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While Auburn’s population has been rapidly increasing, Auburn’s crime rate has been going in the other direction and is, in fact, much lower than state and national averages. In fact, Auburn’s reputation for public safety is one of the factors behind the population growth. While this is something to be celebrated, how can we continue to strengthen the justice system and public safety as witness to God's ultimate protection and salvation in Christ?
While our community here on the plains is undergoing rapid transformation, Auburn University remains the central pillar, shaping the identity of our community. It provides the most jobs, draws the most diversity, and produces the most economic output. More importantly, in our late modern age, the urgency of campus ministry has never been greater. For the Church to be faithful to God’s mission here, we must continue to be deeply involved there.
In 1966, Rosemary and Ronnie Anders started Anders Book Store on Magnolia Ave. With a population of only around 16,000 and a slow pace of life centered around the university, Auburn could be described as a village back then. But now, with a population of over 82,000, we’ve transformed from a village to a city.
In our last post, we saw that the population in Lee County grew by 24.2% between 2010 and 2020 and is now home to over 175,000 people. Not surprisingly, over 61% of people in Lee County live either in Auburn or Opelika. There are so many implications that this has for the Church here, but I merely want to highlight here our posture towards the public service sector. City councils, law enforcement officials, the fire departments, public utility leaders, school administrators and faculty, healthcare professionals, and many others are grappling with how to serve and care for the growing number of people in our community. This is a daunting challenge with many complexities and often no clearcut solutions.
What factors are contributing to the substantial growth in these specific counties? Baldwin, Limestone and Shelby counties sit adjacent to the state’s three most populous metropolitan areas: Mobile, Huntsville, and Birmingham, respectively. The suburban phenomenon is no doubt a major factor for those counties.
Our community here in Auburn/Opelika is changing rapidly, both demographically and culturally. We are also growing in our influence across the State and beyond. It doesn’t take more than a casual drive through town to notice some of these trends, which raise some important questions for the Church.
In the sacred journey of seminary education, as teachers and administrators, we continually grapple with a crucial question: how do we challenge our students without overwhelming them with an excessive load of reading and assignments?
When it comes to biblical education and ministry preparation, we want a robust theology of God’s comprehensive mission to shape all subjects. We do not merely want to add more courses on missions, evangelism, culture, church planting, etc., as helpful as those are. Rather we are exploring how a missional theology will realign the whole curriculum to the goal of equipping the Church for our role in God's mission.
As Christ Our Redeemer Seminary comes to the end of its second year in operation, President and Academic Dean Hoffman Rhyne said he is excited to see what the future holds. “This model of seminary can only exist by collaboration, and I needed to know if there was enough buy-in to bring the idea to fruition,” he said. “From that point forward, we formed a launch team and moved quickly to be able to launch with our first cohort the following August. God blessed us at each step of the way.”
“Do you know God? Can you tell me about him?” These words came within the first five minutes of my first conversation with “Tucker.” It was September 2000, and I had been in China for only three weeks. As the year went on, I learned that Tucker was one of many Chinese college students at that time who was hungry to know God. The Spirit of God was at work. I thought to myself, “Who am I that I get to be a part of this?” What a gift! I wanted to stay until Christ’s return. Though I had to leave in 2010, the joy of those early years has never faded. Far from it! I tasted this deepening joy once again when I read Li Yingqiang’s recent letter to the graduating class of Western China Covenant College, entitled Night is Far Gone, Day is at Hand.