St Ebbe’s Headington: Nearly 25 years on

Al Horn May 2026

It has been a story of God’s extraordinary kindness and faithfulness. In September 2001, we launched the 7.30 service in a suburb up the hill in East Oxford called Headington. And that service was initially labelled as just ‘a Headington congregation of St Ebbe’s’.

That first evening drew about 100 people – about 60 of whom had initially volunteered to be a part of the core group.

The aims at the start were three-fold:

• To clear space at the city centre St Ebbe’s for more numerical growth

• To start a Bible-teaching church in East Oxford

• To make more of a gospel impact among Oxford Brookes University .students

How kind God has been along the way.

Notable landmarks have been:

• The start of a 10.30 service meeting in Cheney School in 2004

• The purchase of our building on Lime Walk in 2006

• Adding an associate minister and children’s worker onto the staff team in 2009

• Seeing ministry to Brookes Uni students get established

• Running a third service to cope with numerical growth 2009-2019

• Seeing God’s global work grow through our mission partners

• Sending out people to form Grace Church Cowley and Town Church Bicester

• Most recently, sending out 100 or so to start the new Christ Church Headington in Sept 2024

But perhaps the biggest delight has just been God doing his extraordinary work through the ordinary operation of church family life: the word doing its work and bringing change.

Along the way of course, there have been different phases and challenges. And that has applied to the student ministry too. But as the Brookes year draws to a close this summer, it’s very encouraging to report:

• Numbers are heading upwards – with around 30 students at our Focus nights on Thursdays

• Around half of students have attended seminars this year and are considering further gospel ministry / ministry training

• Growing partnership between current and former students serving the Lord in the UK and abroad

• Greater clarity and gospel confidence among our students as they participate in the Oxford Brookes Christian Union, proclaiming Jesus on campus

• A growing reach among international students and partnership with Friends International

We praise God for these developments, as well as thanking him for all the staff over the years in different ministry areas, and for those in the church family who have with God’s help made it what it wonderfully is today.

We would love to see you come back for a visit if you would like to!