Column: Mary Ann Bissette remembered as a Christian soldier throughout her life

Mary Ann Bissette was resolute in her faith.

She was absolute in her lifetime belief that Jesus Christ was her Lord and savior.

“She not only talked the talk,” Lynne Green told those who came on Aug. 15 to Fayetteville Community Church for the Celebration of Life for her mother, “but walked the walk.”

Greene was just as resolute in telling us about her late mother, and just as absolute.

“We know where my mother is today,” Greene said. “She knew the Holy Spirit was on her. As her knowledge deepened, so did her degree to be more like Christ. I have no doubt when she reached glory on Aug. 11, she heard the words, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant.’”

Mary Ann Bissette was Fayetteville born to the late James and Mary Catherine Wilson. She was graduated from Fayetteville High School, the youngest student in her class of 1958 with a sweet and kind way.

She married the love of her life, William Arthur Bissette, on Oct. 8, 1960, and raised a daughter and son. The family practiced their faith at Highland Presbyterian Church until Mary Ann Bissette became a founding member of the Church of the Open Door, where WA Bissette was an elder. WA Bissette died at age 82 on July 5, 2021.

Along life’s way, Mary Ann Bissette became known for her Bible Study Fellowship teachings in Fayetteville for more than 25 years.

She knew the Bible gospels.

She knew the scriptures.

“Someone, a friend, told a story about her Bible Study Fellowship,” Greene reminded us, where Mary Ann Bissette once said of Jesus, ‘The more I get to know Him, the more I love Him.’”

Mary Ann Bissette was a woman of devout faith in her love for the Lord.

“You knew she knew what she was talking about, and she did a great job,” says Julia Strain, who at one time attended the Bible studies. “She was very sincere.”

The lives ‘she touched’

Mary Ann Wilson Bissette died Aug. 11 at her home after a brief illness.

She was 83.

“We are so grateful for her life, and have our feet under her table,” the Rev. Wesley Pritchard told those who came to celebrate and remember the life of Mary Ann Bissette. “When she breathed her last breath was to know what it was to be with the Lord.”

The pastor would remind us of earlier in the day, as we walked along the resting places of so many buried in Lafayette Memorial Park. Along with the names are the dates and deaths of loved ones gone, their lives bounded by years and dashes.

“We are living in that dash,” Pritchard said. “I ask, ‘What are you going to do with your dash, and what memories will you leave behind for your family?’ I thank you, Lord, for the life Mary Ann lived” and the dash between the dates “of those she touched.”

The Rev. Jon Wixtrom, too, would remember Mary Ann Bissette in his Sunday sermon at the Church of the Open Door, where Mrs. Bissette was always there in the pew mid-way in the center aisle.

Mary Ann Bissette penned a letter to Wixtrom before her passing.

“I stand at the threshold of a whole new life!” she wrote.

Mary Ann Bissette wrote that she found her love of God at age 19.

“It was an overwhelming experience,” she wrote. “The Holy Spirit living within me filled all the voids … He is my counselor, my comforter, my strength.”

Lynne Greene told us well; her mother “walked the walk” in the footsteps of Jesus.

“Christ has redeemed us,” Wixtrom said in his sermon. “He saved us. He’s recreated us and he has sent us forth to be that light and to be that ambassador in this world to testify to him in his saving work. … Let the light of Christ shine through us … Mary Ann even now is being amazed in the presence of God by his grace and by his glory.”

Epilogue

Mary Ann Bissette was her gentle and reserved self on that Nov. 7. 2023, at Lynne Bissette Greene’s home in Murray Hill, when election returns would tell us that the 61-year-old Dist. 5 Fayetteville City Council candidate would defeat longtime incumbent Johnny Dawkins.

“I’m overwhelmed,” Mary Ann Bissette would say with humble pride. “Now, I’m looking for change. I think it’s in the Lord. The best she can do is walk close to the Lord.”

She was Mary Ann Bissette, and all who came to know her will tell you, Mary Ann Bissette was a Christian soldier of resolute and absolute faith.

Bill Kirby Jr. can be reached at billkirby49@gmail.com or 910-624-1961.

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