We believe God is positioning His people to seize the moment we find ourselves in, and they are seeking a way.
The Lord is doing something marvelous within this moment; He is making a way. This is The Urban Village Way.
"Jesus went throughout all the cities and villages."
Matthew 9:35
PANORAMA
DAWN OF THE URBAN AGE
In 2009, for the first time ever, more than half of the world’s population was living in urban areas. This is particularly true in the United States, where 82% of Americans now live in cities and urban areas.
In a single day you might have breakfast with someone from Bangladesh, share lunch with a family from Lebanon, and enjoy dinner with a group from Denmark . . . without leaving your city block, without crossing the street, perhaps without ever leaving your building.
You can touch the world from your city!
We are living in the midst of a profoundly significant moment. The United Nations estimates that in 30 years, 68% of the entire world population will live in urban areas. Such a shift has never taken place before.
The world continues to move into the city at a rate we have never witnessed, and the church is struggling to keep pace with this unprecedented migration. Our future is urban and requires an urban church.
The gap between the church and the city is widening. This gap is a direct result of the disciple deficit, caused by the disciple disorder and perpetuated by the disciple dilemma.
We are closing the gap as critical partnerships are being established with churches throughout our Western Window as we together raise up, resource, and release God's people to be a mighty missional movement!
OUR
WESTERN
WINDOW
Three marks distinguish
the Urban Village
Western Window:
POST-CHRISTIAN WESTERN CULTURE
1
2
URBAN SPRAWL
3
THE CHURCH IN DECLINE
There are two kinds of cities in our Western Window: Gate and Wall cities.
The thirty "Gate cities" listed represent some of the cultural nerve centers of our day.
"Wall cities" are surrounding areas to gate cities where culture freely flows through urban sprawl.
Los Angeles, CA
San Francisco, CA
San Diego, CA
Portland, OR
Seattle, WA
Honolulu, HI
Phoenix, AZ
Las Vegas, NV
Vancouver, BC
Toronto, ON
New York, NY
Boston, MA
Philadelphia, PA
Washington, D.C.
South Florida (Miami, Fort Lauderdale, West Palm Beach)
Central Florida (Orlando, Tampa)
Atlanta, GA
New Orleans, LA
Charlotte, NC
Nashville, TN
Chicago, IL
Houston, TX
Dallas, TX
Austin, TX
Indianapolis, IN
Kansas City, MO
London, England
Paris, France
Tel-Aviv, Israel
Jerusalem, Israel
If you live in or near any of the cities listed or don't see your city listed, we would love to hear from you to know exactly where you are and how you identify with Urban Village. Please say hello by sending an email to hello@urbanvillageway.com
PROBLEM & PURPOSE
Barna reported in January 2021 that the Number One concern for pastors is a lack of community engagement. The world is disconnecting from God and others more than ever before. This is creating a missional moment unlike any we have witnessed. The world is not coming to church, so let’s bring the church to the world!
Urban Village works with your church to mobilize a missional movement because local mission matters. Many believe we have an evangelism problem; others believe we have a discipleship problem; Urban Village believes we have a missional disciple deficit - a lack of equipped, local, relational, urban missionaries.
We serve your church by raising up, resourcing, and releasing Missional Disciples to reach the lost.
PROCESS
The Urban Village Way is a robust missional system. We Train, Equip, and Activate our Missional System (TEAMS) on three distinct delivery days, spread out over approximately three months, to allow adequate time for the information presented (input) to form hearts and transform missional practice (impact).
Everyone can access information on a broad range of topics with the click of a button or the tap of a screen. But in this era of “wide,” we need to go deep, to a place where our hearts are being formed by the truths of the Gospel. At a time when everyone is familiar with “much,” we must be faithful in the “little”—loving God and loving people.
This is why we created The Urban Village Way: to help followers of Jesus move transforming truth (information) from their heads deep down into their hearts (formation), where it will dwell richly so that the wholistic, Christ-centered work carried out with their hands will create lasting transformation.
INFORMATION + FORMATION =
TRANSFORMATION
Through our partnership with your church, this unique process will create a missional tipping point for an ongoing culture of local mission.
THE WAY
Mobilizing your Congregation
to Fullfill The Great Commission
THE HEART
The Tool to Assist Missional Disciples
to Walk With New Converts
THE CALL
Training your
Missional Team Leaders