The Most Rev’d David Epps

The Cathedral of Christ the King
Fourth Sunday of Easter
April 29, 2012

Sermon Link: The Secret of David’s Courage

The Most Rev’d David Epps

The Cathedral of Christ the King
Easter Sunday
April 8, 2012

Sermon Link: God Will Surprise You

The Dental Assisting certificate program provides the student with the knowledge, skills and techniques to meet the occupational needs of the dental community. Graduates may be employed as chair side assistants in general dentistry, pediatric dentistry, orthodontics, endodontics, oral surgery, periodontics, and prosthodontics. Other career opportunities include insurance coordinators, infection control coordinators, appointment control coordinators, dental office assistants, and dental hygiene assistants.

Denise Landon is the daughter of ICCEC U. S. Army Chaplain (Major) Jonathan and Rebeka Landon who are currently stationed ion Colorado Springs, CO. Denise is currently employed at the Cathedral of Christ the King in Sharpsburg, GA as a child care worker.,

I then moved to the church office down the highway and began the same process there. After taking a couple of hours to go through piles of stuff on my desk and a box of more stuff I kept in the shower (Yea, I know), I opened a desk drawer. There I saw it. No, not the sought after document. Rather, I saw a file folder marked “Urgent.” Behind it was a file folder marked “Important.” The stuff in the “Urgent” file was dated 2005 and 2006. I guess it wasn’t that urgent after all. I couldn’t bear to look in the “Important” file. Who knows how long it had been in the drawer?

As embarrassing as this story is to tell, in the great scheme of life the misplaced and forgotten items were of little long-term significance. Everyone misplaces things, even important things. The tragedy is when we lose and misplace ourselves, intending—someday—to make things right.

As a pastor, I know scores of people who are “used-to-be’s.” That is, they are people who used to be committed, faithful Christian. They used to be dependable church members. Perhaps they used to be Sunday School teachers, board members, youth workers, or children’s workers. I know people who used to be ministers, pastors, priests, and even bishops. Some of these people used to be tithers and generous givers. They used to be examples that inspired people. They used to pray. They used to read the Scriptures. They were people upon who the Church could depend. But no more.

Some are pale shadows of who they used to be while others are not who they used to be at all. Somewhere, somehow, they lost themselves in the boxes, and piles, and files of life. They have become, for all practical purposes, of no value. The checks that sat in my cardboard box in the basement office did no one any good. They had potential but not as long as they remained lost. There are those who were once useful, vibrant, even powerful, but have sadly become “used-to-be’s.” You know who you are.

Easter is the highest, holiest day in the Church calendar. It is also the day that most commemorates and celebrates the return of hope to those who had become hopeless. It is a day of being “found.” It is a day where people who have lost themselves and have lost their way can return to God, to Church, and to usefulness.

Be found this Sunday. Hide from God and His purposes for your life no longer. Don’t stay lost in the piles of stuff that life heaps upon you. Go home to Church. If you don’t have one, find one. If you would like an invitation, come to my church—even if only for one Sunday. God will restore you and life will become good again—but you must want to be found. Your file really is marked “Urgent.” Don’t ignore it—please!

David Epps is the pastor of the Cathedral of Christ the King, 4881 Hwy 34 E., Sharpsburg, GA 30277. Easter Sunday Services will be held at 8:00 and 10:00 a.m. (www.ctkcec.org) He is the bishop of the Mid-South Diocese (www.midsouthdiocese.org).

This coming Good Friday, April 6, will mark the 31st Annual Community Good Friday Service in Peachtree City. It is not unusual for churches to celebrate Good Friday. It is not rare for a few churches, usually of like or similar theology, to combine for a Good Friday observance. It is very unusual, however, for very diverse churches to meet together year after year for over three decades. A wonderful anomaly will take place once again next Friday.

Over thirty years ago, a group of pastors, none of whom remain today due to relocation or retirement, met over breakfast to plan a nondenominational Good Friday service that would focus on their common heritage and beliefs while setting aside theological differences and denominational distinctives. The service would include a call to worship, prayers, familiar seasonal music, scripture, and at least seven ministers giving brief meditations on The Seven Last Words from the Cross.

For the past 14 years, Dr. George S. Dillard III, senior pastor at Peachtree City Christian Church, has planned these popular services attended by over 1,000 each Good Friday. This year, Dr. Dillard’s church will host the service. Although, a number of churches hosted the Good Friday Service in the early days, the growth in attendance has restricted where the service may be held. In addition to Peachtree City Christian, the other churches who host the service on a rotating basis are First Baptist Church, First Presbyterian Church, Holy Trinity Catholic Church, and Peachtree City United Methodist Church.

This year’s clergy participants will come from Christ Our Shepherd Lutheran Church, All Saint’s Anglican Church, Southside Church, Peachtree City United Methodist Church, First Baptist Church, First Presbyterian Church, St. Christopher Hellenic Orthodox Church, Peachtree City Christian Church, and Christ the King Charismatic Episcopal Church. In the past, other denominations represented included the Church of Christ, the Episcopal Church, and the Assemblies of God. Diverse indeed.

I, too, will have a part to play in this great event. When I was first invited to participate, I was the newest and youngest pastor. Then I was Luke Skywalker. Now I am more like Yoda, having participated for 29 of the 31 years. Not that I am wise—just older.

There will be an offering which, as it has for many years, will go to support the worthy work of Fayette Samaritans. The Kiwanis Club of Peachtree City will be there too, serving as ushers. The service is open to all regardless of church membership or lack of same. Catholics, Protestants, Evangelicals, Charismatics, Independents, Sacramentalists, and more, all worshipping together and, on the essentials, united—if even for a short while. For an hour to an hour and a half, beginning at noon on Good Friday, I can imagine that God smiles. You, too, are invited to come!

David Epps is the pastor of the Cathedral of Christ the King, 4881 Hwy 34 E., Sharpsburg, GA 30277. Services are held Sundays at 8:30 and 10:00 a.m. (www.ctkcec.org) He is the bishop of the Mid-South Diocese (www.midsouthdiocese.org) and is the mission pastor of Christ the King Fellowship in Champaign, IL. He may be contacted at frepps@ctkcec.org.

All ages welcome!

Join us for fun!

Please bring 12 stuffed eggs to church between now and Sunday, April 1.

(No chocolate, please!)

We need volunteers to help! Please e-mail Michelle Handley at mhandley14@gmail.com.

God has had a very clear plan and Richard and Sallie pray together to submit to it. They moved to Peachtree City from Long Island in 2006. They had come to Georgia for Memorial Day weekend, bought their house after only one day of looking and the following day attended a Memorial Day observation in PTC where Bishop David Epps spoke. They were excited to learn of and join Eagle’s Nest Christian Home Educators Association. On Long Island they were one of only two home school families.

Sallie’s educational background, at Southern Virginia Women’s College and State University of NY at Stonybrook, as well as her professional experience is in early childhood education and the education of the handicapped. For almost 10 yrs. Sallie was a special education team-teacher in the public school system on Long Island, NY. Later, living outside of Wash. DC, she was hired by an education company to direct one of their private schools. After a few months she was promoted to Program Coordinator, where it was her job to write the curriculum for the four schools owned by that company. Shortly thereafter she was brought onto the small team managing the four schools and opening two additional schools. She acted as interim director for the new schools while training directors to take over. She trained the teachers in the curriculum she’d written and led parenting workshops in the Maryland-DC area. More recently, at her parents’ (former) church, she co-founded and opened St. Paul’s Episcopal Day School in Conway, SC.

The Metzgers have home schooled since Thomas was 7 yrs. old. These days Sallie home schools their three boys and helps her husband run Brooks Vacuum Shop in downtown Newnan. Last January (2011) her beloved Dad, her hero, went home to be with Jesus. They are blessed now to have Sallie’s mom living and worshipping with them. Sallie is involved with The Order of St. Luke healing ministry and is a prayer minister on Sunday mornings. She says she feels a very strong call to Jesus’ healing ministry and is especially pulled to inner healing. Sallie is also involved, along with Deacon Tony McGee, in Monday night Prayer and Praise at CTK. She’s been singing all of her life, training as a teen, under voice coaches who were Broadway performers. She says she loves to sing, especially to God, and felt blessed to sing with the Worship Team recently. She says she’d like to be able to join them again from time to time, “maybe for special occasions to bring glory to God and honor to my parents for paying for the lessons!” She loves cooking, writing, flower gardening and is much enamored with butterflies –watching, drawing, painting and photographing them.

When she underwent treatment for Stage 3a breast cancer in 2010, she spent a great deal of time with God in prayer. It was a time He taught her things she’d not otherwise have learned – showed her things she may not have otherwise taken the time to see. His Word says to “Come and let us reason together.” (Isaiah 1:18) And she did. She told Him she didn’t want to die but to “live and declare the works of the LORD.” (Psalm 118:17) Sallie knew He told her that she was healed and that He was doing a new thing; that He had work for her to do. Sallie tells of visions of the women of CTK as an army, walking in lock-step with the Holy Spirit; of healing that would come to our church through the women; that He considers the women of CTK His handmaiden! “Behold the handmaiden of the LORD.” (Luke 1:38)

Women’s Ministry is a new direction to Sallie, but she trusts God’s call, His grace and His guidance. He has already blessed her with some ideas, a few helpers, a lot of passion and love for Him and a heart for our church family. Sallie says she has always been “a high-energy, super-organized person. Since I’ve come through all the treatments for breast cancer and am one year into my five-year medicine, my energy level isn’t what it was and I often don’t feel as good as maybe I could. But I will trust my church family to extend grace and to undergird me with prayer. I am so excited to be your servant and His.”

Plans are underway for a Martha and Mary’s Ministry, monthly Women’s meetings, Bible studies, a book club, Proverbs 31 Ministry, social activities and fellowship opportunities.

While attending a meeting in Orlando a few days ago, one of the speakers used the term, “sponge people.” I had never heard the term before. He went on to explain that sponge people are those who get close to you and then suck and drain all the life out of you. Like sponges, they absorb whatever you have in you without giving anything back. The meeting consisted primarily of pastors and I saw nods of recognition and agreement all over the room.

Strangely, the first thought I had was not of the sponge people I have known, and there have been many. My first thought was, “I wonder if I am a sponge person?” As a pastor of some 40 years, I have always thought of myself as an encourager, a lifter-up of people, a sort of coach who says, “You can do this, I believe in you, now go get ‘em!” But, I wondered, am I still? Or have I morphed into a sponge person?

There is no doubt that the strain and grind of 40 years of dealing with people and problems has taken a toll. While there have been marvelous victories and times of exhilaration, there have also been down days and difficult people. I have known my share of sponge people. Sometimes they are easily recognizable as those who gripe, complain, gossip, and criticize. Other times, the sponge people are more subtle. The common thread is that they drain you without ever giving anything back.

Sponge people beget sponge people. A sponge person can befriend a positive, encouraging individual and slowly drain the life and vitality out of them. When these people are drained it is very easy for them to be drainers of people too. So, I wondered, am I still an encourager or am I a sponge person?

I hope that I am an encourager of people, but it’s important that I do an examination of myself. As I have done just that, I am a bit concerned. When I leave a room, do I leave it better or do I leave it worse off? In discussions where there are differences of opinion do I see the good in the plans or am I always seeing the down side? When I am engaging in conversation with someone, do I leave them encouraged or are they discouraged as a result of my presence and words? Do I bring with me a ray of sunshine or a cloud of gloom? Are people glad to see me or do they inwardly groan?

It probably, I have concluded, depends on who you ask. Still, if even one person sees me as a sponge person, that is one too many. In some ways, I come from a line of negative thinkers. My mother, God rest her soul, could always find the cloud in every silver lining and my dad (God rest his soul as well) always encouraged me to consider the worst case scenario as I embarked on my plans. I was programmed to lean to the negative side. Most of my life, with the help of good people, I have been able to reject much of that programming.

I have decided that I refuse to be a sponge person. It will probably take some work for I fear I have occasionally given into the dark side of negativism which is a sure sign that sponge people have been at work somewhere. When I think clearly, I can see the good, the beautiful, the hopeful, the delightful, the positive, and the greatness in people. When I give in to the dark side, I become critical, negative, and a pain in the neck to be around. It ought not to be so.

There is too much good and too much God in people and in the world to give in to sponge people. And to become a sponge person is a great waste. The world is full of takers but it is the givers who accomplish great things. With God’s help, I can do this.

David Epps is the pastor of the Cathedral of Christ the King, 4881 Hwy 34 E., Sharpsburg, GA 30277. Services are held Sundays at 8:30 and 10:00 a.m. (www.ctkcec.org) He is the bishop of the Mid-South Diocese (www.midsouthdiocese.org)