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199 pages

English

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More than half the people in the world live in cities, including a growing number of megacities with populations exceeding ten million people. This trend means that an understanding of urbanization must be an urgent priority for Christian theology and mission across the globe. This updated edition of Seeking a City with Foundations, with an additional chapter, explores Christian responses to the city, ranging from rejecting the urban as evil, to embracing it as being central to God’s redemptive purposes.
Drawing from a wide range of disciplines, including history, social science, urban planning, and the history of art, readers are given a detailed text which confronts the challenges that contemporary urbanization presents to world Christianity. Looking at urbanism as a theme throughout Scripture, culminating with the great vision of the New Jerusalem, David Smith explains that God’s own future is revealed as urban, highlighting the need to identify modern-day idols as we share the gospel in cities and acknowledge the impact of global economic forces. The book also explores the causes of what has been called the divided city and traces the urban theme through the Bible to present an alternative vision of the urban future – a future in which the injustices in ever-growing slums and a crisis of meaning among the privileged might be overcome through the power of the reconciling message of the cross. This timely book proposes a way forward for urban mission, highlighting that transformation of our cities must be the focal point of Christian mission and hope.

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Publié par	Langham Creative Projects
Date de parution	31 mars 2019
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781783684984
Langue	English
Poids de l'ouvrage	1 Mo

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0037€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

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David Smith traces urbanization from biblical times to the present phenomenon across the Majority World, describing how unplanned settlements appear around and within modern megacities, a reality I know in Nigeria. The book describes the marginalization of the urban poor by elites and foreign land-grabbers, creating an ever-widening gap between a minority of rich people and the poor majority. It points too, toward the hope of the emergence of a global movement characterized by love and justice, and offers a very cogent description of the emerging concerns arising from the phenomenon of the endless city.
Samuel P. Ango, PhD
Provost,
Theological College of Northern Nigeria, Bukuru, Jos, Nigeria
What a timely work! As I read these pages it felt as though the book was written in my city of Manipur, India, because it addresses the pertinent issues I am struggling with every day. David Smith has beautifully described the unprecedented influx of people into the cities, and the complex problems arising from this, including the threat to the natural world. Drawing insights from different fields of study, this is a must-read book for those who are committed to making the Christian message relevant in a global context today.
Jangkholam Haokip, PhD
Dean of Theology and Ethics,
United Biblical Seminary, Pune, India
David Smith grapples with the nature, meaning and trajectories of urban life, which he combines with a profound depth of theological reflection, rooted in Christian hope. This book will prove to be an excellent guide for students and practitioners alike who seek a deeper understanding of how the texts of the Bible can powerfully and prophetically speak afresh into our contemporary urban world.
Colin Smith, PhD
Church Mission Society, Oxford, UK
Seeking a City with Foundations lays a foundation that all future urban theological works must reckon with if they are to be faithful to their task. Smith both instructs and inspires in this very important book.
Eldin Villafane, PhD
Professor of Christian Social Ethics,
Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, Boston, USA
Recent years have witnessed an increasing focus on the growth of cities and megacities in the non-Western world. Sadly, the Christian community has been slow to respond to what this means for mission. David Smith’s book provides foundations and perspectives on the city and what it means to engage with the urban contexts of today in missional and gospel centred ways.
Peter Rowan, PhD
Co-National Director, OMF UK
David Smith’s book on urban theology is a remarkable achievement of interdisciplinary scholarship. This ground-breaking, beautifully written and lucidly organised text is thoroughly grounded in the literature of urbanism and urbanization, and also informed by the urgent theological problem posed by a radical change whereby more than half of humankind now lives in an urban environment.
David Martin, PhD
Emeritus Professor of Sociology,
London School of Economics, London, UK
This is a magisterial, complex book that deeply challenges the reader. It is recommended reading for Christians who are serious in seeking to understand and confront the changing needs of urban life throughout the world.
Geoff Gobbett Former London-Based Pastor
David Smith’s fascinating interpretation of global cities such as Mumbai, Brasilia, Dubai, and Glasgow, and his detailed urban reflections on the biblical text takes his readers on the most thrilling of journeys. The riches contained in the different levels of this text provide not just historical perspectives, but a dynamic and global relevance that reaches out into the future. Students and practitioners of urban mission will benefit in profound ways from absorbing this newly expanded book.
Stuart Weir, PhD
Scottish National Director, CARE
In Seeking a City with Foundations , David Smith argues with passionate conviction, Christianity’s shift in its “centre of gravity” from Europe to the Majority World. Through keen analyses of urban history and pathologies, the book offers fresh perspectives on the phenomena of megacities in Africa and Asia where millions of Christians crowd into churches to be part of a faith that is inclusive rather than exclusive, a faith in which slum dwellers and marginalized communities find their hopes and aspirations realized in the compassionate person of Christ. It is also where the major pentecostal movement promises material prosperity and success to the middle classes. The future of urban Christianity, the book maintains, is in its potential for being “global” – a world religion. David Smith’s writing is direct, insightful and compelling in its appeal. It is a major contribution to Christian religious studies. The book is of particular interest to scholars and readers in the Majority World.
Kanchana Ugbabe, PhD
Professor of English and Writer in Residence,
Fordham University, New York City, USA
What David Smith is talking about in this book, that is urban pathologies, is a reality I see and experience in my own Asian context in the Philippines. What makes this book important for our context is not only that it shows us the reality but that it gives us a vision that empowers us. The challenge is global, but God has chosen to use us to be agents of transformation.
Federico G. Villanueva, PhD
Publications Secretary, Asia Theological Association

Seeking a City with Foundations
Theology for an Urban World
David W. Smith

© 2019 David W. Smith
Published 2019 by Langham Global Library
An imprint of Langham Publishing
www.langhampublishing.org
Langham Publishing and its imprints are a ministry of Langham Partnership
Langham Partnership
PO Box 296, Carlisle, Cumbria, CA3 9WZ, UK
www.langham.org
This edition of Seeking A City With Foundations is published by arrangement with Inter-Varsity Press, Nottingham, England.
ISBNs:
978-1-78368-497-7 Print
978-1-78368-498-4 ePub
978-1-78368-499-1 Mobi
978-1-78368-500-4 PDF
David W. Smith has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988 to be identified as the Author of this work.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher or the Copyright Licensing Agency.
Requests to reuse content from Langham Publishing are processed through PLSclear. Please visit www.plsclear.com to complete your request.
All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan.
Scripture quotations marked NKJV are from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations marked NRSV are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN: 978-1-78368-497-7
Cover & Book Design: projectluz.com
Langham Partnership actively supports theological dialogue and an author’s right to publish but does not necessarily endorse the views and opinions set forth here or in works referenced within this publication, nor can we guarantee technical and grammatical correctness. Langham Partnership does not accept any responsibility or liability to persons or property as a consequence of the reading, use or interpretation of its published content.

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This book is dedicated to the memory of Ted Herbert, Christian leader, biblical scholar and greatly missed friend, without whose encouragement and support it would never have been begun.
Contents

Cover

Preface to the New Edition

Preface to the First Edition

Introduction to the New Edition

World Christianity and The Endless City

Life in the Endless City

Lessons from the Age of the Industrial City

World Christianity and the Endless City

That the World May Believe

1 Introduction

The Garden and the City

The City of God

The Challenge for Theology

Part I

2 The Challenge of an Urban World

The Growth of an Urban World

Urbanization in Africa

Cities of the Rich, Cities of the Poor

Understanding the Urban World

Agenda for an Urban Theology

3 The Birth and Growth of the City

The Sacred City

The Search for the Good City

The Fall and Rise of Urban Cultures

The Holy Commonwealth

The City and the Industrial Revolution

The Endless City

Urban Pathologies

Conclusion

4 Urban Visions, Urban Nightmares

The Garden City

The Radiant City

Visions and Nightmares