Tulsa Christian Fellowship (TCF) will celebrate 50 years in a special November 3 service, at 10 a.m., to mark a half-century since the church’s first meeting on November 2, 1969, in rented space at Wright Junior High School.

TCF was founded by a group of people who left another Tulsa church to enable them to continue ministry to the “hippies” and (some homeless) young people on a stretch of South Peoria Avenue, then called “the restless ribbon.” The new church asked Bill Sanders, recently fired from that same large Tulsa church, to serve as pastor of the new fellowship.

In the years since its founding, TCF has served locally and internationally, with local outreach, evangelism, discipleship, and world missions. In its 50 years of existence, the church has sent missionaries to more than 45 nations around the world, with multiple missionaries in a half-dozen countries. The church currently has 12 missionary singles or families (all of whom attended TCF prior to going overseas) in places as diverse as Tajikistan, India, Japan and Honduras, including three career missionaries who’ve been on the foreign mission field for over 40 years.

As the church developed a team-leadership approach in the 1980s, the church’s first pastor, Bill Sanders, continued to serve in leadership until 1996, and he passed away in 2011.

TCF moved into its current location at 2121 E Third St, Tulsa, in November 1980, after meeting in rented school buildings its first 11 years. The church met, in various times, at Wright Junior High School, East Central High School, and Edison High School.

TCF is now led by a 10-man leadership team.

For more information, go to www.tulsachrisianfellowship.com.