Global

City, Global Perspectives, LBA Ministers Conference Jan 2016

Introduction [s1]
Identify the communities to which you belong. [s2]
Which ones matter to you most?
Which ones have the greatest influence on your life?
Kim Lau BBC want children to be British but still Chinese. [s3]
This is glocalisation
Mass migration responding to global (economic) forces: wealth,
development, education.
Landing in particular places and having to make sense of being from there
yet living here.
Not limited to but focussed in cities. By 2050 it is predicted that 10 billion people
will live in cities. LBA the only association focussed on a city.
Not just a phenomenon of future and the present [s4]
2000 years ago Romans 16 how many different nationalities? When in
Rome are we really supposed to do as the Romans do?
2500 years ago Book of Daniel how to cope with the malign influence
and the threat of a globalising imperial culture as it threatens assimilate
you and rob you of your identity.
Book of Jeremiah how to resist the dangers of living in the dream world
of fond memory of a lost homeland or the dream world of a rose-tintedimagined return rather than taking seriously the reality of the here and
now and living as Judeans in Babylon.
This the question for all who find that their fragile local reality is impacted by a
powerful global forces. And its a question with a particular edge for people of
faith, especially people of a marginalised faith like 6C Jews or 21C Christians.
How can we sing the Lords song in a strange land? Ps 137 (NB the
Captors asked for a song from their home -and fans of world music.)
And who gets to call the tune? [s5]
NB the land becomes strange when we move from here to there. It also
becomes strange when there moves to here. Here is there and there is
here.
Tension between neither Jew nor Greek, all one in Christ Jesus (Gal 3:28)
To the Jews I became a Jew (1Co 9:20)
What does it mean to take seriously both sides of Col 2:2 which describes
the community of disciples to which it is addressed as in Christ and in
Colossae
What is the impact of global power on local realities including the reality of
our communities and our churches, and how should we respond?