Community and Vocation in Emerging Generations

My morning newspaper had a story in the Life and Arts section about Chris Wiesinger, 25, who recently graduated from Texas A&M and started a bulb(flower) company. What led me to the article was my interest in all things landscaping but as I read on I was fascinated by a 25 year old's desire to drive around to remote parts of the state to dig up bulbs for resale. He is an Aggie, but there seemed to be something here beyond mere aggieness. It turns out that Wiesinger and two other friends from college live together in a cabin out in the country (near Mineola for those of my readers from East Texas). Another partner, Amanda George, lives down the road but is just as involved in the work and community life. The business partners work together and then gather around the dinner table for dinner and friendship each night. The article writer, Ginia Bellafante, writes that,

If the focus seems unusually intense, it is because their interest in gardening is motivated less by aesthetic predilection than by philosophical belief. Wiesinger and his friends said they are all observant Christians who see gardening as a lesson in the politics of personal responsibility and the value of rewards deferred.

Bellafante also finds that Wiesinger's encounter with the poverty in East Texas, which he discovers on bulb hunts, "stirs his philanthropic impulses" and dreams of transforming impoverished communities.

These four exemplify what emerging generations value in life and what kind of community and world they want to live in, one that is based on authentic friendships and conversation, the mixture of work and spirituality/secular and sacred, care for the poor and neglected, and a focus on making the world a better, more beautiful place.

I don’t know if Wiesinger attends church anywhere nor do I know much of anything else about him or this group, but it seems like he has created a community that looks so much like what I believe Jesus intend His followers to be.

emergent

bulbs