As I read through an article by Forbes Magazine I was not at all surprised at some of the results that they came up with. I was obviously interested to see how Columbus was rated on any of the sins and sure enough, we are ranked high with two of seven deadly sins.

Envy & Lust

It isn’t hard to see these sins in every city. All I have to do is look in the mirror on any given day I can see all seven in my own heart. Forbes’ article may not be saying anything we don’t already know but it is helpful to be reminded of our need for gospel transformation in our cities.

Yesterday I met with a man that quickly became a local hero to me. His heart is to see the city transformed by Jesus not only in word but in deed. He has bought a house in a developing city neighborhood (Old Towne East) and connected with others around him to see the city made better.

The city is a sinful place yet its sins are not without redemption. Jesus was born and grew up in the sticks but spent his ministry in the city. Our family loves the city. The city has so much to offer and though its sins are being talked about by a non-sin-believing company Jesus can transform it.

So you might be thinking, “Can anything good come from Ohio?”

Besides being the Heart of if All Ohio has some awesome things to do, see, and love. One of those things is the Gallery Hop in the Short North (our neighborhood).

Please read THIS ARTICLE and be convinced that Ohio is the place to be!

By Haya El Nasser, USA TODAY

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Mayor Michael Coleman has one piece of advice for presidential candidates: Campaign as if you’re running for mayor of Columbus. If you can win Columbus, you can win America.

The buildings of downtown Columbus sit along the Scioto River.

By Robert Deutsch, USA TODAY

Columbus is America. It’s urban. It’s suburban. Farmland is just a freeway exit away. It has poor inner-city neighborhoods and exclusive suburbs.

It’s a state capital and has the sophistication that a big state university brings. Yet it hasn’t lost its Midwestern simplicity. Columbus is the home base of Wendy’s International, Red Roof Inns and Limited Brands — leaders in mass consumption and symbols of middle America. And Columbus is experiencing all the demographic trends that have swept the nation in the 1990s: population growth, sprawl, aging, an influx of immigrants and downtown revitalization.

Marketers have realized Columbus’ “everyman” qualities for some time. The city is a favorite testing ground for products from cars to potato chips. “It’s representative of the rest of the nation when it comes to consumer interests, voting interests,” Coleman says.

The changes in the 1990s have been as dramatic in Columbus, the USA’s 15th-largest city, as in the rest of the nation. The city’s aggressive annexation continued. Columbus grew from 191 square miles in 1990 to 225 square miles today. Population increased from 633,000 in 1990 to more than 720,000 today.

Affluent new communities were built: Easton and New Albany to the east. Town centers, homes, condos and offices sprouted on farmland. Easton’s creator is Les Wexner, founder of The Limited apparel chain and one of Columbus’ most famous and wealthiest residents. Limited executives live in expensive homes in New Albany.

Some neighborhoods have been transformed by immigrants. Northland, once a mostly white and black working-class neighborhood, now is multiethnic. It’s home to many of the 30,000 Somali refugees in Columbus, one of the largest concentrations in the USA. They’re helping revive an area that became depressed after the Northland Mall, once one of the region’s most successful, closed. The land has been purchased and will be redeveloped into a retail, residential, office and recreational complex.

Curtis McGuire, a black entrepreneur, has lived in Northland since 1986. He has witnessed the changes. Elderly neighbors died, and young people moved in. His freight management company, Redleg’s, is based in a building that now has a health center for Somali refugees. He has had to reach out to the Hispanic and Somali communities to recruit workers.

“We are a city of new immigrants,” says Coleman, who just cut the ribbon for a Somali-owned mall. “That’s a good thing.”

The Hispanic population more than doubled in the 1990s to about 18,000. Most of these immigrants from Mexico live on the west side of the city. Businesses are responding to this ethnic wave. Nationwide Insurance opened offices to cater to recent immigrants.

The city has weathered the recession better than most because of its diversified economy. It has always been less reliant on heavy industry than other Midwestern cities. Poverty declined in the 1990s. The number of people living in high-poverty neighborhoods dropped 55% to 48,020 in the 1990s, according to recent studies by the Brookings Institution.

Downtown is showing more activity than it has in decades. A hockey arena was built for the National Hockey League’s Blue Jackets. A $28.5 million soccer stadium 4 miles away opened in 1999 for the Columbus Crew, a Major League Soccer team.

More people are living downtown in hip neighborhoods such as Short North and the brewery district. Kroger just announced it will open a supermarket downtown. The city is two years into a 10-year plan to add 10,000 housing units downtown. A retail center straddling Interstate 670 is under construction. A floodwall has finally gone up to contain 7 miles of the Scioto River. “We can continue to grow,” City Council President Matt Habash says. “We are not locked in in any way.”