Mike Ruffin is former County Manager for Durham County, NC, a post he held for 13 years. He retired in 2014. As the county’s chief executive officer, he oversaw an organization with over 2200 employees and an annual budget of over $500 million. Prior to coming to Durham, he held similar posts in the Atlanta, Charlotte, and the Raleigh-Durham metropolitan areas.
Ruffin is also a featured columnist for the Nashville Graphic (Nashville, NC), the Griffin Daily News (Griffin, GA) and the Independent-Tribune (Concord, NC). He writes weekly on issues that affect today’s Christian, exposing that biblical truths can help Christians to cope with the everyday problems that life experiences bring.
Ruffin, an ordained minister, also maintains a website that features all of his columns, www.devotions.com, and enjoys the distinction of having one of the Internet’s most popular websites for Christian devotions. Thousands of readers in 150 countries around the world are reminded every week that hope is never lost for the Christian.
He is graduate of East Carolina University with a B.S. Degree in Urban and Regional Planning, and holds a Master of Public Administration Degree from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
He is married, and he and his wife, Robbie, have four adult children and four grandchildren. The family resides in Concord, NC.
Ruffin’s columns often deal with personal tragedy and mistakes from which he has learned. He boldly and unashamedly testifies about how God’s redeeming love continues to help him cope with the consequences that come from poor choices, not to mention the challenges that life brings our way everyday. When he speaks, listeners describe him as “real,” “genuine,” “honest”. The truth is he makes it a little easier for us to understand and see God at work in our lives.
He has one of the most riveting testimonies about how he came to know just how much God loves him. Audiences never leave feeling quite the same way about God as they did when they arrived.