The One About our Wonderful, Crazy, Scary, Changing, “Boomtown”
Dear West Family
It has been a long time since I last wrote a “Thursday Thoughts” mail, but I am back at it and committed to them going forward. Last year left its mark, for sure, but I am optimistic and hopeful for our mutual perseverance and joy in the year ahead, not because I think 2022 holds some mystical set of better circumstances, but because I have seen afresh the faithfulness of God in all sorts of circumstances.
We moved to Austin a little over four years ago, and the city has changed significantly even in that small time frame. If you have lived here for any length of time then you have felt it, especially over the last decade and a bit. Census data revealed what we all knew and that is that the Austin Metro was the fastest growing in the US for the last decade (for metros over a million people). Two counties in the broader Austin Metro area make it into the top five fastest growing counties in the country. Hays County came in at number one with over 50% growth! Williamson County came in fourth with over 40%!
That’s bananas.
This kind of crazy growth was reason for everyone’s second favorite South African supervillain, Elon Musk, to adopt an old word associated with rapidly growing cities when referring to Austin.
He called it “Boomtown.”
This is an old English word that was first used in the 1800’s to describe fast growing English urban centers at the time, like Liverpool and Birmingham, which grew extremely quickly as a result of the Industrial Revolution. It was later used to describe similar population growth in US settlements as people headed west and gold was discovered in what were previously tiny communities of people.
We now live, by God’s good design and mercy, in the midst of a booming city. All endeavors to “Keep Austin Weird” seem long forgotten as globe leading corporations make their home here, and it isn’t good news for everyone. The city is becoming more expensive (we have one of the worst annual cost of living increases in the nation), housing is scarce (especially in the affordable housing sector), and many feel like the tone and the tenor of the place is changing in a way that they don’t like. People used to be quick to tell me how much they loved Austin and how proud they were to live here. Now it feels like many people I talk to are disillusioned by the city and its transformation and wondering aloud what sort of role they can and should play in it.
That is why we are launching a new five-week sermon series this Sunday which we have simply called “Boomtown: A Changing City, The Same Mission.”
It is an opportunity for us to press back into what always has been the call of this church and that is to be a people who are for the city. Our hope is that all of us will find an opportunity to take one step of action over the next five weeks in the direction of being someone who is “for” our crazy Boomtown in a God-honoring way. Acts 17:26 tells us that our sovereign Lord has determined the time and the place of our lives, which means that God has us here and now by His design and our call is to figure out how to pursue Christ together in the midst of that. I hope and pray that you will join us.
Before I go, I have had a few people ask me why we would break away from a book study to tackle a topical series from the pulpit. A few things about that really quick:
This has been a pattern of the preaching calendar at The Austin Stone for many years, where the bulk of teaching will come from verse by verse study of the Scriptures (which we all prefer by far), but where we will take a couple of key moments in the new calendar year and new school year to restate vision and to call our people back to the mission of the church.
Even when we teach topically, we don’t really know how to do that without teaching expositionally and so we are always going to root and anchor ourselves in the truth and authority of the text. It is not an “either-or” scenario for us.
We want to be doers of the word and not just hearers as James instructs us. These sorts of series give us a couple of key opportunities to give people tangible calls to action and obedience, especially when it comes to calling people to love the city and to love the nations.
Alright, that’s a lot. If you are still reading, then well done! As a reward, I have included a link to one of my favorite songs at the moment. Enjoy.
Hope Where There Was None | Loud Harp
As always, I would love to hear from you.
See you Sunday,
Ross
