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We will continue in worship by giving attention to the reading of God's Word as it is recorded in the book of Jonah chapter 4. I begin at the verse numbered 1. "But it displeased Jonah exceedingly and he was angry and he prayed to the Lord and said, 'I pray thee Lord is not this what I said when I was yet in my

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country? That is why I made haste to flee to Tarshish for I knew that thou art a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and repentant of evil. Therefore now O Lord take my life from me I beseech thee for it is better for me to die than to live.' And the Lord said, 'Do you do well to be

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angry?' Then Jonah went out of the city and sat to the east of the city and made a booth for himself there. He sat under it in the shade till he should see what would become of the city. And the Lord God appointed a plant and made it come up over Jonah that it might be a shade over his head to save him from his

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discomfort. So Jonah was exceedingly glad because of the plant. But when dawn came up the next day God appointed a worm which attacked the plant so that it withered. When the sun rose God appointed a sultry east wind and the sun beat upon the head of Jonah so that he was faint and he asked that he might die and said

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it is better for me to die than to live. But God said to Jonah, 'Do you do well to be angry for the plant?' And he said, 'I do well to be angry, angry enough to die.' And the Lord said, 'You pity the plant for which you did not labor nor did you make it grow which came into being in a night and perished in a night. And should not I

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pity Nineveh, that great city in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons who do not know their right hand from their left and also much cattle?' And may God bless to us and to our understanding this reading from his word. Pray with me. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy

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Spirit, amen. Ever since coming to this pulpit in the center of this city I have been concerned about what I see as the increasing ruralization of God. I mean by that the romanticizing of nature, the suggestion that God is only to be found

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in pastures and among green hills and not in the midst of urban realities. The man who is most known for espousing this view is the distinguished French philosopher and theologian Jacques Ellul. He's on the faculty of the University at Bordeaux and he's written a book called The Meaning of the City. And in that book

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he points out that Jesus was essentially a rural person, that he spent very little time in cities, that when he wished to talk with people he took them out of the city environment, and that in the last week of his life when what he was doing was being carried out in a city, Jesus insisted on living in the suburbs. Ellul

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goes on to continue to say that there is no real meaningful ministry of proclamation that can be carried on in a city. You cannot preach in a city because the city will not hear you. You can, he says, only pray for the city. And the man who was probably writing most profoundly in the field of prayer today, Kenneth

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Leach, picks that idea up. He says that the city today is the desert of yesterday and that congregations in cities should make themselves principally into fellowships of prayer. That is about the only ministry that can be theirs in such places. Well I'm very ill at ease with this, with what I call the pastoralization

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of God. It is true that Jesus was born in a rural environment, but he spent most of his life going into the cities. He was not like John the Baptist who was a country preacher. Jesus went to Capernaum, he went to the cities of the Decapolis, he went to Tyre and Sidon and Jerusalem. His whole passion experience was played

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out in the context of a city. Cities regularly entered into his teaching. He talked about a city that's set on a hill. In the parable of Diocese and Lazarus, the opulence of the city is the background. He talked about idle workmen in the city's marketplace. Jesus talked about kings and tax collectors and

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neighbors that made too much noise. He was himself a carpenter, which was essentially a task carried on in the midst of the city. And the greatest of all Jesus' apostles, Paul, was certainly a metropolitan man. His whole ministry was organized about places like Corinth and Ephesus and Philippi and Rome, and he

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used figures concerning athletics and military maneuvers and marketplaces. He was decidedly an urban personality. And it seems that this is also the picture that the rest of the Scriptures give to us. The Scriptures may begin with a story of something that happened in a garden, but they conclude with John telling us

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about the city of God. The great prophets Moses and Nathan and Elijah and Elisha and Jeremiah and Jonah all go to cities. Abraham and Joseph, for the period of Judges, all emphasize the movement toward the cities. The Scriptures do not say that the city is godless, while the country is God-filled. The Scriptures

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teach us that God is no respecter of persons and he's also no respecter of places, and that means that God is just as real in the Grand Concourse as he is in the Grand Canyon, just as real in Gimbel's basement as he is on Pikes Peak, just as much at the corner of Sixth and Smithfield as he is on some beautiful

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hills in the Ligonier Valley. So let's give up this ruralizing of God. God has both a city and a country address, and if you ask me where he spends most of his time, I would have to reply he spends his time where his people are, and because there are more people in cities than elsewhere, I think he is more to be found

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upon sidewalks than he is in pastures. It is then altogether appropriate for me to speak of the city from this pulpit today, and I address with you the theme for Pittsburgh's. The first Pittsburgh I would ask you to think with me about is Pittsburgh as it is seen by those who have never been here or who have not

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been here for a long time. About a week ago I was flying into Pittsburgh from Detroit. There was a young salesman sitting beside me, a very pleasant chap. He said to me that he was going to Pittsburgh, and I said, "Do you live in America's most livable city or will you just be visiting?" "Oh," he said, "don't give

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me that baloney about that pole, that almanac thing." He said, "You know how they decided that? Pittsburgh has more bowling alleys than any other city, and that's the reason it's number one." Now I don't know how it is with you, but I rarely can think of exactly what I want to say when I need to think of it. I

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always think of it later, but that was not the case this time. I said, "Is that places-rated almanac really assess the value of Pittsburgh in terms of bowling alleys?" and he said, "That's true." And I reached in my briefcase and I pulled out the almanac, and I said, "Show me." As a matter of fact, on page 318 and page 319

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it does count the bowling alleys in Pittsburgh, but we're not even in the top 25. We don't score well in that category at all. And I went on to point out to him that we do very well with regard to climate and terrain and housing and health and crime and transportation and education and the arts and recreation

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and economics. I said, "Really, I'd be glad to go through the whole book with you." And he laughed, his face was red, and he said, "I guess you've got me." Well, there are a lot of people who are simply ignorant of the city or outdated in their view of it, and some are just plain envious. Mayor Caligiuri told me here

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the other day that he was attending the conference on mayors, and when he was introduced, he was introduced as the most hated mayor in America. Well, other cities do envy us. I would say to you this morning that our task is to explain Pittsburgh to these people and to promote it. To do so is in the service of

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the truth, it's also in the service of our town, and it's also in the service of each and every one of us. The words that God directed to Jeremiah are quite appropriate for us. "Seek the welfare of the city where I have caused you to be sent, and pray unto the Lord for it, for the peace thereof will be your peace." But

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enough of that Pittsburgh. The second Pittsburgh I would call to your attention is Pittsburgh as we know it, the Pittsburgh we understand as Pittsburghers. What astonishes me is how many Pittsburghers complain about Pittsburgh. They're always totaling up our potholes, they're always tearing down

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our public transportation system, they're always lambasting our litter and our losing sports teams. I think Pittsburgh is quite wonderful. Now I'll confess to you that I believe all cities are miracles. It's a marvel that cities work. I mean, when we brush our teeth in the morning, we use tens of thousands of

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gallons of water. If you looked under our streets, you would see such a network of pipes and cables and conduits that it would boggle your mind. All the major cities of the world, and we are a major city. Pittsburgh, you know, is larger than Amsterdam, it's larger than Copenhagen, it's larger than Vienna, it's larger than

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Dublin. We're a major city, and all the major cities of America, I'm surprised that they haven't burned down a long time ago or been eliminated by the plague. Why haven't our rivers flooded this out? Why during the dark and smoky days here didn't we give the whole place up? When it's sticky and hot in August, how is it

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that Pittsburghers can stay on elevators or get caught in traffic jams and then kind of laugh it off and sing a chorus of "We Are Family" and go about their merry way? I mean, I think this is a wonderful place with its fountains and its squares and more trees than any other city in America. Pittsburgh has

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done well. There are only three cities that have more corporate headquarters. We now have 130 high technology industries in Pittsburgh. We may very well become the software capital of the world. We have many cultural assets, 45 permanent musical groups alone. We're one of the safest cities in America. Where is it

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that you can have art contests in the streets and 36 acres of parks beside your rivers and table cars that climb green mountainsides and stern wheelers that ply your rivers and glass buildings and railroad stations that are turned into fascinating malls and strip districts that look like parts of Europe

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and have all the ethnic customs of those places and markets that are every bit as interesting as the Grand Souk or the Casbah? We have the tallest stained glass windows in the world in Pittsburgh. We have the finest collection of dinosaur remains. We have the largest collection of flowers under glass anywhere on the

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face of the earth. And ticket prices here, compared with other cities, are the envy of other places. Every time I hear individuals scorn or denigrate this town, people who live here, I want to say to them, "Cast down your buckets where you are." Did you hear about those two ships that met off the east coast of South

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America? One was heading toward the coast, one away. And the one heading toward the coast sent a message to the other. "We are out of fresh water. Would you please give us some?" And the other ship sent back the message, "Cast down your buckets where you are." And the captain of the first vessel was confused. "You can't

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drink salt water." He said, "We have salt water. What we long for is fresh water. Would you please give us some?" And the message came back, "Cast down your buckets where you are." And now the two ships got very close so the captains could hail one another. And the one said, "I do not need salt water. I need fresh

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water." And the other captain replied, "You are not sailing on salt water. You are sailing on fresh water. You're in the mouth of the Amazon River. It's 200 miles wide. So just cast down your buckets where you are." Well, Pittsburghers who don't like Pittsburgh, cast down your buckets where you are. This is America's

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most livable city. It's a strong city full of friendly people who are well educated. We sit in a stunning national setting with our rivers and our mountains. We have white collars, blue collars. We have schools. We have hospitals. Well, we can say with the psalmist of old, "Our lines have fallen in

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pleasant places. Yea, we have a goodly heritage." It ought not then be difficult for us to do what God told Jeremiah to do. Seek the welfare of the city where I have caused you to be sent and pray unto the Lord for it, for in the peace thereof you will find your peace. But Pittsburgh is not perfect. And so my third Pittsburgh

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is Pittsburgh as I believe God sees it. Now cities can be very evil places and the Bible acknowledges it. The Bible says that the first city was built by Cain who was a killer, you'll remember. The Bible describes cities as places of violence. The Tower of Babel was erected in the context of a city and the Bible lists

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evil cities like Sodom and Gomorrah, Jericho, Nineveh, Babylon, Jerusalem. While I'm not in favor of our ruralizing God, I at the same time have to acknowledge that the scriptures teach that a city can be a very sinful place. And Pittsburgh is a city and a very sinful place. And when I say that, I say that with no lack

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of love for my hometown. Men trade their souls for silver here. Young girls with hearts as pure as crystal offer them for cheap and tawdry things. Power is bought and misused in this place. Lies are told and lies are lived and lies are sometimes applauded here. Because cities are places where the accomplishments of

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men are very very obvious and oft times very very good. Because there is so much of that light, there is corresponding shadow and darkness. I remember hearing a missionary tell of how Indian farmers often worship their tools. Before a farmer begins to sow or to hoe, he will take out his instruments, put them up in

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the ground, and bow down and pray to them. Now we think that very unsophisticated and very pagan and primitive. But there are people in this modern 20th century American city who offer their families in sacrifice to their work. Who offer their employees in sacrifice to their companies. Who present their own

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consciences as living sacrifices to that which is unworthy of praise. People hold positions here, oft times with arrogance and belligerence. Sometimes they show that with skunk water and dead fish. Sometimes they show that by refusing to make loans to small groups that want to work hard and agreeing to make loans to

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those who raid the hard work of others and take what does not rightfully belong to them. It really doesn't make any difference in the long run whether you scare a child with a gas mask or take the food out of its mouth with an unjust employment practice. When someone refuses to work and expects to be paid for it,

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that's a sin. When someone is paid for being concerned for profits and nothing else, that is also sin. It is all the idolization of the self. It is all praise of position. It is all worship of worth. There is no fundamental difference between worshiping a hoe and worshiping a mill or a union card or the bottom

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line or a continuous caster or a particular economic philosophy or the arrogance of power or the power of arrogance. It is all of one piece. Sin, of course, is everywhere because sin is in people and people are everywhere. But there are more people in cities than elsewhere and that's the reason cities

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become places of such profound sin and that's the reason the Church of Jesus Christ must be in the city. There is no place where the Word of God is not needed, but there is no place where the Word of God is more needed than in the city. Our work and our witness must then be in this place and there is no

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guarantee of success. It was Paul Tillich, one of the great theological lights of this century, who taught us that to witness is to bear a true and faithful word to Jesus Christ so that others may hear and utter in honesty their yes or their no to him. Witnessing does not automatically and invariably mean

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winning. Yet having said that, I want to go on to say that I believe with all my heart that the city can be won for Jesus Christ. Our scripture reading of the morning was from Jonah 4. You remember the story. Jonah went to the evil city of Nineveh and he preached 39 days there and then he went out of the city waiting

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for God to destroy it and God didn't. And the reason God didn't destroy Nineveh was because Nineveh changed. It started with individuals and then it moved to families and then it moves to governments and the king himself led a kind of pageant of penance across that city. Nineveh did not become a perfect

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place, but it did change in its heart and that teaches me that cities can change. Cities like Pittsburgh, cities like Washington or Moscow or Beiping. We are not inevitably committed to evil. We are not so ensnared by the events of history that we cannot decide to go against that which is evil and toward that which is

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good. To refuse to believe that is to refuse to believe in the presence and the power of God. Well Jonah became very angry with God because he forgave Nineveh. You see he wanted Nineveh to get it in the neck. Jonah's worldview was that anybody who did anything wrong should be punished

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and that right quickly. And when God forgave Nineveh, well the moral seams of Jonah's universe started to come apart and he says to God, "You're a softy. You're a bleeding-heart liberal. You gave in to them, so I quit." And he went off out of town, sat down there in a little hut he made. So God prepared a special sermon

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for Jonah and because Jonah was acting in such a childish way he made it like a children's sermon. He used an object. He caused a vine to grow up and the shade was very pleasant for Jonah and he enjoyed it. And then God sent a worm to do what worms do and the worm killed the vine. And now Jonah was sitting out there with

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the hot Sun beating down on his bald head and God came to see him. And Jonah according to the story said, "You know you put us in the midst of this rotten world where things don't happen the way they ought to and then you come into this world and you do a lot of fuzzy soft things. You refuse to bite the bullet of

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judgment. Well as for me I'd rather be dead than to serve a soft-hearted God like you." And God says to him, "Oh Jonah, you feel very sorry for this plant and you feel very sorry for yourself. These are small things. Can't you see if you feel sorrow for such small things how I can have pity on a city which contains

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thousands of people who don't know their right hand from their left." Jonah looked at Nineveh and he saw evil. God looked at Nineveh and he saw people. Jonah looked at Nineveh and he saw moral squalor. God looked at Nineveh and he saw people. Jonah looked at Nineveh and he saw that which should be

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crushed because it was wrong. God looked at Nineveh and he saw people on whom he needed to have compassion. There is profound hurt in my heart, not when I hear ignorant people disparage Pittsburgh because they don't know any better. Those words irritate or cause us to laugh and not even when I hear

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Pittsburghers complain about Pittsburgh they ought not to be so ungrateful and insensitive. But what wounds me is when I hear Christians in this place say, "To hell with this city." How can they say that of so many who do not know their right hand from their left? The Scriptures teach us that God is not

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willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance. If that is the desire of the heart of God then it ought to be the fondest wish of our lives. God is very patient with us. He waits a long time for us to get beyond our ugly thoughts and our hard-heartedness and during that time he

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expends compassion. And the compassion of God is the power not to foreclose on the future. We're Christians. We know that in the end God is going to win this world and all that's part of it. Knowing that we ought to be able to be patient and not to take to ourselves the attitude of a Jonah who sees at the center of faith

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not a cross which is patient sacrificial love but a club with which to beat people into submission or into death. Yes, God moves very slowly. Sometimes he moves so slowly that it seems as if he is not moving at all. But he is a great artist and he is working on his masterpiece and he is not going to be

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rushed by us and he is not going to surrender his plans to ours. And that's the reason my friends that we must not give up. We must not give up on our neighbors. We must not give up on our leaders. We must not give up on our employers. We must not give up on our employees. We must not give up on our

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competitors. We must not give up on our children and we must not give up on ourselves. And we must make no demands of God. We must give him time as he gives us time. And we must not only serve this city but really love it. Not only minister to the people who are here but genuinely love them. We must do what God told

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Jeremiah to do. Seek the welfare of the city where I have caused you to be sent and pray unto the Lord for it for in the peace thereof you have peace. As God became one of us in Jesus Christ to save us. So we must be willing to lay aside our pious irrelevancies and our God language and our traditions of the past

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in order to become one with this time and this place. If we do this then maybe there's no guarantee but maybe we will live to see the fourth Pittsburgh which will be the grandest Pittsburgh of all. It will be a Pittsburgh of which people here and people everywhere will speak just as Ezekiel spoke of such a city a

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long time ago when he said the name of this city is the Lord is here. So may it be and that right quickly. [ reprieve is my first discusion of being nominated into the people's congress ]