Tomorrow's Cities will be like sparkling jewels on the landscape — filled with radiant beauty,
with peace and prosperity, with happy, healthy people.
Mankind will never have seen anything like it!
Sound too good to be true? Sound impossible? It isn't.
Such cities ARE COMING —and that before the end of this century!
But WHERE will they be built? And WHO will build them — and HOW?
BASIC plans for these fabulous cities have already been drawn up. All the necessary resources to see this entire plan through to successful completion are available.
The plan is already so far along that a select group is right now being given topflight training to qualify for future responsibilities as administrators of these cities.
Everything is being carefully worked out. Nothing is being left to chance.
The major problems of today's cities will be completely solved in advance before construction on Tomorrow's Cities ever begins.
Problems That Need a Solution
Today's cities are a mess. And the bigger the city, chances are, the bigger that mess is.
Today, city air is laden with every kind of foul pollutant imaginable. Noxious soot, dust and chemical debris from industry. Toxic monoxide fumes and lead from hundreds of thousands of motor vehicles. Stale, filthy smoke from the millions of cigarettes smoked daily. In some big-city areas multiple tons-per-square-mile of such refuse and waste float down every single month!
City water has frequently been reused oftener than anyone cares to remember. The water being used in one city today has often been flushed down a commode and into the sewer in another city just a few days before.
The food eaten by city dwellers — probably grown on depleted soil to begin with — has been waxed, polished, colored, pasteurized, homogenized, taken apart, preserved and chemically "enriched" until it contains pathetically little nourishment.
The noise level is right on the brink of what the human mind can tolerate and still remain sane.
The normal working day's routine for many begins and ends with a nerve-wracking fight through miserably congested traffic. And what are the sights along the way (besides the back end of the car in front of you)?
A miserable jungle-like labyrinth of steel, glass, wire, asphalt and cement — of streets, supermarkets, shopping centers, housing tracts, office buildings, railroad tracks, electrical lines and industrial smokestacks. A helter-skelter conglomeration of unsightly billboards and gaudy neon signs. A sickening bluish-yellow haze called smog.
Small wonder so many people seek escape!
But these are by no means the only problems.
Personal Safety and Crime
In today's cities personal safety is almost nonexistent. Without God's protection you aren't safe anywhere — not even in your own home. Not even with an elaborate system of locks.
And on the street? Anything can happen! Day or night.
The danger on city streets is no longer confined to traffic accidents. Today, the "normal" street dangers include the possibility of being robbed, assaulted, stabbed or murdered. They include the constant danger of someone suddenly going raving mad and shooting everyone in sight.
In certain areas, especially at night, the streets have plenty of motor traffic, but the sidewalks are empty. And if you do see an occasional person on the sidewalk, you immediately wonder whether he is about to commit a crime or if he has lost his mental balance.
This is the shocking point to which we have progressed — or retrogressed — in this "enlightened" 20th century!
Huge sections of cities are designated as "crime containment zones." Poverty, unemployment, overwhelming welfare loads, wall-to-wall children, illegitimacy, looting, riots, racial tensions, savage gangs, and schools called "blackboard jungles" are the trademarks of these areas. Here crimes of every description run so rampant that the police hope, at best, merely to keep this "excessive" crime from spilling over into other areas.
Farther downtown there is the bowery or skid row. Its trademark is cheap hotels and saloons, filled with hopeless derelicts, dope addicts, prostitutes and similar types of degenerate humanity.
And out in suburbia — in the nice part of town? Well, the problems of today's society are here, too.
The houses out here may have two-car garages, boats and double ovens. But they also have family strife, broken homes and divorce. The fear of not being able to meet next month's payments on the house, car, boat, stereo and color TV. Envy at the neighbors next door who just installed a backyard swimming pool and are planning a trip to Europe.
Bored with the blessings of life —but coveting more — many of the inhabitants of suburbia seek escape in the excitement of wild, permissive parties — replete with alcohol, drugs, and sexual debauchery.
And the younger suburbians, with too much free time on their hands and with too little parental supervision, run the usual gamut of licentiousness from vandalism and crime to promiscuity and LSD. At every level of city society and in every part of town, we see serious problems in need of a solution.
And we have yet to mention the matters of corrupt business practices, bribery, cheating, bitter labor disputes, organized crime, payoffs, weak and ineffective city government and exorbitant taxes.
Add all these problems together and you can begin to comprehend what a tremendous top-to-bottom CHANGE is necessary for our cities to become decent places in which to live.
But thank God, such a change is coming — and soon!
But HOW? WHO and WHAT will bring it about? Where would you start if YOU were responsible for undertaking such a gigantic project?
Biggest Problem Solved First
Today men seek to solve the problems of our cities by money, schools, integration, night lights to deter criminals, new laws, more police, etc.
But all these methods ignore the basic reason today's cities are the way they are.
What is the biggest problem in cities today? What makes cities so bad? It's people!
It's the fellow who takes off for work in the morning with his eyes filled with smog and other depressing sights, a hostile look on his face, the din of traffic in his ears, his lungs and nostrils full of foul air and cigarette smoke, his stomach full of nutritionally raped food, his veins full of drugs and tranquilizers, and his mind filled with the violence of the previous night's TV programs or his plans to beat the other guy out of as much as he can when he gets to work. HE'S the problem in today's cities — along with millions of men and women just like him.
And what is it that makes people so bad? It's their unconquered HUMAN NATURE. This nature is a nature of vanity, jealousy, lust and greed.
In Tomorrow's Cities, this basic cause of human suffering is going to be solved first.
Human nature will be changed. But HOW?
Through the prophet Ezekiel God gives us the answer: "A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh. And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments, and do them. . . . I will also cause you to dwell in the cities and the wastes shall be builded" (Ezek. 36:26-28, 33). See also Jeremiah 31:31-33 and Hebrews 8:10.
Human nature will still exist in Tomorrow's Cities. The inhabitants of these cities will still be physical, flesh-and-blood human beings. But God is going to give these people His power — His Holy Spirit to resist and overcome the downward pull of their human nature. They will be able to direct, control and guide their lives into constructive channels. They will obey God's laws. They will live in the way that brings peace, happiness and prosperity for all.
God's Holy Spirit is available today. But mankind as a whole is not interested in God's Spirit. Man is by nature hostile to God and thinks he can solve his problems without God's help. He won't submit to God's way unless he is forced to. And that is where Tomorrow's mayors come in.
Tomorrow's Mayors
The mayors in today's cities are little or no different from those over whom they rule. They, too, have human nature. They, too, are subject to vanity, jealousy, lust and greed — all too often increased because of their position.
Mayors often must ignore urgent problems because to bring them out into the open and to suggest a concrete solution would offend a certain bloc of voters and wash their whole political career down the drain.
And when a mayor does make a sound proposal for getting rid of some evil in his city, it often gets bogged down or lost entirely in a mountain of bureaucratic red tape or in political haggling. Meanwhile the city suffers on.
Many mayors are mere figureheads. Their office sounds important and impressive, but in actual fact it is weak and rather powerless.
The mayors of Tomorrow's Cities will have no such problems. They will possess the power they need. And they will not be motivated by greedy, selfish desires in using this power. They really WILL have the interest of their people at heart.
The rulers of Tomorrow's Cities, as shocking as it may seem, will be divine Spirit Beings. They will be members of the God-Family, the Kingdom of God — immortal SPIRIT BEINGS ruling in God's Government on this earth under Jesus Christ!
God has promised a position of rulership in the soon-coming World Tomorrow to ALL who by their lives in this present age — the world today — meet the conditions which God has laid down.
"And he that overcometh [and that includes human nature] and keepeth my works unto the end, to him will I give power over the nations: And he shall rule them with a rod of iron" (Rev. 2:26-27).
For some, this "power over the nations" is going to involve rulership over cities. This is shown by the parable of the pounds in Luke 19. In this parable example, rulership over five or ten cities is given to those who qualify. Those who overcome and produce more are given the greater rewards (verses 16-19). Those who fail to produce anything receive no reward (verses 20-27).
God is going to appoint as Tomorrow's mayors those who qualify for positions of rulership over cities. For more details about the entire pattern of God's Government as it will be in the World Tomorrow, write for our free booklet, The Wonderful World Tomorrow — What It Will Be Like.
Tomorrow's Cities will be ruled by Spirit Beings who are God. And how will they rule? Why, with all the resources of wisdom, understanding, love, might and POWER of the God-Family!
How These Mayors Will Rule
These rulers won't cater to some groups and individuals at the expense of others. They won't be influenced in the least by petty politics. Their rule will be just.
They won't fear being thrown out of office by unruly troublemakers. They will possess the power to swiftly put down any self-exalting, rebellious elements.
Neither will these rulers tolerate filth, shiftlessness and degeneracy. Today when the lower classes are put in new apartments and schools by the government, what happens? Do these people appreciate what they are given? In many cases, NO! In a period of months many new facilities have fixtures stolen, doors and windows are broken, the smell of urine may even be detected in halls and elevators and the whole place is a wreck!
In Tomorrow's Cities people will be taught that this is not the way to live. They will simply not be allowed to be low class and degenerate. Those who insist on being that way will be punished so swiftly and surely that they will learn very quickly. And all will hear and fear!
Yes, Tomorrow's mayors are going to force their subjects to obey God and to receive His blessings. They will impose a warm and merciful rule that will bring compulsory joy! They will insist on happiness for their citizens. They will demand plenty and goodness in their lives. And they will COMMAND them to be healthy, and filled with a sense of well-being and contentment!
And most of these subjects will quickly learn that God's way is best. They will want God's Spirit to lead and guide them. They will desire to obey God's Laws. They will be converted, cooperative people.
With this kind of rulers and this kind of subjects, the rest is a sheer joy to think about.