'He’s a family person': Sons of Bishop McMurray remember his service to others

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — Bishop Dennis McMurray pastored Renaissance Church of God in Christ for 30 years, mentoring to people and serving others alongside his wife Dr. E. Jean McMurray. His kids — Parris, Auston, and Chavon — were always nearby.

This Sunday November 6 will be the first church service without him.

“He’s not a showy person. He’s a family person. And he wants us to continue to be family, continue to serve God, to worship God with all of our hearts,” Auston said. “I mean, one of his favorite scriptures that he talked to me about was ‘Trust in the Lord with all your heart, lean not on your own understanding, in all your ways acknowledge him. And he’ll direct your path’ and that was scripture he gave me for my career. Sorry, I’m getting teary-eyed thinking about it.”

Auston paused for a bit and proceeded to say “that’s what we’ll do, continue to love and live and serve God faithfully.”

Parris affirmed what he said with a “yes.”

Bishop McMurray passed away this week from a rare disease, they said. But he’ll always be remembered for his serving spirit.

“I remember when myself and my siblings we were growing up, he actually took us to our first Ice Capades, Disney on Ice,” said Tina McGee. “He was like a father to us, even though our father was around he did a lot of things with us. He was our father even before he had his own children.”

McGee said he took them to basketball games, McDonald's, and bought them bikes.

McGee said she’ll never forget his generosity.

The world got to see that generosity, they said, when he spoke at Patrick Lyoya’s funeral back in April.

Lyoya was fatally shot by former GRPD officer Christopher Schurr during a traffic stop on Nelson and Griggs in early April.

Bishop McMurray allowed the funeral to happen at the church when others churches said “no.”

“The Sunday before he had a conversation with the Renaissance family and he said ‘You all, we are not doing this to make a political or a civil rights activist statement. We’re doing this to minister to a hurting family and that’s our mission,” Parris said. “He told every single person that was in the service — whether that’s in singing, that were being involved directly in front of the camera on the service, or behind the scenes serving or moving a chair — this is ministry to a hurting family. And all of these other political conditions just happened to be in place.”

The funeral was attended by over a thousand people including Civil Rights leaders like attorney Ben Crump, Rev. Al Sharpton and the family’s own attorney Ven Johnson.

It was after the event though that his health took a turn for the worst.

“Right now we’re not making the details fully public but it was a rare form of cancer,” Parris said. “And that’s something that we have announced to the community.”

Parris said they told the public about his health when Bishop McMurray received the Giants Among Giants award, which recognized him for his service.

McGee said the family immediately began praying.

“He’s always going to be Cousin Dennis. And to hear about his passing was really really hard for us because everybody was praying for him hoping that he would recover you know because God could do the unbelievable,” McGee said. “But God does things in his own time and how He wants to do it.”

Bishop McMurray died this week. He was 63 years old.

The family said the best way to honor him is to serve others and love them in the way that he did.

“That’s the most important thing is just live. Be sensitive to God’s voice. If you’re called to be a change agent in someone’s life do that,” Auston said. “If you’re called to buy groceries for someone do it because he did it. If you’re called to reach out to someone who has a child in college and their kid needs money, do it because that’s exactly what he did.”