Benefit society eases end-of-life financial burden for ministers, spouses

By Grace Thornton
The Alabama Baptist

Jack Green said he and his wife, Mary Edna, just finished a year-and-a-half long “honeymoon” of sorts.

“She got really sick about a year and a half ago, and I stopped doing everything so I could take care of her,” said Green, a longtime Alabama Baptist pastor.

It was just the two of them, and they didn’t have to worry about anything other than each other, said Green, 91.

Then on Aug. 25, she passed away.

“She was a pastor’s wife and she lived that role to the fullest,” Green said. “She was a great mother, a wonderful wife, a WMU director in two associations. She taught Bible study and sang in the choir. We had 68 years of ministry together.”

Financial aid

And in the weeks since her death, one blessing in the midst of the grief was a gift from the Alabama Baptist Benefit Society, a group that provides financial aid to its members’ families after their death.

“The basic idea behind the benefit society is a plan for how pastors can support fellow pastors or anyone in Christian vocation,” said Mike McLemore, who serves as the society’s secretary/treasurer.

That includes any church employee — pastors, secretaries, janitors, anyone — or any employee of a Southern Baptist ministry, whether its in Alabama or not, he said. Applicants must be 60 or younger and in good health. Eligible members pay a $5 registration fee, $10 in yearly dues, then $1 each time a member dies.

Those funds are collected and sent to the family of the deceased member to help with funeral costs or other needs. So, for instance, if the society has 1,300 members at the time of a death, the member’s family would receive $1,300.

“It’s a death benefit, not an insurance policy,” said McLemore, executive director of Birmingham Baptist Association.

“Many pastors of small churches don’t have the resources that a pastor in a large church has. This can help people in their greatest moment of need, when they’ve lost someone.”

It’s not an investment; it’s a ministry, he said. “It’s a way of serving those who serve others.”

Green said he and his wife signed up for the Alabama Baptist Benefit Society years ago and have been giving ever since.

‘Needs are still there’

“Times have changed a great deal, but the needs are still there,” he said.

The money Green received from the benefit society almost exactly matched what he needed to pay the remainder of his wife’s funeral expenses, he said. “It helped a great deal.”