For Wilshire Baptist Church
That was the headline in quotes on the front page of The Dallas Morning News last Sunday morning after the historic sanctuary at First Baptist Dallas was gutted by fire. The full quote in the article, attributed to Ben Lovvorn, executive pastor, was: “Our church is not a building. It’s not bricks and mortar. It’s the people.”
I’ve been hearing that my entire life, and I know it’s true. When I think about the churches where I have been a member, I think of the people more than the building. Case in point: The same Sunday morning I read that headline, I went to First Baptist Richardson to hear Kevin McCallon guest preach. I grew up at that church and so did Kevin, but I’d never seen him in that building because when we both were youth, the church was located two miles away. Even so, any time I’ve visited the current location over the years, I’ve seen people I knew at the previous site in the 1960s and ’70s, and that makes it the church I grew up in.
I went to hear what Kevin had to say to the people of the church as they prepare for the arrival of a new pastor in a couple of weeks. He said a lot about change and transition, using his own recent retirement from the pastorate of First Baptist Kingwood as an example. He credited the people of the Richardson church for helping shape his lifelong ministry and said just as he was a part of that church in the previous location during his youth, the new pastor will be a part of that same church going forward in their current location.
In that regard, while the church building is not the church, it is the common ground where the people who are the church gather to “worship, learn, serve and give,” as we’ve said at Wilshire. It’s where we’re nurtured, baptized, married and buried. So, we grieve when something happens to such a familiar and beloved place. And we grieve with those who have lost such a place.
I feel that way about First Baptist Dallas, even though I can only recall two times I’ve been in the historic sanctuary: as a groomsman for my buddy Ken in 1981, and this past September at the memorial service for Gil Stricklin, a longtime family friend. But during those years I was a youth in Richardson, my father would “tune in to the big church in downtown Dallas” on the car radio as we’d drive to First Baptist Richardson. My grandfather attended there in the early 1920s when he worked in Dallas, and twice during my own career, I officed near that historic structure and walked past it often, so I have memories there too.
From what I’ve read, every effort will be made to preserve the exterior of the old building, of which Southern Baptist Convention President Clint Pressley said on “X” after the fire, “If the SBC had a Notre Dame (Cathedral), it would be FBC Dallas.” That’s an interesting comparison in light of the devastating fire at the famous French cathedral in 2019. But photos of the burned-out shell of the Dallas church put me more in mind of England’s Coventry Cathedral.
Completed in the early 15th century, Coventry Cathedral was hit during a bombing raid in 1940 at the start of World War II. Nothing was left but some exterior walls and the spire. Twenty years later, a new cathedral was completed adjacent to the ruins, which were kept and can be toured today. I visited there in 1994 and can attest to how that juxtaposition of destruction and rebirth presents a powerful symbol of the evil of man and the grace of God.
It will be interesting to see what the people of First Baptist Dallas do with the remains of their old sanctuary if the walls can be saved. Will just the presence of the walls say something meaningful to those who see it, and will the inside be rebuilt again as sacred space or for service to the community at large? Meanwhile, there’s no doubt building committees across the nation are watching closely to learn the cause of the fire and will assess whether their old buildings might be at risk as well. While the church is the people, church people still tend to regard their worship spaces as holy ground.
By the way, thanks to the early worship schedule in Richardson, I was able to jump in the car after Kevin’s message and drive across town in time to worship at Wilshire. As I drove up Abrams Road and saw our familiar white steeple, I was eager to get inside and be with the people who are our church.