Big

New York is a big city.  Physically there are bigger and more populous cities.  Here is different.  New Yorkers think big.  Big sports teams who are expected to be the best, every season, each championship, and in every category.  Culture is big.  Can you imagine a multistory window in a concert hall overlooking a park?  I’d never even thought to think until I came and found the Allen Room was already a reality in New York.  Music, plays, politics, art, and most of all thought leadership are areas where New Yorkers aspire to be the best.  They realize they haven’t arrived so the quest is relentless, unending, and extremely competitive. 
 
Increasingly the scope of what is fodder for conversation includes everything imaginable in life.  There are no boundaries or limitations.  This is, in my opinion, a good thing.  The edges of self indulgence have always been here, now people can talk about them.  The opportunity to engage people in real life is now present.  The full spectrum of spiritual pursuit is now part of everyday conversations.  The only question lies in ones ability to be open to new languages – very different forms, traditions, and even descriptions of how Divinity plays out in the day to day reality of individual lives.
 
Combine the type of city New York is with the expanded conversations and you get an extraordinary battle of idea supremacy.  Who and what ideas will win?  This isn’t a small inconsequential battle.  One author described it like this: “The Day that God-of-the-Angel-Armies is matched against all big-talking rivals, against all swaggering big names; against all giant sequoias hugely towering, and against the expansive chestnut; against Kilimanjaro and Annapurna, against the ranges of Alps and Andes; against every soaring skyscraper, against all proud obelisks and statues; against ocean-going luxury liners, against elegant three-masted schooners.  The swelled big heads will be punctured bladders, the pretentious egos brought down to earth, leaving God alone at front-and-center on the Day we're talking about.” (Isaiah 2.12-17) 
 
Today you and I walk in the front lines.  What are we fighting for?