The Rev. Edward Bowen says he learned early in life about the importance of hard work and helping others.
Bowen remembers growing up in Indianola and seeing his father work as a truck driver for 75 cents an hour while his mother stayed home to raise 12 children.
“Dad always stressed making something out of yourself,” Bowen said. “And he also stressed being family. He said if one is down and out, you go to the rescue of that person. He said if one is in need, all are in need.”
Sometimes his parents struggled to pay bills and fell months behind on the rent. Bowen already had experience delivering newspapers, and he thought he could do more. So he prayed for God’s guidance.
“I said, ‘Lord, if you let me get a job, I’m going to help my daddy,’” he said. “And I got a job, and I helped that man with what I had.”
He started working at Spencer Grocery and then Labella Grocery. Later he took a job at Lewis Grocery (now Supervalu), where his father worked. He went on to a long career in education, and he has been pastor of New Bethel Missionary Baptist Church in Itta Bena for nearly 23 years.
In school and church, he has tried to pass along to young people the ideals he learned at home.
That early influence is “the reason why, I guess, I don’t mind helping people now,” he said. “It is something that I have to do. It is something that is a part of me. And I expect nothing in return.”
Bowen, 66, was born in Drew and moved to Indianola with his family when he was 3. After graduating from Gentry High School in 1967, he entered Mississippi Valley State University. He was drafted into the Army in 1969 and served in Vietnam for about 18 months working in data processing.
He admits that he didn’t take his college education very seriously at first, but after returning and re-entering Valley on the GI Bill, he had no choice.
“This was strictly business now, because I didn’t have any money, no job, and I had to maintain a C average,” he said. “And that’s what I did.”
He graduated in 1973 with a degree in social studies. After having trouble finding a job, he decided to go into elementary education and set about taking the required courses at Valley, eventually earning a master’s degree in elementary education and certification in special education.
He started teaching at Leflore County Elementary in 1983 and spent one year there before being moved to Leflore County High, where he taught special education full-time until retiring in 2003. He has kept busy since then, working with students at the high school in the mornings.
He has given them some of the same advice his father gave: Always do your best. If you want something, ask for it or work for it; don’t just take it. Don’t get a police record, because it will follow you everywhere. Always respect your elders — and others, too.
“I like talking to people, and I like telling people the truth about life and whatever it may be,” he said. “And I don’t try to sugar-coat anything.”
Bowen has been pastor at New Bethel since January 1992.
He said he was called to preach a few years before that. He’d known for years that God had a calling for him but didn’t know what it was, although he kept asking. Once on a trip to Louisiana to see his wife’s family, he went out to get a hamburger and saw a vision in the sky above the restaurant — three figures in robes, with Jesus in the center. He said Jesus told him to “tell them about that book” — the Bible.
In the moment, Bowen said yes, but later he backtracked. And God “knew that I wasn’t going to do it, because he knows everything,” he reasoned.
Still, he couldn’t get the experience out of his mind, so he talked to his pastor at New Bethel, the Rev. Fred D. Mathis, who advised him to come before the church when he was ready. When Mathis became ill in the spring of 1991, Bowen began serving as interim pastor, and months later he was elected pastor.
The church is involved in the community in a number of ways. New Bethel adopted Leflore County elementary and high schools a few years ago, and it holds ACT workshops and awards scholarships to top students. Its young people also visit nursing homes and take part in other activities.
New Bethel’s membership is aging, and attracting new people can be a challenge. Bowen said he wants people to know that it is a caring place where they can feel God’s presence. His goal, he said, is to “reach the community with the love of God in my heart and to share with everybody what God has done for all of us.”
Bowen and his wife, Ethel, have been married for 42 years and have two sons. They have lived in Greenwood since 2006 after spending 29 years in Itta Bena.
He says his health is “pretty good,” and he tries to keep in shape. He hasn’t set a timetable for how much longer he’ll stay at New Bethel, saying only, “When the time comes, I guess the Lord will let me know.”
Going to school at 7 or 7:15 a.m. can be tiring, but he thanks God daily for the opportunity.
“It’s something that I wouldn’t trade,” he said. “I don’t like getting up all the time so early during the morning time, going to work, but when I get there, it just means the world to me.”
• Contact David Monroe at 581-7236 or dmonroe@gwcommonwealth.com.
