For Wilshire Baptist Church
On a recent Saturday morning, while it was still sort of cool, we did a little weeding in the back yard. LeAnn attacked the flower beds while I focused on our pea gravel pathway, where Bermuda grass grows better than in the actual lawn. There, among the round and colorless gravel, I found a quarter-sized chunk of Sunset Red granite.
If you don’t know, Sunset Red, also known as Texas Pink, is perhaps best known in the Lone Star State as the granite that gives our state capitol building its pink hue. As I turned that small piece of granite over in my hand, I imagined it was left over from the 50,000 tons of the stuff that cover the capitol’s exterior. Or, it might be a remnant of the uncounted tons scattered at a particularly tight curve on the 50-mile train route from the quarry in Marble Falls to the capitol construction site.
Either way, that would be quite a legacy to have on our garden path if there was any truth to what my imagination had conjured. After all, the Texas capitol has stood the test of time since its opening in 1888.
On the other hand, some of what has happened inside that impressive building has been less than impressive. There have been hits and misses coming from the legislative chambers in that building over those 135 years. As it turns out, legacy is a messy business, and state government is ultimately about serving the best interests of people and not erecting buildings.
At Wilshire, we’ve been doing a lot of legacy work lately. We’ve called a new pastor, we’re searching for a new minister of music and minister to senior adults, and we’re taking stock of who we are in the post-COVID world and perhaps the post-denominational era. Will we build something that will stand the test of time like a grand granite capitol building? Or will we raise something nice but ultimately superficial that will crumble into pieces along the weedy path of history?
It’s a rhetorical question because I already know the answer: We’ll continue to build something of long-term value and worth. That’s what Wilshire has always done, because we’re focused on people and not buildings; we’re all-in about “Every Body” rather than “Every Place.” That doesn’t mean the work is easy. In fact, it’s been hard in the past, and still is now, but we’ve endured because we know we’re not doing it just for ourselves. We’re doing it for those who follow us. More important, we’re doing it for the Kingdom — on earth as it is in heaven.