I am so excited to be starting my new series, it all about cities!
For centuries, the city has been a place of many luxuries, beauty, opulence, the spectacle of skyscrapers, the slice of flyovers, the spice of innovation, culture, diversity and creativity The city has fostered national and international relations, cultivated trade, tourism and commence. It has reinvigorated industry and service, it has facilitated transportation to connect widely and excavation to discover and treasure the old. The city has enabled more opportunity for educational excellence and fostered justice and security for all. The city remains dynamic and almost mysterious in some ways. By day, it is a bright hum of boisterous activity and by night it is a scintillating sparkle of lights and indulgent play.
Cities boost of these invigorating qualities around our world today but according to Resonance 100 best cities chart, the top 5 cities are London, Newyork, Paris, Moscow and Tokyo. Without saying much, i think we know why London might be number one. Everyone on the planet has probably heard of the place called London. You might be thinking, well i wouldn't want to live in London but this is not about personal preference for where you would want to live, if that where the case I wouldn't choose London either.
Apparently, "there is no better urban experience anywhere" compared with the city of London. Despite the hash realities of Brexit in last year it ranks no 5 on the number of fortune 500 companies meaning it is heavily invested in. Money is obviously a defence - true words of the bible.
I guess the question one might ask is how have these cities been ranked? What criteria has qualified them to be the best? Is it just money you might ask? No, it is not. Resonance has used a very clever methodology to sieve these cities - within it are 6 pillars, place, product, programming, people, prosperity and promotion. Within these pillars there is mention of the city's natural and built in environment, its attractions and institutions, its ability to generate wealth and the diversity of its people also how well recommended it is by the rest of the world. All this to say, there has been considerable thought in the ranking methodology.
Fast forward two thousand years ago, there were also top cities existing way before Christ and after His death. They were the Roman cities. The Roman empire was the strongest force to reckon with once upon time. Roman cities where renown for the same things as alot of the cities we know today but of course our innovation and technology has far surpassed theirs still the sense and purpose created by the city is pretty much the same.
Cities are constantly mentioned in the bible by God which suggests the concept is of very high importance to Him. The world would not be the same if we all lived in villages and never developed cities. The world would not be the global hub it is today if not for the innovation of transport or the swiftness of technology harnessed by cities of the world. Putting this in biblical context, it would be difficult to allegorise how God's chosen people, individual and unique, are grafted in, to inhabit one fortified city of light.
God loves to use the analogy of a city with his chosen people, God spoke of withholding His blessing by making His people like "uninhabited cities", He spoke about "renewing cities" and restoring former desolations, He commanded Moses to section out the people of Israel into cities after the got their promised land, Canaan. God used the analogy of the city with the church to describe the incredible beauty, value and importance He places on His people akin to that which we place on the cities of this world.
Yet even cities have their dark side and for that reason I believe God sent a warning to seven churches of the most affluent cities of its time in the book of Revelations. He sent warnings and promises because God is relentlessly in pursuit of His bride.
He did this to initiate a process of sanctification that would usher in peace in the form of our peacemaker, Jesus, who will return for a bride without blemish, a city of light. Revelations 21: 10- 12 says, "And he carried me away in the Spirit to a mountain great and high, and showed me the Holy City, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God. It shone with the glory of God, and its brilliance was like that of a very precious jewel, like a jasper, clear as crystal. It had a great, high wall with twelve gates, and with twelve angels at the gates."
This city boosts of fortification like none of the cities of this world, it boosts of brilliant light, it announces the glorious presence of God Himself because this city is totally flooded with His light. This city has been ranked number one using the Creator's flawless ranking methodology.
My series is talking to this glorious impression that manifests as the bride of Christ. The church of God is this city and you represent this city. It is a city well fortified, full and flashing, impossible to overlook.
But what makes these cities so formidable and more importantly what makes this city of God impossible to overlook and incomparable to the Londons and
of this world? How do we as the church of God outshine earthly legacy to birth an eternal one? And where we might have fallen into ruin how can we be restored back to our original glory. Lets find out in my series, City of Light.
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