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An overflow crowd of several thousand people filled Briarwood Presbyterian Church in Birmingham on Wednesday afternoon to mourn and remember Senior Pastor Harry L. Reeder III, who died suddenly on May 18 in a car crash.
Reeder, 75, was a “towering oak of a pastor,” said the Rev. Sandy Willson, retired pastor of Second Presbyterian Church in Memphis.
“We had no idea how large, until he fell,” Willson said. “We have all had our lives changed forever.”
Reeder’s surviving sister, son and two daughters spoke at the service, which was highlighted by a bagpiper, a 35-piece orchestra and a choir of more than 100 voices performing classical music and leading hymns.
“In life, and now his unexpected death, he points us to Christ,” said his oldest daughter, Jennifer Hay. “He got older; his preaching kept getting better.”
She said her father was nicknamed Ike in his youth before he started using his given name of Harry, a name he inherited from his father, who had been a minor league baseball umpire in the Carolina and Southern Leagues.
“He’s Dr. Reeder, Rev. Reeder, Pastor Reeder, Pastor-Teacher Reeder, PTR, Papaw, Grandpa, HLR III and Harry,” she said. “Daddy lived his entire life defined by one priority. That priority was his love for Christ.”
Reeder is survived by his wife of 54 years, Cindy, who helped keep Reeder from forgetting where he left things, Hay said. He was so focused on his messages, that he simply left things behind.
Cindy once called a hotel to ask the staff to send a journal that Reeder had left in his room. They sent it in a box. “Not only had they included his journal, they also included four books, a bunch of pens, a toothbrush, his iPod, a pair of shoes and some shorts,” Hay said. “We didn’t like to let him travel alone.”
Reeder’s son, Harry Lloyd Reeder IV, said his father’s messages transformed the spiritual lives of thousands. “There is no place Dad would not go to preach the gospel if he was asked,” Reeder said. “He was simply seeking to serve God humbly and with the master’s heart.”
Reeder was a military history aficionado who took his family on vacations to Gettysburg and other historical battlefields.
Reeder viewed his ministry as a battle, a life and death struggle, his son said. “Dad’s adversary was Satan and his schemes,” Reeder said. “Why? Because he loved the truth of God so much he hated when people were led astray.”
Reeder wanted to “make the church a safe haven for sinners, but not for sin,” said his other daughter, Abigail Leib. “He was a driven man.”
Reeder’s sister, Beth Thomas, said her brother officiated her wedding in a sweaty softball uniform because he was playing in a close game for the church team and refused to leave until he hit a home run to win it, then drove directly to the church.
When he preached funerals, Reeder used the Bibles of the deceased, and preached from passages they had highlighted. “God used my brother as the highlighter for all the Bibles,” Thomas said.
Reeder had served as senior pastor of the 4,100-member Briarwood Church since 1999, taking over for founding Senior Pastor Frank Barker, who became Pastor Emeritus. Barker, 89, died Dec. 27, 2021.
Since Barker became the founding pastor of Briarwood in 1960 and Reeder took over as senior pastor in 1999, they were the only two senior pastors in the 63-year history of the church, Barker for 39 years and Reeder for 24.
Previously, Reeder had been pastor for 17 years of Christ Presbyterian Church in Charlotte, N.C., which he started and grew to 3,000 members. Briarwood and Christ Presbyterian are among the largest churches in the Presbyterian Church in America denomination.
Willson said that Reeder told him, “I was the only PCA pastor stupid enough to follow Frank Barker.”
Reeder may have been the only one who could have succeeded following Barker at Briarwood, Willson said. “He was the one eminently suited for it,” he said.
“He poured himself out for the sake of the gospel,” said Briarwood Executive Pastor Bruce Stallings.
In February 2017, Reeder underwent open-heart surgery. He preached a sermon leading up to the surgery as if it might be his last. Briarwood reprinted Reeder’s closing remarks from that sermon in the bulletin for the funeral.
“By God’s grace I hope this is not my final word unless He decrees otherwise but my final word about this is very simple,” Reeder said at the time. “It doesn’t matter whether it’s 68 years or 88 years, I am a blessed man. I am saved by grace. I have a Savior who has sought me and bought me and brought me. He gave me a wife that is incomparable. He gave me children that are astonishing and astounding in their love for Christ and how He has gifted them to serve Him. He has given me grandchildren that I have been able to enjoy and anticipate what God is going to do in and through them. He has given me a family with wonderful sisters and brothers-in-law who love Jesus. He has given me an extended family beyond those that is absolutely extraordinary. More than that, He has given me life forever and Jesus Christ.”
Rev. Harry Reeder, Briarwood senior pastor, killed in Shelby County crash
Founding Pastor Frank Barker of Briarwood Presbyterian Church dies
The Rev. Harry Reeder III, senior pastor of Briarwood Presbyterian Church, died May 18, 2023. He was 75. (AL.com/File photo)
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