The (false) Allure of the City
How the calmness of small town America warps our understanding of mission.
I just returned from a short trip to New York City with my wife. For years, I wanted to visit the city because to me it was akin to Thoreau going to the woods to live deliberately and “to suck out all the marrow of life.”1
New York City is a city of dreamers — some seeking the American dream, some living it, and some whose dream has turned into a nightmare. To dream is to be human. At our core we desire life that is truly life and in seeking it, we prove who we really are.
My version of the good life is vastly different from most others— it’s to leave a legacy built upon following the Way of Jesus and helping others do the same. It is because of this that the city has an allure on me. What better place to build a legacy than in a city where results can make a marked difference? After all, the need is so evident in the city.
In the city, you cannot escape from people’s need for the gospel. It is constantly in your face.
New York City is a juxtaposition of towering opulence and lowly destitution both finding themselves at the crossroads of gospel need.
It is the woman in the Bronx sitting among trash on the ground, glass broken all around her, just trying to disappear. It is the man on the subway in Midtown telling his story of homelessness in search of pittance. It is the businessperson on Madison Ave. or Wall St. seeking to get ahead by any means necessary. It is seeing the beauty of the Highline from the slums of the outer boroughs.
It is no wonder that our hearts are strangely warmed when we go to the city. The God who seeks and saves the lost is looking out upon the harvest fields searching for those who will join Him on mission. Some respond to the need, but many of us return home with forever a memory of the need etched in our minds.
The Problem of Calmness
At home in the quiet and stillness of small town America, we forget that the in-your-face gospel need of the city is still right in front of us in our small towns. Sure, it isn’t as extreme, but it is still there. Oh for eyes to see.
Why is it so easy for us to see the need in the city but miss it in our small towns?
Perhaps it is our doctrine of sin where we give greater weight to “big” sins. A 2020 Lifeway Research and Ligonier survey found that 66% of Christians in the United States either strongly or somewhat disagreed with the statement, “Even the smallest sin deserves eternal damnation.”2
That is not the view of Christianity and it reveals our lack of gospel understanding. Until we regain a proper understanding of sin, lostness, and the gospel, we will miss the missional allure of small town America.
Until we regain a proper understanding of sin, lostness, and the gospel, we will miss the missional allure of small town America.
Consider a fictitious John Goodman, an electrician by trade who lives a quiet life raising his 2.7 children with his wife in a town of 30,000. He was raised in a Christian home and still prays occasionally. He drinks a little and may sometimes tell a crude joke with the boys, but overall he tries to do more good than bad. He is seen as an upstanding citizen who supports the local school and is always willing to help those who need it.
John would likely not be the first person who comes to our mind when we think of someone who is lost. Our minds are more likely to go to the worst of the worst. And yet, John’s need for the gospel is the same as the drug addict sitting among the trash on the streets in the Bronx.
But why are we so quick to forget this? Have we not read in Romans where it says that all have sinned (3:23) and that the wages of sin is death (6:23)? If only it were that simple.
The Problem of Moralistic Therapeutic Deism
The heart of our problem is a syncretic worldview that amalgamates Christianity with that of Moralistic Therapeutic Deism (MTD). MTD was coined by sociologists Christian Smith and Melissa Lundquist Denton in their 2005 book Soul Searching. At its core MTD is adherence to these beliefs:
A God exists who created the world.
God who wants people to be good.
The goal of life is to be happy.
God is distant and only really needed in response to problems.
Good people go to heaven when they die.
Moralistic Therapeutic Deism represents the primary central belief system of adults in the U.S. today and more often than not tries to pass itself off as Christianity.3
A 2021 study from the Cultural Research Center at Arizona Christian University that was conducted by George Barna “found that although three out of four people (74%) who embrace MTD consider themselves to be Christians, only one-sixth (16%) qualify as born-again based on their theology. The study also found that the beliefs of the vast majority of this group conflict with basic biblical teaching.
For example, they:
Do not believe that people are sinful and need salvation through Jesus Christ (91%)
Trust sources other than the Bible for moral guidance (88%)
Contend that good people get to Heaven through good behavior (76%)
Do not believe that the Bible is true and reliable communication from God (71%)”4
The falsely held beliefs of Moralistic Therapeutic Deism reveals why we don’t see John the Electrician’s need for the gospel. We’ve equated net-positive morality and belief in a god with Christian salvation.
We’ve equated net-positive morality and belief in a god with Christian salvation.
The Path Forward
Gone are the days of hoping things get better. We are not here to make bad people good, we are here to help dead people live. We must regain a proper understanding of sin, salvation, and discipleship so that we can be effective in our mission to the world.
But mere understanding will not suffice. It must give way to a changed habitus.5 We must be transformed by the renewing of our minds (Romans 12:2) in order to contend for our neighbors.
This puts us in the uncomfortable place of seeing the lostness of those around us and being moved to do something about it. It means living life that is truly life while breaking bread with those who are far from God. It means investing in the lives of those around us and seeking the wellbeing of the places in which we find ourselves.
The in-your-face depravity of the city is alive and well in the coffee shops, bank branches, and grocery stores of small town America if we are willing to see it. We need not thrust ourselves into the midst of Manhattan to change the world, we need only to love our neighbors by living out the Way of Jesus where we are.
Thank you, Mr. Keating.
Ibid.
See Alan Kreider, The Patient Ferment of the Early Church for more on this.