City-changing Christian movements
It takes a movement to reach a city
When a church or a church network begins to grow rapidly in a city, it is only natural for
the people within the ministry to feel that God is really making a difference in that place.
Usually, however, what is going on is ‘Christian re-configuration’. When churches grow,
they usually do so by drawing believers out of more static and less vital churches. This can
be a very good thing, if the Christians in these growing churches are being more welldiscipled and if their gifts are being more well-deployed. Nevertheless, though there are
always an encouraging number of conversions that also happen in such churches, the
overall Body of Christ in the city is not actually growing. If (let’s say) X-per cent of the
city’s population was Christian before these churches began to thrive, it is the same
afterwards. The whole Body of Christ in the city was not growing, only re-configuring.
Reaching an entire city, then, takes more than having some effective churches in it, or even
having a burst of revival energy and new converts. To change a city with the gospel takes a
movement.
When a ‘City Gospel Movement’ occurs, the whole Body of Christ grows faster than the
population, so that the percentage of Christians in a city rises. It is a movement because it
consists of an energy that extends across multiple denominations and networks. It does
not reside in any one strong church or set of strong leaders, or in any one ‘command
center.’ Its forward motion does not depend on any one organization. It is organic and selfpropagating, the result of a balanced set of forces that interact, support, sustain, and
stimulate one another. I’ll call it an ‘ecosystem’.1 A biological ecosystem is made of
organisms that are inter-dependent in various ways. When all the elements of an
ecosystem are in place and in balance, the whole system thrives and produces growth.
1 Likening a gospel city movement to a biological ecosystem is an analogy, of course, and no analogy illumines the concept you are
trying to present at every point. Biological ecosystems consist in some part of stronger animals eating weaker ones. No one should
think this means stronger churches should eat weaker ones! Actually, a city in which some churches grow by drawing members out of
other churches is the very opposite of the kind of evangelistic gospel-city movement we are seeking. The image of the ecosystem
conveys how different organisms are interdependent, how the flourishing of one group helps the other groups flourish.
Note: this is an excerpt from Timothy Keller’s forthcoming book, Center Church to be published by Zondervan. Please do not share.
Copyright © 2012 by Timothy Keller and Redeemer City to City.
What is the ‘ecosystem’ that produces a gospel movement? I picture it as three circular
layers, like the rings of a tree trunk. At the very core of the ecosystem is a way to
communicate and embody the gospel that is contextualized to the city’s culture and
therefore very effective in converting and discipling its people.
The second layer of the system, around this core, is a number of different church
multiplication movements, each using the effective means of ministry within their
different denominations and traditions. Around this second ring of church multiplication
movements is a third ring that is the most complex. Based in the churches, yet also
stimulating and sustaining the churches, is a series of crucial ministry networks. Let’s look
at each of these three “rings.”
Gospel DNA
The churches that can catalyze gospel movements do not all share the same worship style,
come from the same denomination, or reach the same demographic. They do, however, all
share much of the same basic “DNA”: they are gospel-centered, urban, balanced,
missional/evangelistic, growing, and self-replicating. These qualities are topics treated in
this entire book. A brief list:
1. Gospel theology—a theologically rich way to read and preach the Bible by combining classic
evangelical doctrines—the law/gospel distinction, forensic justification, and penal substitution
—with an understanding that God’s saving purpose is to restore all of creation. This gospel
theology must be contextualized into a ‘Theological Vision’ for a particular time and place.
(See below)
2. Gospel renewal dynamics—bringing about personal character growth through applying
the gospel to every area of life and making permanent changes in the heart through
repentance and growth in faith, rather than simply pressing on the will to try harder to
live by biblical principles. When a critical mass of converted nominal believers and
renewed sleepy Christians develops in a church, the whole body is marked by a
balance of theological depth, vibrant worship, intimate fellowship, vigorous
evangelism, care for the needy, and cultural impact.
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3. Gospel preaching—a way of preaching that is expository and doctrinal, but which
always makes the gospel itself clear by preaching Christ from every text, always aims
at the heart and life by making the truth real as well as clear, and always applies the
text to both Christians and non-Christians, so both can profit from it.
4. City vision—a city growth model that seeks converts through vigorous evangelism, but
then turns Christians outward to serve the city and engage the culture. The goal is not
just a great church, but a great city.
5. Church-culture model—a way of discipling all believers to integrate their faith with
their work, rather than sealing off their beliefs from their public lives. The goal is
cultural presence (not absence) and serving the common good, while overtly pointing
to the resources of Christian beliefs and love as the inspiration for doing so.
6. Contextual and missional—being missional in a way that is not less than being
extremely evangelistic, but more. Such a church contextualizes every part of its life
and message—education, preaching, worship, discipleship, decision-making, public
discourse, evangelism, spiritual formation, community structures—so that it connects
effectively with the people and culture of a secular, pluralistic, global center city.
7. Integrated, balanced ministry—a unique balance of four ministry fronts. Evangelism
and worship connect people to God. Community formation intimately connects
people to one another. Faith-work integration connects private beliefs to public life
and work. Justice and mercy connect resources of the church and Christians to the
needs of the city. Such churches are committed both to the peace and welfare of their
neighborhoods and city (unlike traditional conservative churches) and to converting
people and making them into disciples (unlike traditional mainline churches).
8. Movement mindset and church planting bias. This includes the practice of visible unity
among all gospel-believing Christians. Making thoughtful decisions to cooperate as
broadly as possible shows others that the church is not there strictly to increase its
tribe but to enhance the body of Christ and bless the city by its presence. By a ‘church
planting bias’ we mean seeing it as the normal practice of every church to plant new
churches regularly. Just as every church’s ministries encompass music, education,
pastoral care, preaching, worship, and discipleship, so its preparations for church
planting are as natural and routine as the others.
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Gospel Ecosystems
An ecosystem refers to the combination and ordering of components within an
environment. We said that the core of the dynamic movement is a shared commitment to
communicating the gospel to a particular place and time. Then, the second ring or layer
around this core is a set of new churches. New churches provide spiritual oxygen to the
communities and networks of Christians who do the heavy lifting, over decades, to renew
and redeem cities. They are the primary venue for discipleship and the multiplication of
believers, as well as being the financial engine for all the ministry initiatives. There must
be a number of church multiplication movements, each using the effective means of
ministry within their different denominations and traditions. As much as we want to
believe that most people will want to be our kind of Christian, that is not true. The city
won’t be won unless many kinds of Christian traditions are multiplying churches. What is
needed is at least 5 or 6 different church networks in which most of the churches are
planting a daughter church within 5 years, and then the daughter churches are doing the
same thing.
The third ‘ring’ around the church planting movements is a complex set of specialty
ministries and institutions.
First, there needs to be a prayer movement that unites churches across divisions in
visionary intercession for the city. Secondly, there should be a great number of specialized
evangelistic ministries, and especially effective campus and youth ministries. The citychurch’s future members and leaders are best found in the city’s colleges and schools. Also
while students graduating from colleges in ‘college towns’ must leave the area to get jobs,
graduates of urban universities do not. Students won to Christ and given a vision for living
in the city can remain in the churches they joined during their school years and become
emerging leaders in the urban body of Christ. Winning the youth of a city wins city-natives
who understand the culture well.
Third, there needs to be a dizzying variety of justice and mercy ministries, addressing
every possible social problem and neighborhood. Like the evangelicals of the 1830s, there
needs to be an urban ‘benevolent empire’ of Christians banding together in various 501(c)
3s and other voluntary organizations to take on the needs of the city. Christians of the city
need to be famous for their care for their neighbor. Fourth, Christians from across the city
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should gather with others in the same profession. We could call these faith and work
initiatives and fellowships. Networks of Christians in business, the media, the arts,
government, the academy, etc should come together to help each other work with
excellence and Christian distinctiveness.
Fifth, there should be a whole raft of institutions that support family life in the city,
especially schools and counseling services. Sixth, there must be systems for attracting,
developing, and training great numbers of urban church and ministry leaders. That
usually means good theological education, but a dynamic city leadership ‘system’ will need
to include more components, such as well developed internship programs and connections
to campus ministries. Seventh, there must an unusual unity of city Christian leaders.
Church movement leaders, theologians, heads of institutions, business leaders, and others
must know one another and provide vision and direction for the whole city. They must be
more concerned for reaching the whole city and growing the whole Body of Christ than
just increasing their own tribe and kingdom.
When all of these ecosystem elements are strong and in place, they stimulate and increase
one another, and the movement becomes self-sustaining. How that happens, and what
happens as a result, is the subject of what follows.
Ecosystems, when intact, reach tipping points
Isolated events or individual entities crystallize into a growing, self-sustaining movement
when they reach a “tipping point,” levels where the movement dynamics for change
become unstoppable. A “tipping point” is a sociological term: “the moment of critical mass,
the threshold, the boiling point.”2 For example, neighborhoods stay largely the same if
new types of residents (richer, poorer, or culturally different from the rest) comprise less
than 5 percent of the population. When the number of new residents reaches somewhere
between 5 and 25 percent, depending on the culture, the whole neighborhood shifts,
undergoing rapid and significant change.
2 Malcolm Gladwell, The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make A Big Difference (New York: Hachette Book Group,
2006 [2000]) 12.
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1. The gospel movement tipping point. A church planting project becomes a movement
when the ecosystem elements are all in place and most of the churches have the
vitality, leaders, and mindset to plant another church within five to six years of their
own beginnings. When the tipping point is reached, a self-sustaining movement
begins. Enough new believers, leaders, congregations, and ministries are being
naturally produced for the movement to grow without any single command-andcontrol center. The body of Christ in the city funds itself, produces its own leaders,
and conducts its own training. A sufficient number of dynamic leaders is always rising
up. The number of Christians and churches doubles every seven to ten years. How
many churches must be reached for this to occur? While it is impossible to give a
number that would hold for every city and culture, all the elements in the ecosystem
must be in place and very strong.
2. The city tipping point. When a gospel movement tipping point is reached, it is a matter
of time before a whole-city tipping point is reached. That is the moment when the
number of gospel-shaped Christians in a city becomes so large that Christian
influence on the civic and social life of the city—and on the very culture—is
recognizable and acknowledged. In New York City, minority groups—be they of the
ethnic, cultural, or a life-style variety—can have a palpable effect on the way life is
lived when their numbers reach at least 10 percent and when the members are active
in public life. I have heard it said that when the number of prison inmates reaches
10% the very culture and corporate life of the prison changes. There is no scientific
way to precisely determine a city’s “gospel tipping point”—the point at which the
gospel begins having a visible impact on the city-life and culture. As a rule of thumb,
we pray and work for the time when 10 percent of the center-city population is
involved in a gospel-centered church. For Manhattan, this would be about 100,000
people.
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Today in a place like Manhattan the vast majority of residents do not know an orthodox
Christian believer. As a result it is very easy for them to believe negative stereotypes.
Ironically, evangelical Christians are as strange and off-putting to urban residents as gay
people used to be to most Americans. As a result, Christianity isn’t even a thinkable option
as a way to live for most center-city dwellers. But what would happen in a place like
Manhattan where there were so many believers that most New Yorkers knew some
Christians they respected? It would mean that the strong attitudinal barriers many urban
residents have currently against the message of Christianity would diminish. We might
see strong growth in the churches.
How likely is it that an urban gospel movement could grow so strong that it reaches a ‘citychanging tipping point’ at which time the gospel begins having a palpable impact on the
city-life and culture produced there? We know this can happen through God’s grace. The
history books give us examples. We see how the geometric growth of Christianity changed
the Roman world in the first three centuries A.D, and how it changed pagan Northern
Europe from 500-1500 A.D. There are studies of how the evangelical awakenings in the
18th century changed British society in the 19th. But we don’t know what it would look
like for one of the great, culture-forming global cities of the world to become 10-20%
gospel-believing Christian in their core, with believers taking up their portion of roles in
the arts, publishing, the academy, and business, all the while using their power, wealth and
influence for the good of those on the margins of society.
Every city in the world needs Jesus Christ. But our cities do not merely need a few more
churches and ministries—they need City Gospel Movements. It takes a movement to
reach a city. So urban ministers should make this their goal, and give their whole lives to it,
not expecting to see it in their own lifetimes. That’s the right balance between expectation
and patience that we need to strike, if we are going to see our cities loved and reached for
Christ.
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