A Name Rooted in Angus Acres

Angus Church is a Southern Baptist congregation tucked into the Angus Acres neighborhood of Sand Springs, a community that straddles Tulsa County just across the Arkansas River from the city of Tulsa. The building sits on South 129th West Avenue, and the church carries a name that reminds longtime residents of the area's rural past. The FAQ explains it plainly: the neighborhood may once have been cattle pasture, but it now holds a network of residential streets, ministries, a playground, and Angus Valley Elementary. The church sits in the middle of all of that growth, and its name simply tells newcomers where the building stands.

Angus Church has been part of Sand Springs for over fifty years, and many of the families on roll can trace their roots to the same Charles Page High School classrooms. Several of the pastors are Sand Springs lifers who came of age in those hallways and later returned to the same church.

Sunday: Groups at Nine, Worship at Ten-Thirty

The rhythm of a Sunday at Angus is consistent and easy to follow. Doors open at 9 a.m. for Angus Groups, the church's version of Sunday school. Classes run at the same hour from the nursery through senior adults. The church calls these groups "the heart of ministry," because this is where relationships begin and deeper discipleship takes root.

At 10:30 a.m. the whole church gathers for the worship service. A typical service includes prayer, praise, preaching, testimonies, response, and giving. The church's FAQ describes the design this way: each element of the service is meant to be an act of worship directed toward God, not toward the people in the room, and not for show.

The preaching style is described as verse-by-verse, or exegetical, which is a way of saying line by line through a book of the Bible, teaching what the text means in context and listening for how its truths fit into daily life. The pastors work through books, currently moving through Matthew in a series titled "Kingdom Life" and "The King Has Come," and only occasionally step out for a topical series such as the Christmas or Easter seasons.

Worship That Welcomes Every Voice

The music at the 10:30 service leans contemporary. Praise songs are the main fare, with hymns and older songs folded in regularly. Sunday evening services, when they happen, pull primarily from the hymn book. During the contemporary sets the house lights are dimmed and the volume of the praise team is set high enough to carry the room, so that anyone who wants to lift their voice can do so without feeling watched. The room, the church explains, is meant to encourage everyone to engage in worship however they feel led.

The dress code is as casual as the music. Visitors show up in everything from jeans and a t-shirt to dresses and suits. As one of the pastors puts it in the FAQ, "God is much more concerned about our hearts than our clothes. We aren't real worried about clothes either. We just ask that you wear some when you come!"

Children: The Mix

Angus Church pours a great deal of energy into children. The Mix, as the children's ministry is called, runs Sunday morning classes at 9 a.m. for infants through fifth grade. During the 10:30 worship service, children through fifth grade have their own classes in the children's wing. Wednesday nights from 6:30 to 8 p.m. add another hour of activities for kindergarten through fifth graders, with games, scripture memory, and a focused time of teaching.

The conviction underneath the programming is that children are capable of far more than the world usually gives them credit for. The church teaches the Bible using age-appropriate methods, holds that nine out of ten people come to faith before they turn eighteen, and welcomes children into the same Spirit-filled life as everyone else. Students from the same classes can regularly be seen reading Scripture on stage, running sound, and greeting visitors at the front door.

Brittany Stowe, wife of Pastor Jordan, leads MomCo on the first and third Wednesdays of the month, with morning sessions from 9:30 to 11 a.m. and an evening option from 6:30 to 8 p.m. MomCo is open to every kind of mother, and free childcare is offered during the morning session. Gatherings mix practical teaching, video, and conversation with refreshments, and are designed to draw women into honest friendships across generations of motherhood.

Students and Young Adults

Nexus, the student ministry for sixth through twelfth graders, meets Wednesday nights from 6:30 to 8 p.m. and Sunday mornings from 9 to 10 a.m. Each Wednesday includes Bible study, worship, games, and fellowship. Jacob Weber, who became a full-time Youth Minister after serving as a pastoral intern at Angus, oversees both the youth group and the young adults ministry, with a stated emphasis on evangelism.

The church holds a family-centered view of discipleship, teaching that parents are the primary faith trainers of their children, with the church coming alongside. Nexus students regularly join the adult praise team, help on the welcome team, and step into leadership in the children's ministry.

Young Adults gathers Monday nights at 6:30 p.m. The group studies the Bible, prays, eats meals, and spends time together, and members regularly head out for movies, dinners, or just coffee. The ministry is open to anyone who wants to grow alongside peers navigating the same season of life.

Angus Disciple Institute

For adults who want more than a Sunday morning, the Angus Disciple Institute meets on select Sunday evenings at 5 p.m. in the youth room. Topics rotate through a slate of eight core classes: hermeneutics, the reliability of Scripture, biblical finance, apologetics, evangelism, natural science and the Bible, how to spend time with God, marriage and family, and gender and the Bible. A yearly flex class fills the ninth slot, with subjects chosen by the pastors as the need arises.

Each of the eight core classes plus the flex class meets one Sunday night a month over nine months, and attendance earns a certificate of program graduation. Students who want even more depth can pair the ADI classes with free "For the Church" courses offered through Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary; completing that two-to-three-year sequence results in joint graduation and training certificates from both Midwestern and Angus Church, along with continuing education credit from the seminary.

Angus Cares and the Local Mission

Thursday nights at 5:30 p.m. the church loads up and heads into the Shannon Valley Manufactured Home Community, where a weekly hot dinner is served to the residents. Beth Conley coordinates the outreach. The dinner table doubles as a listening post, a place where the church meets its neighbors and looks for ways to share the love of Christ more broadly.

Angus Cares gathers all of the church's outreach work under one umbrella. The church gives regular financial support to Oklahoma Baptists, the Tulsa Metro Baptist Network, New Life Ranch, The Spring (formerly DaySpring Villa), His Open Door, the Baptist Collegiate Ministries, the Sand Springs Local Church Network, and a long list of other partners. An online Angus Cares form is open to anyone with an idea for reaching the community, and to anyone in the community who needs help.

From Sand Springs to Manila, Cochabamba, and Beyond

Local outreach extends outward in concentric circles of mission. Angus Church has long-standing ties to mission work in Piedras Negras, Mexico, through Vine and Branches Ministries. The congregation partners with Light Ministries in East Africa and with Iglesia Génesis Cochabamba in Bolivia. The newest overseas partnership is with World Family Missions and Pastor Mike and Sarah Jones, who lead a ministry in Manila called Portion that serves children and families in need.

Each year the church sends two or three short-term teams overseas. A Kenya trip in early September, a Philippines trip in October, and a recurring Mexico trip in the spring together make up the rotation. Applications are due early in the year, and trips generally host around two dozen participants at a time.

In Cleveland, Oklahoma, about thirty miles southwest of Sand Springs, Angus Church has helped plant Hope Church. Pastors Brandon and Candace Morton, who have lived and worked in Cleveland for twelve years, lead the work, with the support and finances of the Sand Springs church behind them.

The Nexus Fireworks Stand

Each summer from late June through the Fourth of July weekend the student ministry runs a fireworks stand at the corner of 41st and 129th in Prattville, just south of the church. All proceeds go to students so they can attend camp and other events. The stand has grown into an outreach tool as well as a fundraiser. Sales conversations lead to prayers and testimonies shared in a parking lot, and people have come to faith in Christ at the stand who thought they were simply there to buy a fuse.

What Angus Church Believes

Angus Church holds to the Baptist Faith and Message 2000, the confession adopted by the Southern Baptist Convention. The church is in formal partnership with Oklahoma Baptists, the North American Mission Board, the International Mission Board, and the Tulsa Metro Baptist Network. Core teachings include the full authority and trustworthiness of Scripture; salvation by grace through faith in Jesus Christ alone; the priesthood of all believers; and the two biblically recognized church offices of elder and deacon. The office of elder is also called pastor, overseer, bishop, or shepherd, all of which describe the same role in the New Testament. Angus Church calls its teaching and counseling pastors "pastor/elders," and other staff who lead specific ministries are called "ministers" because every believer is a minister of the gospel.

Pastors and Staff

Jordan Stowe was voted in as senior pastor in January 2019 after serving as co-pastor of Springs of Life Church in Colorado Springs. While in Colorado Springs he also ran an inner-city children's ministry that saw more than six hundred people put their faith in Christ. Jordan currently serves as president of the Tulsa Metro Baptist Network, co-chairs the Church Health Team for that same network, and helps the Oklahoma Baptist State Convention develop church revitalization processes. He and his wife, Brittany, are raising four boys in the area and are known around town for their love of the Oklahoma City Thunder, the Oklahoma Sooners, and just about any excuse to be outdoors.

Wade Leslie, pastor/elder for groups and counseling, has deep Sand Springs roots. He and his wife, Sallye, were married in this church in 1985, raised four children here, later served as house parents at the Sand Springs Home for twelve years, and returned in 2017. The Leslies now have nine children and multiple grandchildren, and Sallye serves as the church administrator.

Jacob Weber stepped into the youth ministry role after serving as a pastoral intern at Angus. He leads both the middle and high school ministry and the young adults ministry. Charles Thomas leads the praise team and shapes the music ministry week by week. Morgan McCallie directs the children's ministry, coordinating lessons, volunteers, and the weekly schedule.

A Church That Meets People in Many Places

Beyond the building on South 129th West Avenue, Angus Church meets people in homes, on Monday nights, on Thursday evenings in Shannon Valley, in online small groups, and through a podcast feed that makes the church's preaching available on YouTube Podcasts, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, and Audible. Sermons are posted online each week, and giving can be done online as well. Whether someone drops in for a Sunday morning, joins a MomCo session, sends their student to Nexus on Wednesday night, or simply listens to the teaching from another town, the same line-by-line approach to Scripture carries through everything Angus Church does.