Author’s note: This series is a largely autobiographical “Cliff Notes” version of my family’s journey. I realize that it may not appeal to many, but this little exercise at least keeps me from writing about the 2024 election for now.
We sold our second car, packed the newer one, loaded up the rental truck and, a day or so after Christmas1980, began our 1,680-mile road trek to Grand Junction, CO. I drove the truck; my wife, over six months pregnant, drove the car, and the two boys, Jason, 8, and John, 6, each rode with one of us.
I would be one of six associate ministers serving the Senior Pastor, Rev. Clarence Cope, who served the people of First Assembly of God, at the time, the largest church of any denomination between Denver and Salt Lake City. I, like the others, reported to Pastor Cope who met with us one morning a week and then we all went to lunch together.
My assignment was as the Minister of Outreach. I was on probation for six months and would be responsible for writing and implementing my own job description. By this time, at age 30, I had learned that my primary job was (1) to keep the boss happy and (2) make him look good. Certainly, I served the church and God, but, as one under authority, I tried to keep in mind those two most important roles as an associate minister.
Pastor Cope, while he had firm expectations, gave me remarkable freedom to “reach out” to the members of the church and especially to the residents in Mesa County. We would only spend 2 1/2 years in Colorado but it was a busy, formative, and tremendously satisfying time in my ministry. The rest of the staff — pastoral, administrative, and support — were wonderful to work with and members of the church pitched in to make things succeed.
Conscious of being under probation, I took on two assigned responsibilities and instituted a new ministry. First, the church conducted either one or two nursing home services a week. Before the probationary period ended, we increased that number to nine weekly services with some 400 patients in attendance.
Secondly, I was given responsibility for the Chi Alpha group, originally a college group, but now a ministry at First Assembly for young adults, mostly single, aged 18-35. More about that later.
I also started a karate team. I was a black belt in Okinawan Isshin-Ryu karate and had earlier established “karate ministries,” in both Tennessee and Virginia. The target age was youth and children, but we also received adults. The youth pastor, Randy Popineau, was a student in the classes but was also the chaplain for the team.
This would become the largest team I had up to that time, with 40-50 participants at any given time.The students were motivated, parents were supportive, and the church members mostly curious, but accepting. We practiced weekly, promoted deserving students up the ranks, and participated in karate tournaments in Colorado.
In March of 1981, James was born on a Sunday morning. Eventually, Cindy went to work as a registered nurse at one of the local hospitals. The older boys were enrolled in public school and life was good.
The Chi Alpha group had twelve members that met at night in a Sunday School room at the church. Part of my mandate was to grow that group. After a year, the average attendance remained at twelve. It was time for our vacation so, using all our savings, we bought tickets for the family and flew to Kingsport, TN for a two-week reunion with family. While there, I tested for and received a higher degree black belt.
Upon our return, I discovered that the Chi Alpha group had increased to eighteen which prompted one guy to say, “Maybe you should go on vacation again.” A young twenty-something man with long curly blond hair soon joined the group.
He was a new Christian and had been a musician, a guitarist, in rock and roll bands, I had been (poorly) leading Chi Alpha worship with my 12-string guitar and I asked him to help. He declined, saying that the guitar “had been his god” and he was through with it. He had “laid it down.”
Some weeks later, I approached him again and asked him to pray about taking up the guitar again “for the glory of God” to lead people in worship of Him. He did and felt that he could take up the guitar under the conditions I outlined. It was a pivotal momen tthat would radically change the scope and ministry of Chi Alpha. It would also be part of the very earliest ministry of John Cappetto.
John would be one of a number of Chi Alpha members who would be leaders in the group and would later become church and civic leaders, one of them becoming the mayor of Grand Junction. Another couple would become career missionaries.
As the group grew, it moved into a larger Sunday School room. When it outgrew that, it changed nights and moved into the church cafeteria. Eventually, Chi Alpha met in the sanctuary of the church and from, or with the cooperation of, the group for new ministries were launched.
John recruited people like himself, rock ‘n rollers, who had either become Christians or those he led to Christ, and formed a band named “Hundredfold.” Now Chi Alpha had a worship band. The members of the band also wrote music and would cut a record album of contemporary Christian music, also known as “Christian Rock.” I still have a copy of that album.
Out of Chi Alpha would come “Solid Rock Productions” which would bring a number of Christian bands to Grand Junction and regularly see over 500 young people and young adults attend the concerts and “walk the aisles.” We also brought Christian singer Don Francisco, winner of two Dove awards, for the1980 song of the year (for “He’s Alive”), and for the 1980 Songwriter of the year, twice to Grand Junction.
Sponsored by the church, a weekly Christian radio program on a secular station, would air, disc-jockeyed by Chi Alpha member Steve Faulkner, who had a great energy and personality for the program.
The group, which initially included twelve people, would take on a tremendous project, in cooperation with other ministries of the church, which would affect hundreds of citizens of Mesa County. It would have its foundation in a problem surrounding two men in wheelchairs.
TO BE CONTINUED…
[David Epps is the Rector of the Cathedral of Christ the King (www.ctk.life). Worship services are on Sundays at 10:00 a.m. and on livestream at www.ctk.life. He is the bishop of the Diocese of the Mid-South (www.midsouthdiocese.life). He has been a weekly opinion columnist for The Citizen for over 27 years. He may be contacted at davidepps@ctk.life]
