Want to see the future? It is brighter than you think. What we believe about tomorrow determines how we live today. As Christians debate how to faithfully engage with our rapidly changing world, our vision of the future has never been more important. But rather than providing a clear sense of purpose for our lives, popular Christian ideas about the future steal it from us by saying our work in the world, apart from ministry, has no eternal value. Is it any wonder why young adults are less interested in church, or why a culture desperate for meaning and hope dismisses our message? In Futureville , Skye Jethani offers us a vision-shifting glimpse of the world of tomorrow described in Scripture. He reveals how a biblical vision of the future can transform every person’s work with a sense of purpose and dignity today. Futureville is a smart, inspiring call to cultivate the order, beauty, and abundance that reflects the heart and vision of God for our world. Skye Jethani (www.skyejethani.com) is the managing editor of Leadership journal, a magazine and online resource published by Christianity Today International. He also serves as a teaching pastor at Blanchard Alliance Church in Wheaton, Illinois. FUTUREVILLE DISCOVER YOUR PURPOSE FOR TODAY BY REIMAGINING TOMORROW By SKYE JETHANI Thomas Nelson Copyright © 2013 Akash Jethani, aka Skye Jethani All rights reserved. ISBN: 978-1-59555-461-1 Contents ONE · VISION...............................................................1TWO · CULMINATION..........................................................21THREE · EVOLUTION..........................................................41FOUR · EVACUATION..........................................................61FIVE · RESURRECTION........................................................79SIX · VOCATION.............................................................99SEVEN · ORDER..............................................................115EIGHT · BEAUTY.............................................................135NINE · ABUNDANCE...........................................................155TEN · HOPE.................................................................175DISCUSSION QUESTIONS.......................................................185RECOMMENDED RESOURCES......................................................191ACKNOWLEDGMENTS............................................................193NOTES......................................................................197ABOUT THE AUTHOR...........................................................211 CHAPTER 1 VISION THE PRESENT This book is not about the future. It is about the present. It isabout determining what sort of life is truly meaningful. It isabout rethinking the way we relate to the world and our purposewithin it. How we decide what matters today, however,cannot be separated from what we believe about tomorrow. Tounderstand the present-shaping power of the future, let's takea journey back to the Great Depression. For my grandparents' generation, the future began onApril 30, 1939. That Sunday, scores of motorists and pedestriansstreamed across the newly built Bronx-Whitestone Bridgefor the first time. As they crossed the East River, behind themwas the past: New York City—a metropolis under the shadowof scarcity and injustice. The Great Depression had festered fora decade and stolen much of the city's wealth and hope. Butacross the river, in Queens, was the promised land. Ahead ofthem was the future. From the bridge they could see a gleaming white spirepiercing more than six hundred feet into the sky, and at itsbase was its massive companion—a white globe eighteen storieshigh and almost two hundred feet in diameter, the largestever built. The Trylon and Perisphere stood at the heart of the1939 New York World's Fair and served as beacons drawingvisitors across the river toward a better future. They were thestarkly modern symbols of the fair's theme: "The World ofTomorrow." It is difficult to overstate the importance of the 1939 NewYork World's Fair on the psyche of the country. One visitorrecalled the poverty that dominated his Staten Island communityat the time. "Everyone was poor, everyone looked poor,everyone ate poorly. It was a threatening, gray world, withoutmuch hope." Against this dreary backdrop, he says, "theWorld's Fair burst upon our lives with astonishing brilliance.Here was a whole new world set forth, a world of the future inwhich sheer physical plenty would be combined with grace andculture and art and beauty and technological achievement.We could hardly believe what we saw and heard. We returnedagain and again, reassuring ourselves that it was really there." In 1939, the nation's vision of the future had been shapedby its dismal circumstances. The Great Depression had stolenits hope. But the New York World's Fair offered an alternativevision of the future, one of beauty, order, and abundance. Itkindled hope when