JENKS—In Paul’s second letter to Timothy, he challenged Timothy to make more disciples and to teach others how to make disciples. Disciple making has become a mainstay of Christian ministry and helps to fulfill the Great Commission given to Christ’s followers.
This pattern of disciple making is still a focus today, including in churches like Jenks, First, led by pastor Cody Brumley. In recent years, Brumley has even further emphasized making disciples, a craft he refined while serving at Little Rock, Immanuel, Ark.
In his ministry career, Brumley has served in a variety of roles, including two separate tenures at Jenks, First. Brumley’s first church role was serving as a janitor at Collinsville, Eastside, where his father was pastor. Following this, he served at Tulsa Community College as Baptist Collegiate Ministry (BCM) director. During this time, he and his wife, Breanna, were invited to attend Jenks, First. Brumley felt the call to student ministry but was unsure how to pursue the calling since the church already had a student ministry pastor.
Not long after, the student minister moved away and Rick Frie, the pastor of Jenks, First, and the church asked Brumley to serve on staff as student minister.
From 2012 to 2015, Brumley served in youth ministry until he moved into an executive pastor role for Jenks, First. Brumley loved serving alongside the Jenks, First family and with his wife Breanna, pioneered an emphasis on foster care in the church that continues to this day.
In 2019, Brumley was called out of state to serve as pastor of ministries and missions at Little Rock, Immanuel, Ark. For Brumley’s family, leaving Jenks and the state of Oklahoma which he had known for all his life, was a difficult decision. But one he felt God had called him to make.
“Deciding to leave Jenks to go serve at another church in another state was one of the hardest things we’d ever done,” said Brumley. “Our family had grown there. We’d grown with the church, but God just made it abundantly clear that we needed to go.” Brumley and his wife have three children, and they enjoyed their time serving in Arkansas. During this time, Brumley also completed a ministry degree with Midwestern Seminary.
Three years later, when Frie announced his retirement as pastor at Jenks, First, he and the church’s leaders felt led to ask Brumley to consider returning home and take the position as senior pastor.
Brumley felt led to accept and came back to Oklahoma. Frie made plans for a retirement process in which there would be overlap between himself and Brumley serving. In 2022, Brumley took on the position full-time, and the church hasn’t missed a beat.
With a 111-year-old history, Jenks, First has a long line of people who are on mission for Christ. Because of this, moving from one generation to the next has never been a hurdle, by God’s grace.
“The people in this church really love the Word and love their neighbors,” said Brumley. “There’s consistently been people in this church who are missional in their following Jesus. They want to see the Gospel impact others.”
Two of Jenks’ top priorities are prayer and disciple making. Numerous prayer programs and discipleship groups have been formed and are already producing fruit in answered prayers and new disciples who go on to start their own discipleship groups. Due to their success, other churches have turned to Jenks, First for guidance in similar programs. Jenks, First is also a leader in Cooperative Program giving and missions.
“I just love the Biblical idea of churches helping other churches accomplish the mission,” said Brumley. “How we see Paul navigating church partnerships so other churches can be empowered and so other nations can be reached.”
As Brumley looks to the future, he feels grateful that God has brought him full circle back to Oklahoma, where he’s serving in the Kingdom of God—and where he’s helping make disciples.
