Tipton Family Church
about us
Hello and welcome to the Tipton Family Church web site. The purpose of the site is two-fold. First of all it exists as a shop-front window for the fellowship. We might be biased but we believe that we have a great church, and as such we want to advertise that, particularly to those people who have a negative impression of Christianity.
We are a young church - our latest congregational survey conducted in October 2007 (we do a yearly one) reveals that the average age of people in the Sunday morning service is 30.8. Our leadership, made up of Stewart and Debby Bloor and Paul and Joanne Westwood, averages out at 43.25 years. And in an age where many churches are in serious decline, we are definitely going against the flow. In fact from October 2007 we set our stall out to become a growing chuch and you can read how it's all going by clicking here.
Paul and Joanne, Stewart and Debby
Of course, any church is only as good as the people in it, but with some nice genuine folks we're happy to stand by that statement. But ultimately tipton family church is not built around people but around Jesus Christ. He is the reason we exist.
Secondly, the site is a means of communication with members and non-members alike. Although we believe in the gospel of Jesus Christ, which hasn't changed in two thousand years, as a fellowship we certainly aren't stuck in the past. We're more than happy to embrace modern technology, particularly when it helps us to be effective and efficient.
Maybe you once went to church, but for various reasons no longer do so. Perhaps the idea of religion totally turns you off, and the only time you visit church is for weddings and funerals. Well, we would love the opportunity to present a different picture of what Christianity is all about. Why not pay tipton family church a visit one Sunday morning, or perhaps to one of our other regular events? We would love to see you and a warm welcome is guaranteed.
The web site itself is updated often, as you will be aware if you check it out from time to time. Although much of it is, in effect, an on-line brochure, we do update the ' Church diary ' section regularly with programme and event additions. We also have a guestbook where you can post a message.
Tipton Family Church was started in November 1992 when Stewart and Debby Bloor (below) and their four year old daughter Rebekah (they have since had another daughter - Miriam) hired a local school hall and began Sunday morning services. Although there were just the three of them for a few weeks, they weren't discouraged as they knew it was the right thing to do. How about that for faith!
Tipton Family Church is an evangelical Christian fellowship, and whilst we are independent and therefore have no official ties with any denomination, that does not mean to say that we operate in isolation. Actually the opposite is true, and we enjoy excellent relationships with a number of other churches in the Tipton area, particularly St. Matthew's CofE, with Just Music being a collaboration between the worship teams from both churches.
In addition, Stewart Bloor as well as leading TFC, also has a wider ministry that takes him to a variety of different fellowships and denominations as a visiting preacher including Baptist, Brethren, Congregational, Methodist, Pentecostal etc. We believe very strongly in the unity of the Body of Christ. We also accept the doctrinal statement of the Evangelical Alliance, which represents more than a million Christians in the UK. The statement of belief can be found here.
As our name implies, we are a church that appreciates a wide range of age groups. Whether it be singles, families, young or old - all are welcome. (The photographs below show the members of the youth band, as well as Leanne and Miriam up a tree at one of our regular summer picnics.) There is a club for primary school age children on Tuesday evenings, and the youth have an exciting programme that includes social events and activities with other churches.
As you will have realised so far, we are a group of people that are not inward looking, but rather we look beyond our own four walls to see how we can be a blessing to others. We support missions work in Africa and at the end of the year, for example, we participate in the Operation Christmas Child project, whereby we send shoe box sized parcels to children in nations less fortunate than ourselves. In 2007 we completed 98 boxes.
We are also very blessed to have an excellent music group at the church. When you walk in on a Sunday morning and look ahead it's like being at a concert with all the equipment on display. But rather than be confronted with noise for the sake of it, once they start to play, you are actually very impressed by the sensitivity that they show. In fact music is one of our real strengths, because as well as the church band we have a very active youth band and also a youth music workshop after school on Tuesdays. We are very blessed to have Paul Westwood with us who oversees the music side of things. We also have our own all-girl band Sonday Rose. Once a month (apart from when we have Just Music) we organise an event called Saturday Nite Live @ TFC.