Friday, June 27, 2003
Friday, June 27, 2003 |
| Thanks
for a great 20 years, and more to come
By DAVID EPPS This month has been an anniversary for my family and me. In June 1983, 20 years ago this month, we arrived in the Fayette/Coweta area from Colorado to assume the pastorate of a 4-year old-congregation. I was 32, my wife a year younger. Jason was 11, John was 8, and James was 2. Now Jason, 31, is married, a Georgia State grad, a police sergeant, and the father of a girl, 8, and a boy, 6. John is 28, married, works in Atlanta, and is the father of four children (two boys and two girls). Both own their own home. James is 22 and a senior airman stationed in San Antonio, Texas. All my sons grew up as Georgians, although the older two were born in Tennessee with the younger joining the family in Colorado, and Jason and John married Georgia girls. James is still single, if any young women would like to apply for the job. My wife, Cindy, who had graduated in 1978 with an Associate of Science in Nursing degree from East Tennessee State University, has, in those two decades, earned a BSN from then-West Georgia College and an MSN and a Ph.D. from Georgia State University. She is now an associate professor of nursing at the State University of West Georgia, does teaching at both the baccalaureate and master's degree levels, and presents research in such places at the United States, Canada, Australia, and the Virgin Islands. For my part, I watched that small Assemblies of God congregation grow from about 80 in attendance to a high of 525 (a special Christmas program), with the average Sunday attendance working out to be between 340-400 in my last years there. Fayette Fellowship began in 1979 under Pastor Don Barron and, by the time I arrived, a solid congregation had been established, property had been acquired in Peachtree City, and a 10,000-square-foot building built. After I came on the scene, we purchased the property behind the church and expanded the sanctuary. Later, we acquired 15 acres in Coweta County, build a 25,200 square foot building, changed the name to Trinity Fellowship, and sold the Peachtree City property to Carriage Lane Presbyterian Church who, since then, constructed a new sanctuary. We began a school on that new property, Trinity Christian School, which had an initial enrollment of about 17 kindergarten and first-grade students under Administrator Regina Garrett, and, within a few years, the school expanded to include K-8. Frances Ashe later became the principal of the school and, after I left the church, saw the building of a separate school facility. The school thrives today with several hundred children, including the preschool. In 1989, I became a police chaplain for the Peachtree City Police Department and, in 1993 (after graduating from the police academy in Fulton County in 1992), added the Fayette County Sheriff's Department, the Senoia Police Department, and the Fulton County Public Safety Training Center to my volunteer chaplaincy duties. In 1996, after a prolonged period of prayer, study, and searching, I resigned from Trinity Fellowship and from the Assemblies of God (both wonderful organizations with godly people), after 13 and 19 years respectively, and was ordained to the priesthood of the Charismatic Episcopal Church. In September of that year, with eleven people in addition to my family, I became the founding pastor of Christ the King Church. We began meeting in my living room in Sharpsburg, then moved into the chapel of Carmichael-Hemperley Funeral Home in Peachtree City where we spent the next six years. On Nov. 24, 2002, we moved into our new sanctuary on 11.5 acres of land on Highway 34 and, last Easter Sunday, 253 people worshipped together. I have never been happier and more fulfilled and intend to end my days as the shepherd of this wonderful group of people. Since beginning my present ministry at Christ the King, in addition to my earlier training, I picked up a master of arts in Biblical literature and, with God's help, will receive a doctor of ministry degree next spring from Trinity Episcopal School for Ministry in Ambridge, Penn. In December of 1996, I became a weekly columnist for The Citizen newspapers and have enjoyed sharing my musings, ramblings, and profundities with the tens of thousands of families that live in this wonderful area of the Old South. I think I have become a Georgian. I pull for the Dawgs and the Jackets every autumn whenever they play teams outside the state (the exception being the University of Tennessee; every East Tennessean's blood has an orange tint to it), and, when the two rivals play each other, I pull for the team that has the best shot at a national championship or a good bowl game. I pull for the Falcons and the Hawks too. I gave up on major league baseball after all the strike talk and could give two hoots in a holler about the Braves or any other millionaire's club in the big leagues. All six of my grandchildren were born and baptized in Georgia, so they are the real things, even if I am still considered just a transplant. Thank you, God, for allowing us to come here. And thank you, citizens of Fayette and Coweta counties, for welcoming us for these past 20 years. God bless y'all. [Father David Epps is rector of Christ the King Charismatic Episcopal Church, which meets Sundays at 8 a.m. and 10 a.m. in new facilities on Ga. Highway 34 between Newnan and Peachtree City. He may be contacted at FatherDavidEpps@aol.com.] |