[Oe List ...] Thanks for the Memories

[Karen Snyder]

When I read John Epps’ remarks titled “Thanks for the Memories,” a small echo rang in my head. I recalled he had thanked colleagues before in a talk he gave sometime in the late 1970s. Scouring the archives database, Karen found what I was looking for. 
 
John was assigned to deliver a talk on “The Life of Destiny” at a Guardians meeting. I was present for the talk and in re-reading it now, a couple of things struck me. John, surprise-surprise, had a 4 X 4 outline. He did a marvelous thing with the first three points. Instead of describing his own theological insights (which as we all recall, were numerous if not a little mysterious), he pointed back to the talks and reports given by others up to that point in the weekend meeting. That way, he reinforced and celebrated the contributions of his colleagues. I have often utilized that technique ever since.
 
Here is the pivotal pearl of his talk (slightly abridged for clarity):
The other thing we need to know and be aware of as we give the gift of destiny to people for the sake of their profound humanness is that it means also giving up your death, in the sense that death is no longer - once one is a person of destiny - it is no longer an option to at least be let alone to die peacefully. Even death becomes a sign. Even that becomes a tool, a vehicle, a device that history uses for the sake of its creative movement. That is what we are doing to folks.
 
The impact of this remark is accented when one realizes that right before John came on stage to deliver his talk on the Life of Destiny, institute founder and dean Joe Mathews had completed his life that noon, Sunday, October 16, 1977. 

Well, John nailed it, didn’t he? And all I can say is, John, you have fulfilled your destinal gift as well, brother; we’ll never forget the sign you have been to us.



Jim Troxel
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