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Ronnie Wilson’s long journey as a teacher in the Bible Fellowship Hour at First Baptist Church on McCarty Lane has ended. After 55 years of teaching, Wilson said, "I looked out over the class and realized there were better teachers than me sitting there.”
As a modest man, he doesn’t realize how much he has inspired many, including me.
To quote William Arthur Ward, “The mediocre teachers tells. The good teacher explains. The super teacher demonstrates. The great teacher inspires.”
Looking back, I don’t remember everything that we talked about; but I do remember how Wilson made me feel. Over the years, he was always positive and encouraging. He follows the verse:
“Therefore encourage one another and build each other up.”
I Thessalonians 5:11
He practices his spiritual gift of exhortation every Sunday morning.
Wilson and his wife, Carolyn, are a long way from where they met in Houston. Fate took him away from challenges there to the University of Houston, where he earned a degree in accounting that brought him to San Marcos to start a career as a CPA. The Wilsons established their home and raised two children. Today, the family has increased to include six grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren.
James 3:1, warns “Because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly.”
That is not a problem for Deacon Wilson who has served as a role model to me and many others. There are generations of witnesses at First Baptist Church who can give thanks because of how Wilson has lived his life before them.
“Oliver Wendell Holmes once said, 'A mind once stretched by a new idea, never returns to its original dimensions,” his Pastor Chad Chaddick said.
Wilson has been stretching minds for 55 years at First Baptist Church San Marcos. Drawing from the Bible, frequently quoting C.S. Lewis, he has been making the truths of the gospel accessible to youth, college and adults of all ages for five decades. That’s a long time, which speaks to his passion and faithfulness.
In that same time, he has been doing more than stretching minds, though. He has been challenging his students to take their knowledge of God and their experiences with God and to put them to use for God through service. It’s for this reason that you will find his students and former students in leadership all over the church, the community and even the world. The love of God in Christ Jesus is meant to be shared. Wilson has taught this as truth. He has modeled it in his own life. He has challenged others to do more than think good thoughts and, instead, to live good lives. And for his friendship, his encouragement and his partnership in the ministry, I consider myself blessed.
If you see Wilson, thank him for his commitment and his faithfulness. And by all means, remember that you have been blessed so that you can bless others in Christ’s name.
In closing his life verse is:
“For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith – and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God –not by works, so that no one can boast.”
Ephesians 2:8-9
Wilson is a man of Faith expressed in Grace to others.
A fellowship reception is planned for Sunday, Jan. 20 at 2 p.m. at the First Baptist Church on McCarty Lane.
