Not that long ago, Betty Bedenbaugh would have been in her customary seat on the front row in the alto section of the sanctuary choir. And if the choir had been presenting the Swahili rendition of one of her favorite hymns, “I Have Decided to Follow Jesus,” the retired Southern Baptist missionary to Tanzania certainly would have been leading out in a version of the familiar song that she had taught the choir.
Don KirklandOn this day, however, the choir of the Earle Street Baptist Church in Greenville was singing the Swahili lyrics to “I Have Decided to Follow Jesus,” not with Betty but as a tribute to her.
At the age of 79, the Illinois native, who had made her home in Greenville since retiring from the mission field, died peacefully in her sleep on June 11. Her death followed a heroic battle with cancer that near the end depleted her resources of energy and limited her activities. However, the disease never touched her will and determination to continue serving her Lord and her church.
Her pastor, Stephen Clyborne, and his new associate, Greg Dover, visited Betty the day before she died. “She spoke some very encouraging words to Greg,” Clyborne recalled. “Then we joined hands and prayed, and we left, never dreaming that would be the last time we would ever see her in this life.”
The Earle Street pastor said Betty told him over and over again that she was ready to go home, saying with that determined tone of hers, “There is no reason why I should have to stay here in this hospice house.”
“And now, at last,” said Clyborne, “she is home — to stay.”
At the time Betty Bedenbaugh and her husband Charles entered missions service, their country of destination was known as Tanganyika, not Tanzania, in East Africa.
Asked why she was willing to give up a more comfortable and settled existence for the harder life of an international missionary, she would answer simply, “I was called. That’s what God wanted me to do.” And she would learn — though I am sure she already knew — that God’s call is followed by his enablement.
During furloughs in the United States, the Bedenbaughs lived in a variety of missionary homes in South Carolina, where Betty had attended Furman University before graduating from Mississippi College. Later in their careers, they came to the missionary home of Earle Street Baptist Church. When Charles died in 1991, Betty retired and settled in the Earle Street missionary house, where she continued to live until shortly before her death.
The very presence of Betty Bedenbaugh in church, where she was active in Woman’s Missionary Union, heightened the missions consciousness of the Earle Street congregation and its support of the Great Commission work that continued to consume her life. Consistently, she came to Wednesday prayer services with the needs and concerns of missionary friends on her mind and heart, and those needs and concerns became ours, too. Betty understood as well as anyone the heart of God, his desire that all be saved — and she always reminded us of our part in that divine endeavor.
Betty’s missionary career, accompanied by her husband Charles, spanned more than 31 years, with a variety of assignments in East Africa. Their ministry was marked by expected hardship but unexpected tragedy. In 1971, their 6-year-old daughter Lynette died in an accident in Tanzania. The Bedenbaughs stayed on the mission field, doing their grieving and beginning their healing there. They buried their daughter beneath a flowering tree whose purple petals (Betty’s favorite color) often blanket the small grave.
The life of Betty Bedenbaugh is a faithful witness to, and an eloquent reminder of, a fundamental fact of following our Lord wherever he leads: Once the decision is made to follow Jesus, there cannot be any turning back. Betty never did.