ABOUT US

Thomas First United Methodist Church is located three blocks North of Highway 33 in Thomas, Oklahoma.

Our worship draws from strong Christian tradition. Our Sanctuary features a large Latin Cross at the front along with purple and gold stained glass. Each week you will hear the magnificent sounds of the organ and piano ring throughout the gorgeous pine vaulted ceiling.

We believe we are a community faith called to share the Love and Good News of Christ with all persons that we meet. We are a deep rooted church with a close connection to the town, school, and agriculture.

THOMAS FUMC HISTORY

The desire to worship and provide religious training for their children brought early settlers together to share their common faith. While a group of settlers South and East of Sugar Loaf Mound were building a small Methodist Church, another group several miles north were meeting in a brush arbor, until driven into a dugout by cold weather. Con Kutch, a circuit rider authorized to assist in starting new churches, help the latter group organize a United Brethren Church in 1894.

In 1902, the Oklahoma Railway Co. of Trenton, Missouri in an effort to help build the new town of Thomas, Oklahoma Territory, gave two lots to each of the United Brethren and the Methodist. Using donated property, the United Brethren completed the new church for their thirty members in April 1903 and moved from their location north of Thomas. In the same year the Methodists were building a church on their two lots that was completed in October with the help of some of the member of the Mound Church.

In 1946, the United Brethren and Evangelical Churches united and became known as the Evangelical United Brethren Church. In the late 1960’s through the annual conferences of the Evangelical United Brethren and Methodist Churches, the two churches were united and became the United Methodist Church. This union became a reality in Thomas on May 12, 1968, when the two local churches were joined to become the First United Methodist Church.

MISSION & BELIEFS

We are a local church of The United Methodist Church. Our denomination is worldwide with over 8 million members. Our connection to other United Methodists is one of our greatest strengths in that we are able to provide ministry to a great variety of places and people around the globe!

Our beliefs are Trinitarian in that we believe that God is Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

John Wesley, an 18th century Anglican priest, was the founder of Methodism.

We follow his emphasis on grace which was three-fold:

Prevenient Grace is the belief that God seeks after us before we are aware of God.
Justifying Grace is the belief that we are made right with God through faith in Jesus Christ.
Sanctifying Grace is the belief that the above faith leads us to seek to become more Christ-like in our daily living.

We seek to become more Christ-like through following Wesley’s three General Rules:

Do no harm.
Do all the good one can.
Continue to work on our relationship with God.

As we try to discern God’s will for our lives, we do so prayerfully, using a disciplined approach we refer to as the “Wesleyan Quadrilateral.” This fourfold method begins with Scripture and illuminates it with:

Tradition – Church traditions and writings such as the Apostles’ Creed but also recent church writings such as our United Methodist Book of Discipline or Book of Resolutions.
Experience – Our religious experiences of what we believe God is calling us to do. As we believe that God permeates our lives, we may often broaden what we tend to think of as religious experiences.
Reason – God has given us minds with which to use. Our reason allows us to interpret scripture or life issues utilizing other scripture, tradition and experience. We don’t believe in checking our brains at the door when we enter the sanctuary.

Our denominational beliefs are found more thoroughly here:

http://www.umc.org/what-we-believe/basics-of-our-faith