A Celebration of Life will be held for Merilyn Magnon Hanewinckel on Friday, March 6, 2026, at 2:00 P.M. in the chapel of Mulhearn Funeral Home Sterlington Rd. Monroe, with Dr. Johnny Hutchison and Rev. Warren Eckhardt officiating. Interment will follow in Mulhearn Memorial Park Cemetery. Visitation will be held from 1:00 P.M. until service time on Friday, March 6, 2026, at the funeral home.

Merilyn went home to be with her Lord on March 2, 2026, her 90th birthday.

She was born on March 2, 1936, in Monroe, Louisiana, the only child of E.L. (Ed) and Mary Magnon.

After graduating from Neville High School and Northeast Louisiana State College, Merilyn attended Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas, with an emphasis on Youth Ministry. After seminary graduation, Merilyn accepted a position as Youth Director at First Baptist Church, Winston-Salem, North Carolina. It was there that she met her husband, Bill.

Merilyn and Bill married on September 15, 1962, and soon after relocated to Denver, Colorado, where Merilyn served as the Youth Director of the church they attended.

Upon returning to Monroe, Merilyn became the Youth Director at North Monroe Baptist Church, a position she held for 10 years. During her ministry there, she developed an outstanding program for teaching and mentoring youth. The positive influence Merilyn and Bill had on so many of these young people led several to enter the ministry and others to be very strong leaders in their respective churches.

Merilyn was preceded in death by her parents and her husband, Bill.

Serving as pallbearers are David Ford, Steve King, Randy Nichols, Phillip Sheppard, Terry Slawson, and Ted Grace.

Memorials may be made to North Monroe Baptist Church, the Louisiana Baptist Children’s Home or Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary.