mission practitioners will value this new resource.

This edited volume discusses the socioeconomic, environmental, and policy implications of smart cities. Written by international experts in energy economics and policy, the chapters present wide range of high quality theoretical and empirical studies at the nexus of social, entrepreneurial, governmental and ecological transformation. The book covers a wide range of topics, with a view towards providing empirical evidence of the benefits of smart cities as well as practical frameworks for smart city initiatives. Topics discussed include: smart city transition pillars, innovation for smart and sustainable cities design and implementation, smart city governance, smart mobility within cities, and smart cities in emerging economies. This volume will be of use to students and researchers interested in resource economics, energy economics, sustainability, ICT, and governance, as well as policymakers working on smart city initiatives. This is an open access book.