MESSENGERS to the Baptist General Convention of Texas annual session gather around a table in the registration area for conversation. (BGCT photo)

CLC honors Lawson with service award
___By Dan Martin
___Texas Baptist Communications
___CORPUS CHRISTI--Bill Lawson, pastor of Wheeler Avenue Baptist Church of Houston, was given the Texas Baptist Christian Life Commission's Distinguished Service Award Oct. 31.
___The award was given during a banquet commemorating the 50th anniversary of the founding of the CLC, the ethics and social concerns agency of the Baptist General Convention of Texas.
___The current director and three of the four former directors of the CLC were present at the banquet.
___Phil Strickland is current director, and the former directors are Foy Valentine, Jimmy Allen and James Dunn. A.C. Miller, the first director, died some years ago.
___"The award is not given because of status or power or wealth," Strickland said. "It is given to a person who knows the greatest qualities have to do with servanthood."
___In accepting the award, Lawson, who was an associate of the late Martin Luther King Jr., said that to be in the same room with Valentine, Dunn, Allen and Strickland is "an awesome experience."
___He described the CLC as "the conscience of Baptists," and said leaders have understood very well "that great courtroom scene of Matthew 26 where the basis of judgment is how we have treated other human beings."
___He encouraged the CLC to "keep beating us on the head to remind us of who God wants us to be."
___

The Baptist Standard