Pastor’s Post #13: “MINISTERING IN MANHATTAN” (03/11’17)

You can make the case that cities are one of the great themes of the Bible.

It was not long after the fall of man that Cain built the first city – named Enoch, after his son. Following the great Flood that destroyed the world that then was, cities were built – forming the first post-Flood empire, Mesopotamia. Cities became associated with culture, education, trades, and business; but also with vice, corruption, and immorality. The Israelites were warned against being infected with the morals of the remaining Canaanite cities in the land they were beginning to inherit. Later Babylon became the epitome of a city built as a monument to the skill and pride of man: “Is not this great Babylon which I have built by my mighty power as a royal residence and for the glory of my majesty?”, boasted King Nebuchadnezzar – before he experienced the far greater power and majesty of the true and living God who topples idolatrous things – and those who make them. And that theme is a major focus of the book of Revelation – in which Babylon the Great – a metaphor for a world system in organized opposition to God – displays vehement opposition to God and to His people, but is eventually toppled by the power of the great King, Jesus Christ.

At the same time, God Himself is building a city. In the Old Testament, Jerusalem was the city in which God had, in a special way, placed His Name. His glory resided there in the Tabernacle and, later, in the Temple. He was building His city as the holy alternative to the cities of man. Jerusalem was the center of the Holy Land. The word of God went forth from it; and people flocked there to hear that Word and to worship. The New Jerusalem is the ultimate and consummate expression of God’s saving work in history. A perfect cosmopolitan hub of perfect life and perfect activity for the redeemed of every tongue, tribe, and nation to dwell in -forever. All of the Lord’s people will be city dwellers in eternity!

And in the Gospel age – the age in which the Greater Son of David, King of the Old Testament Jerusalem, has come to be King of His people from all nations – it’s quite apparent that the cities of this world are to be special targets – if you’ll permit me to put it that way – of the invasion of the Gospel. Jerusalem is the place in which the Church in its New Covenant form began on the day of Pentecost. From there, over time, the Gospel invaded cities, and from those cities “turned the world upside down” (actually, right-side-up!).

Let me give you a montage of those cities:

  • Ephesus (in Asia Minor): A major port city and center of trade. One of the greatest cities of the Roman world.
  • Philippi: The city in which Christianity entered Europe. A place of special privilege in the empire of Rome.
  • Thessalonica: Another major port city and a center of communication.
  • Athens: The intellectual capital-city of the world of that day.
  • Corinth: A city known for its bustling commercial activity, athletic games – and its legendary immorality. “Corinthian morals” was a term of disgust, even for pagans.
  • Rome: The capitol city of the Roman empire, and the bastion of the worship of both man and mammon. It became, again in the book of Revelation, the actual model of what Babylon was as a symbol.

Yet the Gospel went to those cities, and from them, to many other cities like them, and –from all of them – brought transformation to the whole known world. King Jesus is strategic in ordering the work of building His Church. While we neglect no area for Gospel ministry, cities have always been of special significance in church history.

Now, what I’m struck with in the little montage I gave you a moment ago is that – if you put those descriptions together – you have an exact description of New York City.

Over 8 million people living in five boroughs: Staten Island, Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx, and – what most of you think of when you think of what New Yorkers simply call “The City”: Manhattan. And while New York City is the most densely populated city in the United States, Manhattan is the most densely populated of its boroughs: Nearly 2 million people live in about 23 square miles. That’s about 72,000 people per square mile. Imagine: 72,000 people in an area smaller than most small towns in the United States of America.

And how fitting it is that the United Nations headquarters are in New York City. “That great city, New York” – as I like to describe it – is home to people from every nation on earth. And, again, if you wove together the descriptions of the cultural, intellectual, financial, and moral (or immoral) life of the cities to which the Word of God went early in the Gospel age, you have a striking picture of New York City – especially Manhattan.

Ministry in Manhattan is a model – a paradigm, if you will – of ministry in our secular culture: Its entrenched opposition to the knowledge of God and His ways given in Holy Scripture. Its social decay intensified by the sheer volume and density of people – coupled with the possibility of anonymity in “the city.” Its displays of structural injustice, especially in the civil and financial realms. Its ghettoes of poverty, ignorance, and despair. The multiple distractions of modern Vanity Fair. That’s an MRI of Manhattan island.

There’s no greater challenge for Christian pastors than the challenge of ministering in a great city. And there’s no city of greater challenge for Christian pastors than New York City. And – in that vast United Nations of New York City – there’s no greater challenge for Christian pastors than Manhattan,

Ministering in Manhattan is our topic in today’s Visit to the Pastor’s Study. Of course, that’s a special passion for Reformation, Metro New York – the organization that produces this program. But we want it to be a special passion for you, too: For your prayers, for your financial support, and for your help. You’ll learn more about that as the program unfolds.

My guest today is a very dear friend and fellow laborer in the metropolitan New York area. Pastor Paul Murphy, a minister in the United Reformed Churches of North America, pastors Messiah’s Reformed Fellowship – which meets in the heart of “Hell’s Kitchen” in Manhattan. I love that! When I have the privilege of preaching for Pastor Murphy I ask people to pray for me as I bring the Bread of Life to Hell’s Kitchen!

Do you want a window on what is to minister in Manhattan? Here it comes! Pastor Murphy, welcome to A Visit to the Pastor’s Study…

Yours in the King of Kings,
Pastor Bill