BETHEL MORGAN
“John Morgan is God’s man, not mine. He is God’s. It took me a long time to really give into it because I had him retiring at 50. How old is he now…75! Hello, I missed that, didn’t I!” Bethel Morgan, Senior Pastor John Morgan’s wife, chuckled as she shared, “When John started I don’t know which building project at age 50 I said to him, ‘What?! I thought we were going to be retired?’ He was shocked and said, ‘Bethel, where did you get that idea?’ I said, ‘I don’t know…from everybody else retiring at 50, I thought you would too!’.” She leaned back in her chair and laughed hard. She sighed and said, “Finally I have said, ‘Ok, Lord, he is yours’, but it took me a long time to get to that.”
Bethel leaned forward and sipped some of her coffee from the steaming mug and then carefully placed it back on the coaster. She sat in her favorite green chair that once belonged in her childhood home, in the middle of her beautifully decorated Hacienda home, with rugs spread out over the Spanish tile and surrounded by authentic beautiful pieces of furniture and decor from around the world. The view behind her extended past two large framed family portraits and through large windows to reveal a beautiful tropical lawn. Beyond the lawn a wood dock reaches out over the waters of Galveston Bay. Chacho, the Morgan’s 15-1/2 year old pekinese moseyed into the room and with a grunt lay near the foot of the green chair. She smiled at the old dog, then reached over and picked up her Bible and hymnal that lay open on the side table and laid them on them on her lap.
“When I come to this room, it is early in the morning. I leave all the lights off except for my lamp. John stays in bed asleep and I sit right here in my green chair and drink my first cup of coffee.” She lifts her coffee mug from the coaster and points out, “This is my second one.” Taking a quick sip she continues as she cradles the warm cup hands, “In the mornings I read my Bible and Baptist Hymnal.” She patted the books resting on her lap and added, “This is my morning time with the Lord asking Him to be with me and listening to Him. He gives me all of my ideas in the morning. It’s absolutely my favorite time. I have been doing this for the last ten years. Then I usually text after that.”
Bethel Ann Barcello was born November 1940 in St. Joseph’s Hospital in Houston, Texas. She paused to point out that in her generation many were born at St. Joseph’s, including our Senior Pastor, Dr. John Morgan, who was born two months later in January 1941.
“I have always been Bethel. In the Bible the word means House of God, but it is not quite that holy as to where my mother came up with it. There was a company in Houston called Bethlehem Steel. How did my mother figure out Bethel from Bethlehem Steel?” Laughing she continued, “When I married John, I thought, ‘Bethel Morgan that doesn’t have a ring at all!’” She made a funny face and then said, “That’s when I started going by Beth Morgan. But then as I got older, I liked to be called Bethel.”
Bethel and her brother, Benny, who was fifteen years older, grew up in Galena Park. Her father was an Humble Oil Pipeline worker for over 40 years. They lived in a small company house in Galena Park. One memory from when she was under ten years of age and living in that old house with the attic fan and the humidity, included a mean rooster that would chase her. She would throw the gathered eggs at until her mother finally made chicken and dumplings with him. She laughed as she added, “That was one of the happiest days of my life to have that mean rooster gone.” She still has a fear of birds.
The Barcello family faithfully attended First Baptist Church, Galena Park as far back as Bethel can recall. She vividly remembers attending a revival when she was twelve years old. “I don’t remember who was preaching, but it was very clear to me that God was knocking at my door. That night I invited him to come in to my heart and I was baptized soon after.”
In 1956 they moved to Pasadena, Texas to a new subdivision off of Richey Street. They purchased a little brick house at 2103 Sharon. Bethel’s family immediately visited First Baptist Church, Pasadena (FBC) in search of their new church home. Brother John’s father was pastor. That Sunday afternoon she stopped playing the piano when her mother answered the door to find a group of high school students from FBC. “John remembers me sitting on the piano bench when they came to visit and talk. I had on blue jean shorts. He told me years later he thought my legs were really pretty!” Bethel laughed at the memory.
The Barcellos joined FBC where Bethel was very active in the youth group. She and John would go on group dates with other kids from the FBC youth group. She sipped her cooling coffee as she shared, “Our high schools had proms but they also provided features for those who did not dance. John, as President of the Student Body at Pasadena High School, and some of his friends had a lot to do with that. So in 1959 I was chosen to be South Houston’s first Homecoming Queen, but since we were the first graduating class at South Houston High School, they changed the name to “Anniversary Queen.” I was honored at the South Houston High School banquet as Anniversary Queen and then we went to his banquet at Pasadena High School where he was Student Body President.
In the fall of 1959, John and Bethel attended Baylor University in Waco, Texas. During each summer break from college they returned home where John worked at Champion Paper in Pasadena and Bethel was the receptionist for the original seven NASA astronauts. They graduated in 1963 from Baylor and became engaged after seven years of dating.
They were married by John’s father, Senior Pastor of FBC, L.D. Morgan on June 1, 1963 in the packed sanctuary of FBC. “Our wedding anniversary is June 1 which is the same anniversary as Sagemont Church. I did not like that in the first years because I never got to have an anniversary trip or anything.” She shook her head and said, “Now it doesn’t matter, but then it did.”
The newlyweds lived in an apartment in Pasadena for their first months and during that time Brother John commuted to Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary (SWBTS) in Ft. Worth, Texas. Then they moved to one of the seminary apartments in Ft. Worth. “We could stand in the bathroom and brush our teeth and open the front door. That’s how tiny that little apartment was.” By 1966, Brother John earned a Bachelor of Divinity degree, all the while working part-time jobs and preaching on the weekends. On June 22, 2005, Brother John was awarded the SWBTS National Alumni Association’s Distinguished Alumni Award for his ministry to our Lord and His church.
John and Bethel were 25 years old when they were first approached by FBC. “We were approached prior to that to go to a specific church to come on as pastor, but when he was approached to start this new church, he felt the leadership of God to not accept the first invitation. I was excited. I have always been supportive in whatever he felt led to do. You can ask John, the only problem was when we turned 50 and I thought he was retiring!” She smiled. They never dreamed that little chapel in the rice field would become the mega church that it is 50 years later with a church family of over 20,000. “God led us into that step by step by step.”
Being the pastor’s wife of a small church had its difficulties when her husband was gone much of the time because a senior pastor with a very small staff was expected to do everything. “At the beginning it was very difficult for me with the two boys because Dean was born in 1969 with allergies and Sean developed them at the age of two just as Dean was born. We were at the pediatrician every week. I remembered John’s secretary at that time, Betty Laird, would come over and help me put the boys to bed at night.”
Those days are long past as the boys are grown and married. Now the three grandchildren, Max, Miles and Maris, are involved in the junior high and high school programs at Sagemont. “I am Nuna which means grandmother in the African dialect. John is Pumba like the warthog in The Lion King. I love seeing my grandchildren at Sagemont and being active in leadership roles at their schools. It is a thrill to know that it’s going to be really special to them as they grow older having been there with us at Sagemont. I am so grateful.”
Though public speaking or being center of attention is not her forte, our Senior Pastor’s wife is known for her great hospitality starting at their first home on Sageriver. She claimed, “I am basically a shy person. I was raised in a modest home and even though I am my own person, John has taught me everything to be outgoing. Over the years I have entertained hundreds of people in my home. I always loved it!”
One way that Bethel reaches out to those who come to Sagemont over the years is by being Living Proof of a Loving God to a Watching World. “I am receptive to all people that come in to the church. I want them to feel warm and welcome and that is what I try to be. I love doing that. If someone comes in, I am all energized about showing love and what our church represents to all and for everyone to be comfortable no matter what.”
Bethel has a letter in safe keeping that she received from a teenager who attended Sagemont when they were in the old Chapel. Bethel laughed as she recalled what that letter said: “‘When I saw the pastor’s wife wearing black leather pants I knew I could be a member of this church.’ I don’t imagine there were many other pastor’s wives in black leather pants. It was just a matter of saying that I was down to earth…no pretense.”
Once Bethel, Martha Wessinger and Susan Gadd were the Boogie Woogie girls from Company B. She shook her head at the memory, “We sang it on stage in uniform with all of the motions. That was after we went into The Hall. It was entertainment for some banquet or something. I was probably in my 40s.”
Sunday, October 11, 2015, Bethel was baptized in the new Worship Center. “I felt like I had always stayed in a box and I wanted to be out of the box. I told John that I wanted to be a bolder witness and he said, ‘Wow, that is really being bold’.” She laughed and then continued, “He really quizzed me about it and everything. He knew that I was firm that I believed in my heart what I needed to do. It was all for the glory of God and I wanted to be used to His glory.”
She stopped speaking as the wall clock chimed for the eleven o’clock hour. She then looked down and ran her fingers across the book laying open in her lap. She began to read from the Baptist Hymnal, “They who trust in the Lord shall be as Mt. Zion which cannot be moved but abides forever.” (Psalms 125:1) She looked up as she sang the first verse. “On Christ the solid rock I stand, all other ground is sinking sand, all other ground is sinking sand.” She smiled, “That is my sermon. I come home singing and sit down with my hymn book. With tears coming down I would find songs of strength and healing faith. I don’t have a favorite one. It is whatever God brings to my mind, because they are all God’s Word. My needs God supplies.”
Bethel closed her hymnal and then finished her coffee. After placing the mug back on the coaster, she leaned back in her green chair and said, “I want to say thank you to the church family for allowing me and my family to be who we are. For their love and support through all these years. Especially for the support they have given me and our son Dean the last several years through our health issues. Thank you for the many, many cards and prayers that have been prayed and so many gifts. I only wish I could thank you personally. To God be the glory.”
“What a special and unique group that God has brought together to serve Him and to grow in Him to reach out to so many others. I am so happy to be a part of that. It is a great thrill to me to be celebrating these 50 years. In thinking back to so many people who have touched my life, this is my time to say thank you to all. You will never know how much you have touched my life in every way.
“A final word. There are no words to express the appreciation to church leadership and for the church family providing John with the support staff that surrounds us. We know that God led the Sagemont family to the individuals and families that we affectionately refer to as ‘Sagemont Church Staff.’ They are certainly the best staff any pastor and church ever assembled. They are our extended family and John and I are so grateful for their love and support.”
SEAN AND DEAN MORGAN
Brother John and Bethel’s two sons, Sean Hunter and Dean Fisher Morgan, were raised here at Sagemont Church. Sean was born in October 1967, a year after Sagemont Church began and Dean two years later in November 1969. Both boys were born at Bayshore Hospital in Pasadena, Texas and brought to the family home located at 11227 Sageriver Drive. The boys spent every Sunday morning, Sunday evening and Wednesday evening in the church nursery located in the long main hallway leading out from what we now know as The Hall.
“Sagemont Church is so woven into my life. Growing up at Sagemont, if the church was open we were here. If there was something else going on like a banquet, a wedding or funeral we were here, too.” Sean smiled as he recalled, “If I am in the mood, I will walk those old hallways and step into the rooms and let the memories just flood in. In particular, I remember being about three or four years old in the room right across from the water fountain and bathrooms. I remember the toys and the coat racks in the corner that were the perfect height to hit you in the head. At one point every boy that I knew hit that stinkin’ coat rack.” He laughed as he continued, “In that same room in the corner right by the door there was a table. Kids kept hitting the corner so they cut a 45 degree piece off and they put a bumper on the end, but everybody hit that with their heads too.”
Sean attended kindergarten and first grade at Stuchbery Elementary School on Hughes Road across the street from the old Chapel. His first grade teacher was Sagemont member, Judy Bowers. When Sean was in second grade and Dean in kindergarten, the Morgan family moved to the back of Sagemont neighborhood on Sagedowne Drive at Blackhawk Blvd. They both finished their elementary school years at Frazier Elementary then went on to Thompson Intermediate.
Sean shared what he, Dean and several of the other eight to twelve year old children did while their parents were in choir practice led by Sagemont’s first full time Music Minister, Rick Wessinger. “There wasn’t any childcare, so we got to do whatever we wanted…that is as long as we didn’t get caught. One of our favorite things to do, as kids, was to go upstairs to the Z-Hall. Of course it wasn’t the Z-hall to us; it was the Spook Hall. As you know, there are no windows up there! So the fun thing was to turn off all the lights.” Sean held his hand out in front of his face and explained, “There is a portion of the Z-Hall that is so dark we literally couldn’t see our hand in front of our face if we got the door shut and got all the lights off. It was pitch black. You might as well be in Carlsbad Caverns!”
He laughed and then continued, “If we went down to the old Fellowship Hall, which is above the old Chapel, there was what we called Blood Hall. Because at the end of that hall, in the early years, there was a stained glass window where a street light would pour in through that red glass if all the lights were off inside. To a kid, it was scary to see this eerie red light pouring down the hall. Sean laughed and stated, “That was some of the fun times.”
Dean chuckled as he shared his thoughts about the Z-Hall, “That was the best place for hide-and-seek in the world with all the long hallways and closed doors. We would get in trouble by the janitors ALL THE TIME. I am sure they hated us, but actually it was all the staff kids. We were fortunate that so many of the staff members had children the same age. It was nice to have somebody to get in trouble with and run up and down the halls with.” After the mob of staff kids spent the entire choir practice running back and forth through the Spook and Blood Halls and up and down the stairs and got all sweaty, they would meet their parents.
In those same years another fun activity before or after a church service for Sean and Dean was the overgrown field that began directly behind the Gymnatorium. Sean explained, “You have to remember this was before the Children’s Building, the new building or even Beltway 8 was built. It was endless land to us. Dean and I would go exploring! There were trails that you could follow because some of the kids from the neighborhood would run around back there too.” Sean shook his head and added, “There was always an adventure when we came early before church or whatever.”
Both Sean and Dean recalled that one historic moment of Sagemont’s history that really impacted them as young boys occurred when Sagemont Church raised a million dollars in 40 days in order to build the new debt-free building now known as the Hughes Road Auditorium (HRA). Sean recalled, “The church had gotten out of debt in 1975 so I would have been eight or nine and Dean two years younger. I didn’t understand what debt was but I knew that we were getting out of it and that there was a big thermometer to show how much money we had raised. Back then a million dollars was A MILLION DOLLARS!!!!”
Dean, too, did what he could to help raise the money, “I gave whatever a little kid can come up with, so it wasn’t a lot. We did a lot of mowing of grass and moved a lot of dirt and sand into people’s yards.” He chuckled as he explained, “We would eat together pretty much every night, usually soup that was probably donated from the local grocery stores such as dented cans that they couldn’t sell so we got them. It was pot luck so you never knew what you were going to get. For all those families who sacrificed everything for a month then see the objective accomplished in such a powerful way, it was one of those moments that will always stick with you for something far greater that unites us instead of divides us.”
Sean will never forget being on the front row with his mom and brother the night that the final total was announced. “I also remember as a kid not understanding the financial ramifications of 300 families giving their total income for 40 days which was 100% of what they made! To me it was exciting to see what God had done and to see the church come together.”
Sunday night, November 3, 1974, which was Bethel’s 34th birthday, Sean, age seven attended the Lord’s Supper service at Sagemont. Sean explained, “That night Dad helped me to put all the pieces together and I asked Jesus into my heart. I was baptized a few months later. Then in high school, I think this happens to a lot of people, you kind of go, ‘Was I really saved?’ So I did walk the aisle a second time at a Bailey Smith Revival and was baptized a second time in 1985 as a junior in high school. Looking back, knowing what I know now, I believe my faith was there, but I needed to make sure.”
Dean, too, was saved and baptized at a young age, but then when he was in junior high, he shared that he really took it more seriously at a Discipleship Now weekend and was baptized soon after.
After services, the Morgan family regularly went across Hughes Road to where the Sagemont Annex building is. At the time, it was where Eckerd Drug Store, Safeway Grocery and Vaudeville Pizza were located. Sean and Dean loved to eat pizza and watch the old black and white 16 mm reels of the original “Superman” and “The Three Stooges” on the large screen. Sean recalled, “As a kid, that was the coolest. You would eat pizza and there would be a movie playing while you ate. It was our family and a lot of other families from the church that would be there. Just like now when you go to Gringo’s restaurant and you see everyone.”
When the family moved again, Sean and Dean attended intermediate and high school in the Clear Creek District. “As I got old enough to drive or ride with people who could take me, we did not go to Vaudeville anymore; instead, we would go to Godfather’s Pizza which was down on Sabo.” Sean explained, “It was such a family feel here. Sagemont Church in its growth has changed. In those days it was a community church; in other words, most everyone who went here lived here. Now you have Pearland, Friendswood, Deer Park, Clear Lake, League City and on and on. People even come from The Woodlands, which is awesome, but it feels a little different now than it did then. Even by the time I graduated from high school, the church was almost 20 years old, and I would say 75% to 80% of the high school graduates were from one school, Dobie High School. It was still a community church at that point.”
Sean recalled that in the 1980’s he and Dean were teenagers in Sagemont’s youth group. At that time, the youth met at Thompson Intermediate where Associate Pastor, Emory Gadd, then the youth minister, would teach in the band hall. Senior Adult Pastor Buddy Fortenberry and Executive Pastor of The Heights Baptist Church in Richardson, TX, John Wills, were also the Morgan brothers’ youth pastors. Dean shared his memories of intermediate school years, “I remember going from the Chapel to the Gym, from the Gym to the HRA campus. I remember Sundays whenever we were in the gym and all of the kids’ biggest thing was to hurry and take down all those folding chairs so we could have the gym and roll down the basketball goal and play.”
The brothers attended THEE Camp which stood for The Heaven and Earth Experience. Sean laughed, “I was there and got the T-shirt.” At THEE Camp one summer Sean met his future wife, Leslee Wolf. After eight years of dating through high school and college at Baylor, they were married by his dad in 1992 in the HRA.
After he earned his Masters in Management in 1992, Sean started a business that he recently sold after 20 years. “The debt-free thing gave us mobility in our early years so if God opened doors somewhere. we could just up and go. We had no credit card debt, no student loans, we paid cash for cars and we had two hoopty cars that had a quarter of a million miles on them together.” Sean and Leslee eventually settled in Houston where they faithfully attend and serve at Sagemont Church each week along with their three children, Max (17), Miles (15) and Maris (12).
For the past ten years, Sean can be found each Sunday teaching Sagemont’s first graders in Crosswalk. He began serving in the Children’s Ministry in the new AdventureLand building starting in 2000 where he wrote weekly skits and teaching lessons for the then Family Church. From there he went on to write, direct and sometimes act in six Vacation Bible School dramas in an auditorium full of first through sixth graders.
Not surprisingly, as a child Sean loved anything theatrical. “Through the choir, we did passion type plays and the story of Christ. Associate Pastor, Emory Gadd did a great Satan! I remember he did that more than once. They had him in black tights; it was pretty funny, looking back. I loved all of that.”
Sean recently finished a movie titled Altar Egos with plans to be released later this year. Liberty University in Lynchberg, Virginia made available their senior class drama students and much of the equipment and cameras needed to produce the film.
Dean met his future wife, Tara Clark, daughter of Sagemont’s Facility Manager Emery Clark and wife Anita who is also on staff at Sagemont, during his summer youth internship. Whey they reconnected four years later, they began to date and were married by Brother John in the Sagemont HRA the following year, 1993.
Since 2008 Dean and Tara attend and are members at Houston’s First Baptist Church. After years of working in the corporate world, Dean is now a professional touring golf pro. “It wasn’t anything I had planned on doing, mainly due to my first back surgery in 2011. A year before that I couldn’t play because my back hurt so bad. Then five years after the surgery I didn’t play. I didn’t pick up a club again until May 16, 2015. Everybody was shocked at how quickly the game came back and then I got offers to play.” He laughed and then continued, “This is crazy that at 46 I am playing against kids that are 22 and 23 who are 6’3”.”
Dean leaned forward and stated, “As far as Dad, he is the same guy on stage as he is at home or in a restaurant…that is just him. He loves people and gave everything to the people of this church. I can’t remember exactly how many years he did every wedding, every funeral but he just poured himself into the people. That is his legacy and his testimony. I don’t know of anybody that has been a part of a church as long as he has that is still an active senior pastor, but he is still in there making it happen. He has never said anything to anyone in the family about retiring. If anything, he has only always talked about the future.”
Sean smiled as he shared his final thoughts, “I have always been proud to be a part of Sagemont Church. We have such a great heritage and I am so thankful to be a part and see first hand God at work. It is a special place and I know that it is unique in a good way.” Sean continued his closing thoughts, “It is powerful to see what all God has done over these 50 years. Of course, I am very proud of Dad and how he has lived his life and how he has allowed God to use him through the years. I have a rich heritage with my Dad and his dad as well. I am blessed to have Morgan as my last name and I am excited to see what God does with my kids and what is next. Dean and I have been blessed to grow up here and see so many things and to love and be loved by so many people.”