Seek the Welfare of the City

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• Seek the Welfare of the City
• Jeremiah 291-7

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Jeremiah 296-7

• 6 Take wives and have sons and daughters take
  wives for your sons, and give your daughters in
  marriage, that they may bear sons and daughters
  multiply there, and do not decrease. 7 But seek
  the welfare of the city where I have sent you
  into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf,
  for in its welfare you will find your welfare.

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Options Before Exiles

• Assimilation Reflect the City
• Tribalism Resist the City
• Gods Desire Love the City
• How do you love the city?

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How should the Church love Culture?

• Mainline Liberal (assimilation)
• Lose doctrinal distinctives which conflict with
  culture.
• Care for cities inhabitants.
• Conservative Evangelical (tribalism)
• Maintain doctrinal distinctives.
• Create Christian Ghetto (Save people from the
  City)
• Are there only two options?

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Matthew 511-14

• 11 Blessed are you when others revile you and
  persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against
  you falsely on my account. 12 Rejoice and be
  glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so
  they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
  13 You are the salt of the earth, but if salt
  has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be
  restored? It is no longer good for anything
  except to be thrown out and trampled under
  peoples feet. 14 You are the light of the
  world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden.

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Jeremiah 297

• 7 But seek the welfare of the city where I have
  sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its
  behalf, for in its welfare you will find your
  welfare.

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How can we seek the Shalom of the City?

• Serve the City
• Pray for the City
• Prayer Walk 4/9, 630 am (Check Web for details)
• Pray for the inhabitants of the City.
• Pray for our hearts towards the City.
• How can anyone love Babylon?

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Hosea 31-5

• 1 And the Lord said to me, Go again, love a
  woman who is loved by another man and is an
  adulteress, even as the Lord loves the children
  of Israel, though they turn to other gods and
  love cakes of raisins. 2 So I bought her for
  fifteen shekels of silver and a homer and a
  lethech of barley. 3 And I said to her, You must
  dwell as mine for many days. You shall not play
  the whore, or belong to another man so will I
  also be to you.

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• Christians busy themselves on earth, but their
  citizenship is in heaven They marry and have
  children but do not kill unwanted babies. They
  share their table with all, but not their bed
  with all. They love everyone, but are persecuted
  by all. They are poor and yet make many rich.
  They are short of everything and yet have plenty
  of all things.
• -1st century Christian writer