Seven of the people died last year were important in my life, and I want to give testimony.
Bill Sapp was husband to my sister Debbie. He died in 2023, but the memorial service launched the new year on January 6, 2024, in Lexington. He was a seminary graduate and a well-known pastoral counselor. I delivered the funeral message, and you can read it here.
Tanner White, only 36 years old, died by accident at his home in Tampa. Florida. He was one of the first young college graduates to contact me in 2009 and say, “I want to be a part of the Academy of Preachers.” At the time of his death on June 10, he was married with two small children, pastor of a United Methodist Church, and an employee of Raymond James.
Ten days later, Willie Mays died. Many people consider him the most complete and competent athlete to ever play baseball in the United States. I only know he was the superstar of my boyhood and the inspiration of any athletic ambition I harbored. I played Little League center field, as did Mays: he is famous for his over-the-head catch, while I am forgotten for the fly ball that bounced off my head and over the fence.
On June 20, my Aunt Martha Ross Redden Ozer died, in Washington DC. She had married my mother’s brother (who, in turn, died in a car accident in 1969). She finished her education, moved to DC, married a surgeon named Mark Ozer, and made her mark around the country and even the globe as an advocate for handicapped people. I had a special relationship with her and loved her much.
Kris Kristofferson died on September 28 somewhere in Hawaii. He was 88 years old and for most of those years he was unknown to me. Late in my life, as I began to embrace some segments of country music, I discovered him and began listening. His role in discovering and promoting John Prine endeared him to me. I would like to have met him.
I met Tony Campolo once, when I brought him to Georgetown College to speak in chapel. I wrote about this, and you can read it here. I’m not the only preacher, young and old, who was influenced by the spiritual vision and preaching style of this professor of sociology. He died on November 19.
Then, two days before the year ran out, Jimmy Carter died. We were not friends, but I did meet him twice, shaking hands and exchanging greetings. Both of these occasions were in religious meetings, which does not surprise anybody. He was, throughout my lifetime, the most famous and influential American Christian, known around the world for his faith and practice of the religion of Jesus.
I honor each of these and thank God for their presence in my life in one way or another. I am richer and better for it; I give thanks to God, even as I contemplate who among us might be on a list like this on New Years Day of 2025. May we all live this year to the glory of God and the common good.
