Nick.Name

Chicago may be the published, formal name to the great city to the north, but it has many nicknames, both affectionate and unaffectionate. Here are a few:

1. "Windy City"–in reference to it's politician's speech patterns, but reflective of the weather too.
2. "City That Works"–as known to former Mayor Richard J. Daley. However, Chicago was founded on manual, unskilled labor in the 1830s, 40s, & 50s.
3. "The Second City"–Was a derogatory term for the city in the 1950s in a New Yorker article; perhaps second to NYC. I always understood it to be a referent to the rebuilding of the city after the Great Fire of 1871. One dark night, when the folks were all in bed, Misses O'Leary lit a lantern in the shed...
4. "The Most American City"–Perhaps because of its blue collar heritage, but I can't find a source, other than Pacyga's Chicago: A Biography pictured above.
5. "City of Big Shoulders"–Formerly the City of Broad Shoulders, so called by Carl Sandberg in his 1916 poem "Chicago"
6. "The Jungle"–After Upton Sinclair's 1906 novel
7. "Hog Butcher to the World"–Perhaps the impetus for Upton Sinclair's novel, but mentioned in Carl Sandberg's poem.
8. "Paris of the Midwest"–What Daniel Burnham and his "Chicago" plan were after.
9. "City on the Make"–referred to by Nelson Algren in his 1951 love poem to the city.
10. "City of Neighborhoods"–There are over 200 distinct neighborhoods in Chicago.
11. "Sweet Home Chicago"–sung by Robert Johnson, immortalized by the Blues Brothers.
12. "Chi-Town" or "Chi-City"–as Kanye so affectionately refers to it.
13. "My kind of town, Chicago is"–Frank Sinatra croons.

More recently, Huff Post has reported two studies calling Chicago both the Most Corrupt City in America and the Most Segregated City in America. The corruption in politics has cost the city nearly $500 million; see Rod Blagojevich. And according to a census survey, even though Chicago has experienced the second largest decline in segregation, it is still the most segregated city according to the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research. (Actually reading the study though, points out that Detroit is the most segregated. St. Louis came in fourth.)

Perhaps most appropriate for the Kingdom work to be done there, Chicago is known as "City in a Garden" which is a translation of the Latin on the city seal Urbs in Horto.

Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb through the middle of the street of the city; also, on either side of the river, the tree of life with its twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit each month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. (Revelation 22:1-2)

Churches//People

History: A young nation came into it's 46th year as the sovereign state of the United States of America, the year was 1820. At this point in our nation's youthful appearance–50 was the new 18, as far as national ages go...–there was approximately 1 church per every 875 Americans. However, during the years 1860-1906, Protestants expanded along with the West. They planted a new church for every 350 people, resulting that in 1900, we had 1 church for every 430 Americans. Obviously this is increased the amount of attendance and involvement by Americans in the local church, so much so that, in 1916, 53% of the US population were "religious adherents" up from 17% at the founding of the nation (1776). [1. Keller, Redeemer Church Planting Manual, p 32.]

At this point though, church planting ceased to increase as it had done over the last century. After WW1, older, established churches which dotted the towns across the nation resisted the addition of new churches in to their "neighborhoods." We have seen the results of this resistance. Not only is church membership down in Mainline congregations–those that most heavily impeded and apposed new churches–but many churches have had to close their doors in the recent decades. Numbers-wise: 20.4% of Americans attended a church (Catholic, Mainline, or Evangelical) on any given weekend in 1990 and dropped to 17.5% in 2005. Evangelical attendance has only slightly declined: 9.2-9.1% over those 15 years. However, in the same years we saw a net population growth of 52 million people. Illinois alone declined 7.2% in church attendance (Catholic, Mainline, or Evangelical) from 2000-2005. In fact, every state has declined in church attendance between 2000 and 2005. [2. Olson, The American Church Crisis, pp 35-43.]

I called the 1st, 2nd, and 47th Wards of Chicago today to do a quick survey of how many churches were in each ward. Each ward contains an average of 56,000 people and 25 churches. This is only 1 church per 2240 residents of these wards. Only the 47th Ward knew of 2 churches that were under 15 years old and both of them have been planted in the last 3 years. The median church size in America is 75 congregants with the average being 185. There are approximately 25 churches in these wards, then that means that between 1,875 and 4,625 out of 56,000 are going to church each weekend. Percentage-wise that's 3-8%. That's less than unemployment (8.3% February 2012 national average)!

What in the world!

#FAIL.

Jonah comes to mind. Are we so wrapped up in our own agendas that our hearts don't break for the lost cities of the world?

But God said to Jonah, "Do you do well to be angry for the plant?" And he said, "Yes, 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 pity Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than 120,000 person who do not know their right hand from their left, and also much cattle?" (4:8-11)

Conclusion: we need more churches in the great cities of the world.

Church Plants of Chicago

Some initial research shows that new churches in Chicago seem to be few and far between. While churches on the North Side number into the hundreds, there are only about 16 churches that under 15 years old. Many of them are going multisite, but the established church (over 15 years) to new church (less than 15 years) is still close to 15:1 in West Town (Ukrainian Village), 35:1 in Logan Square, and 28:1 in Lincoln Square. This seems obvious, but the majority of the established churches are Catholic, then Baptist, then charismatic. Very few are Reformed in their doctrine. In fact, there are approximately only one Reformed church in each of those neighborhood areas, mainly A29, but also PCA. And again, no–zip, zero, none, nada–EPC churches.

This means only about 3% of the churches in these neighborhoods are new churches. According to the Redeemer Church Planting Manual, 33% of a cities churches must be under 20 years old for the number of Christians to be growing in a city. And if an organization is planting at least 2-3% each year, then at best they will be maintaining their numbers, but most likely declining.

If God truly loves the city of Chicago, as I firmly believe He does, then we must be planting more churches and making more disciples of Jesus Christ to affect long term change in the fabric of Chicago.

See how I mapped out the areas and churches below:

View Churches Chicago in a larger map

The Chicago Plan

Sunday, March 25th: I was sick. After driving 6 hours from Milwaukee back to St Louis, eating at a Pastor's house, I got home and a 103˚ fever struck me. I crawled into bed fully clothed and with all the blankets possible by 10:30–very early by my standards. A little after midnight, my fever broke and I fell back asleep praying for those in my cityLife and for Stacey and my future professionally. I felt I heard God say to me, I'll show you some progress for your future call.

Wednesday, March 28th: I had a conversation with a pastor that was looking to hire an assistant pastor. It was a no nonsense discussion that I was not going to be hired for that position. However, he said, if I wanted to talk about church planting in Chicago–my dream–that would be a completely different discussion. Essentially, he said, "I can't promise you anything, but if you come back in 2 months with a plan and people ready to support said plan, we could see what God would do with that."

Immediately, my heart lept and as the past week has unraveled, I've been dreaming and praying and talking about the possibilities of planting in Chicago. I am going to plan as if God is calling me there and see what doors He would open on the way.

There are three neighborhoods that I am looking for potentiality: Logan Square, Ukrainian Village, and Lincoln Square. They all have their positives and negatives. Lincoln Square is the most established of the neighborhoods with long-standing residents, young families and young professionals together. They also have a couple of new church plants happening there already. Logan Square is one of the most up and coming neighborhoods in Chicago. Hipster would describe Logan well. Young professionals dominate, but my initial impressions give a less stable environment to plant in. However, there are a number of churches planting in Logan at this time. Ukrainian Village is where I lived after graduating and is a pretty good balance between the other two neighborhoods and only one other church plant is on the east side of that area.

Fun Fact: There is no Evangelical Presbyterian Church (EPC) presence in the city of Chicago. Why not plant the first?

What's next?

First and foremost: Prayer. Please pray with me where God would lead in this endeavor. I know church planting is a big endeavor and a big task and calling is laid out before me. I want to be open to where God would lead rather than my own desires and wishes. I want to be open to this not happening and be able to yield to God's will in this. I want this to happen desperately. I want join in the endeavor God is already at work doing redeeming and restoring His city called Chicago. Please pray with me about how you or those you know can be involved.

Second: Research. Lots of my hours will be caught up in the exercises listed out in the Redeemer Church Planting Manual. Many of my finds will be listed here. Please continue to check in and read more about the city that God loves.

Second B: Contacts. I'll be calling, grabbing coffee, emailing, drinking beer, eating and any other activity I can find to do to network with pastors and churches around Chicago. If you or anyone you know would be willing to sit down and dream about what God would have for the city of Chicago, please feel free to contact me. I'd love to sit down with you.

In 1909, Daniel Burnham put forth The Chicago Plan together with Edward H. Bennett. It was a three year undertaking to strategically just to plan proposed improvements for the city, including the lakefront, highways, parks system, and civic and cultural centers. Many of those plans can be seen in the modern day Chicago. In honor of what Burnham proposed, I will be referring to this church planting endeavor under the same name, firmly believing that the Gospel is the only way Chicago will ever be fully redeemed.