A ceremony has been held at Wolvesey Palace to officially recognise the Diocese of Winchester’s first BMO church after more than 10 years in the making. A BMO, Bishop’s Mission Order, allows the bishop to legally recognise a Christian community and a mission initiative, that works outside of parish boundaries.
Revd Tim Matthews from LOVECHURCH Bournemouth was re-licensed by Bishop Philip at a service in the gardens of Wolvesey Palace.
Bishop Philip said, “In many ways, the BMO is about setting the church loose to be about the mission of God in Bournemouth. LOVECHURCH has been a really exciting initiative for us as a diocese, and this was just a small process really of dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s to make it all properly legal and watertight. Not to restrict it but to enable it to fly.”
The journey began in 2014 when Revd Tim and his wife Debi moved from London to Bournemouth to set up a new church from scratch. Their mission was to set up a community that would focus on reaching the unchurched, the younger generations and to partner with other churches to revitalise communities throughout the diocese. Another aim was to engage with some of the problems that the town has with drug addiction and homelessness (in 2015 Bournemouth had the UK’s highest proportion of benefit claimants unable to work through alcohol and drug addiction).
They opened St Swithun’s in Bournemouth which at the time was a large unoccupied building. From those early days, the church has now gone from strength to strength – what started as a team of 11 adults and 3 children has grown to 600-700 worshippers at five services across the two sites. It has a growing children’s, youth and student ministries and has run numerous Alpha Courses reaching over 800 people. They have faced financial challenges, break-ins and some local resistance to the new church plant, but Tim describes the last 11 years as “incredibly difficult but incredibly rewarding.”
“Looking back to when we started, we had no idea what we were doing. We made a lot of mistakes as well, but we have tried to be led by the Holy Spirit, to pray, listen and be guided. So many resources can be wasted on great human ideas, and so often we need to let him control the reins a little bit more. We weren’t a parish church; we had a slightly different calling. There are some brilliant parish churches in Bournemouth and it’s been amazing to work in partnership with them and that’s continued to this day.”
St Swithun’s is one of the Resource Churches within the Diocese of Winchester and in 2017 began a partnership with St Clements in Boscombe, a church in one of the most deprived areas of the region.
Revd Tim continued, “We felt the Holy Spirit was wanting to see a rising tide that would float all boats. The vision has never been about building up one big church, it’s been about seeing that rising tide sending out people to revitalise other sites. St Swithun’s isn’t about seating capacity, it’s about sending capacity, raising up leaders, sending out congregations, resourcing others, that’s the vision.”
There’s much outreach in the community too. Through a recovery programme, the church has helped people seek freedom from addiction and the Christians Against Poverty team has helped people clear more than £1.5 million worth of debt. The church also runs a charity called ‘Spear Bournemouth’, a scheme that provides educational training for disadvantaged young people to help them into employment.
It has also worked in partnership with local schools to try to combat child poverty which is a major issue in some parts of the town. St Clements now provides breakfasts ahead of the school day on a Thursday morning and regularly feeds up to 250 children in an hour. Read all about it here >>>
In 2020 St Swithun’s and St Clement’s were awarded Government funding to continue supporting local communities through the Covid pandemic. They were a food and medicine distribution centre and established volunteer teams to provide emotional and practical support to the vulnerable and isolated, working in partnership with other churches, schools, councils and businesses.
Many lives in the community have been changed through meeting Jesus. Earlier this month members of St Clement’s and St Swithun’s were among more than 70 people baptised in the sea near Boscombe pier. It was part of a joint event with 4 other churches, exemplifying a spirit of togetherness amongst local churches which has grown over the last 10 years. Read a full account of the baptisms here >>>
Among those on the beach witnessing the baptisms were Selina and Mark Timms who have experienced the transformational power of Christian faith. Mark says, “I met Selina in June last year. She was already a Christian and I wasn’t. I was kind of dead against it, to be honest. It just wasn’t for me. Then Selina sent me a 37-minute worship song, and I sat and I listened to it and I was saved in that moment. I knew that it was real and I cried for three weeks. I got baptised on 17th November last year and then we got married. We’ve joined the worship team and the prayer ministry and now we’ve just got jobs at the YMCA, which is also a Christian organisation. It’s just been a real whirlwind. I’m a recovering alcoholic and have had issues with mental health and eating disorders. Over the last five years, I’ve really worked hard on myself. God was the final piece that I needed and that’s completed as a person. It’s such an amazing, powerful thing.”
Selina added, “Mark could write five books on trauma through his life. It’s an amazing journey and he can now bring all the learnings, through experience in the darkness, to help other people. He’s so on fire for God and God is using him already. It’s a radical salvation and journey from utter darkness to light.”
What next? Revd Tim continues, “The vision now is what role do we have to play to help other parishes and other ministries to grow? There’s a huge work of prayer to be done and many good works already happening. Parish churches really are the hope of the nation. What else in society is bringing people together and providing hope? The importance of the parish church now is higher than ever.”
LOVECHURCH has now partnered with St Andrew’s in Charminster which is also seeing some wonderful fruit, and a future partnership is planned with St Mary Magdalene in New Milton. It’s exciting to see what God’s plans for the future. We encourage our diocese to keep praying for the whole town of Bournemouth and its churches and volunteers, that God would continue to work powerfully in people’s lives!
