Overview

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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9781783684977

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Reviews

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 landgrabbers, 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

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 landgrabbers, 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

Author Information

DAVID W. SMITH spent eleven years as a pastor in the heart of Cambridge, UK, until he sailed to Africa with his young family in a Nigerian cargo ship to work in the rain forest and burgeoning cities of Africa. After returning to the UK with a host of questions, he earned a PhD in Secularization and Evangelicalism under Professor Andrew Walls at Aberdeen University. He later spent time in various leadership roles at theological institutions across the UK, where he made a significant contribution to the field of missiology.

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