Eulogy Funeral Service For Bessie Payne Bryant

Funeral Eulogy Bessie Payne Bryant

By Rick Gillespie- Mobley

Psalm 139:1-18 Ecclesiastes 3:1-14

Summary: Bessie Payne Bryant was an elderly believer who loved her family, had a special bond with her sister, and gave her life to Christ as a child.

It is amazing how God uses governments and nations for his own purposes. God raised up Pharoah in Egypt, to prepare a place for Moses to be born and raised. God raised up Augustus Ceasar of the Roman Empire with his mandatory census, just to make sure that Jesus Christ, the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem.

Some of you may recall the great French General Napolean Bonaparte. He was the ruler of France in the early 1800’s who conquered much of Europe. When he was finally defeated on June 18, 1815 at the battle of Waterloo, many of his officers and fighters fled to the United States.

They petitioned Congress to buy some land in Alabama so that they could build a community for themselves. They settled in western Alabama and founded the city of Demopolis.

The same God who used Pharoah and Ceasar, used Napolean for his own ends. Napolean’s soldiers built Demopolis, not knowing God intended for it to be there to be the birthplace for Bessie Payne 121 years into the future.

Bessie was a humble, gentle, and sensitive person who had always in the background the strength to put her foot down when she needed to. The spirit of drawing a line in the sand that you better not cross came from her great, great aunt Louise who had been born a slave in the South. She had a strength in her spirit, that she passed down through the family.

Story has it that Aunt Louise refused to do what her master told her to do.

She told her master, “You will have to kill me first.” But since she was the head of the kitchen and an excellent cook, the master decided to let her be smart and bossy like she wanted. That gene of mental toughness and resilience would be passed down for generations to come,

God is amazing. He knew Bessie Payne would be born in Demopolis, Alabama long before her parents did and God used Napolean to make to make sure Demopolis would be there for them.

The Scriptures tell us “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart” God has a plan for each of our lives.

For Bessie, the date was on a Monday, January 3rd, 1938, the place was Demopolis, Alabama, the event was that God sent a little bundle of life and potential to William and Louise Payne. She was the fourth of five children to arrive and they called this latest bundle of joy, Bessie. She arrived just six months ahead of her sister Ella, who would become almost like a twin in their love and affection for each other.

We are here today because that bundle of joy touched our lives in various special and unique ways and that same bundle has returned to the wonderful God who created her. She has completed that cycle of birth, life, death and returned to God. It is a journey that we shall all one day complete.

There are some children that are born as sweet as they can be, and they are as gentle and obedient as your heart could desire. Bessie was one of those kids. She wanted to please her parents.

She was born in between in her brother Sam and sister Ella. When those two wanted to do some thing they shouldn’t, Bessie would always go in the opposite direction. She believed you should follow the rules and stay out of trouble.

Bessie was crazy about both of her parents. She loved the encouragement she received from her mother to get an education. She loved the way her father treated her mom and took care of them. Her father told her mom, you don’t have to do anything but take it easy. He worked building houses. He would come home from work and cook. He even paid someone to come and help clean the house. Bessie remembered eagerly waiting for her father to come home, and running up to greet him. He often brought her and Ella dolls home.

Bessie never forgot her last whipping from her mother when she tried to make a joke about her father. Bessie’s mother was very fair skinned and her father was very dark skinned. She told her mother, “You really got yourself a coal burner.” She never made a joke about his color again.

Bessie’s mother saw to it that they were in church as they were growing up and that’s where she gave her life to Christ. God has a way of sending us the people we need in life. For Bessie, it came in the form of her younger sister Ella. They became each other’s guardian angel.