Annual Report 2025

What a year 2025 was as we focused on Building Freedom – our building project which finally became a reality!

In January, two years after the original planning application was submitted, we gained full approval by Test Valley Borough Council – a very special moment in the history of Freedom Church. We were given two years to start work on the land and lock in the planning permission.

An excellent Building Team was created with people offering their time and energy to ensure the various conditions that formed part of the planning approval were completed in time. Designs were firmed up, websites created and funding campaigns kicked off to ensure the work could continue.

On Sunday 8th June, we launched our fund-raising campaign, with the church raising almost £200,000 to get the project off the ground. Obviously, we have a long way to go, but this is a significant amount of money raised in one Sunday.

(If you would like to find out more about the project or would like to give financially then please visit www.freedomchurch.uk/buildingfreedom)

The story of Nehemiah has been a significant part of our building story, reminding ourselves that

‘The God of heaven is the one who will give us success’ – Nehemiah 2:20.

We continue to do all that we can, as we work hard to raise funds and start work on the land, but ultimately, we are people of faith who believe in a God that can do more than we can ask or imagine!

Throughout the year so much more happened than just the start of Building Freedom. Read below to find out more about our thriving Freedom Kids & Youth programmes, to hear about our Community Outreach Projects, getting involved in the local Mayors Picnic and Walk the Test Way, times of significant prayer and worship as well as our regular gathering on Sundays – a high point of the week.

We have so much to be thankful for as we look back and remind ourselves of a special year in the life of Freedom Church.

Thanks everyone who gave their time, prayers, skills, finances and energy to support the work of Freedom as we lead people in the pursuit of Jesus to see lives and communities transformed.

Sundays

Sundays are one of our favourite days of the week! We love gathering with our church family, where people of all ages come together to worship and discover how we can walk in the way of Jesus.

We began the year by learning about fasting and experiencing the practise of fasting together as a Church. We experienced special moments as we gathered mid-week and ate together to break our fast and pray together. Then we explored the biblical character of King David with his Heart after God. We went through the arc of this incredible story and asked the question ‘who are we becoming as followers of Jesus?’

In June we started the journey for our building project entitled Building Freedom. We looked at buildings throughout scripture and the leadership outlined the vision for our new Church building.

Then, over the summer, carrying on this theme, we looked at Building the Temple, Building the Ark and Building the City walls – some memorable moments as part of our Summer Sundays.

Then in the autumn we focused on

“The Spirit who…”

exploring the different gifts and fruit that the Holy Spirit makes available to each one of us. We had special times of ministry and people stepping out in faith. Our prayer is that this is not a one off teaching but a practise that we continue as a church, into the future.

December finished on a high, with many Dedications and the teaching topic, JOY!

The Joy of Mary and Elizabeth, the Joy of the Shepherds and the Wise Men and how we can find joy even in the most difficult of seasons.

Thank You!

A huge thank you to everyone who served on the various teams that make our Sundays happen.

Whether you helped set up chairs and staging, made and transported drinks, led our children, invested in young people, used your musical talents to lead us in worship, managed sound, lighting, and video, streamed online, or prepared and preached God’s Word —

Your contribution has been immense!

Connect Groups
& Pastoral Care

As with every year there has been some reconfiguration of Connect Groups. We have three new groups to celebrate- The Walking by Faith group, Catherine and Matthew’s group, Sam Hannah and Sarah’s group, and we’ve been preparing with Carolyn and Sarah to launch a new daytime group as we step into 2026.

I want to give a big thanks to the Munros’, Mistrys’ and Mandy Reynolds, who have served faithfully as group leaders, but have decided to step aside this year. In this change, a special thanks is also due to Michael and Sarah Hughes, who have taken on leadership for the online connect group this year.

It has been beautiful to see connect groups pulling together to serve at the weekend away, encourage one another, provide pastoral care for those in and outside of their group and strategically make space for new members as the church grows. I may be biased- but these relationships are where I get to see the fruit of Jesus building his church most clearly, and I want to encourage you in that.

The year started with Fast and Curious - our exploration into prayer and fasting. We took a break from our usual weekly rhythm of meeting as Connect Groups, to gather and reflect on how we were getting on with the practice of fasting– but also to break-fast. I’ve never seen the church family so hungry - physically and spiritually all at once. The food was always going to taste good after the wait, but Connect groups took turns to produce some brilliant food for the rest of the church family. I’m incredibly grateful for getting to journey through that shared experience with you.

The Alpha relaunch was a significant moment for us as a church this Autumn. Between us we assembled a fresh team, invited friends and loved ones, and worked together to provide meals (even some connect groups got stuck in!). Carolyn Chart was an administrative whizz! There are now new people in our Church family as a result, with other friends continuing to work out who Jesus is to them. Thank you all for investing your time, prayers and service in making Alpha such a success this year.

Most of our pastoral care is provided through our connect groups, though we recognise that not everyone is part of a group and that some needs require a more nuanced response. Our pastoral oversight team supports this work through decision-making, signposting, coordination and record-keeping.

If you have a pastoral need, or become aware of one (with consent), please get in touch with myself or your connect group leader so that appropriate support can be arranged. Information about joining connect groups is available via our website and ChurchSuite,

I’m also happy to help anyone access groups or pastoral care at office@freedomchurch.uk.

Prayer and Worship

Prayer and worship are at the heart of everything we do at Freedom Church.

We continue to strengthen our partnership with 24/7 Prayer and the growing number of churches (now 27) within the Tribe Network, which our Senior Leader, Sim Dendy leads, alongside Simon Benham from Kerith Church, Windsor.

In 2025, our prayer and worship ministry included a variety of activities and events, such as:

Sunday morning worship services
Fasting and Prayer during the month of January
The return of the prayer room at the Church Weekend Away
A week of prayer in October
The ‘Lectio Hour’ monthly on Monday afternoons
‘All In,’ our monthly Sunday evening worship and prayer gatherings
The Press In Prayer Group, led by Dave and Ruth Gatting
Weekend Retreat at the Greenhouse Christian Centre

The Worship and Production Team have done an incredible job facilitating our prayer and worship spaces. Much of their work is unseen, as they prepare and practice throughout the week to serve faithfully on the weekends. Thank you to all involved — your passion and dedication are vital in ensuring that prayer and worship remain at the forefront of Freedom Church.

Kids

2025 has been a year of transition for Freedom Kids. In March, we said a heartfelt thank you to Joe Land-Jones as he stepped down as Children’s and Families Pastor; we really appreciate the significant contribution he has made to the discipleship of our children and team over the last few years. In April, Catherine Adomah stepped into the role and is deeply grateful for the incredible support from the Freedom Kids team during this change.

Throughout the year, the team delivered engaging sessions:

Spring Term: We explored the life of David, enjoyed Mother’s Day crafts, celebrated Palm Sunday with a joyful re-enactment, reflected on Good Friday, and joined the whole church for an all-age Easter celebration.
Summer Term: We focused on Jesus’ miracles and ended with a fun-filled Church Weekend Away, complete with games, activities, and lessons on the beauty of church family. Freedom Kids then enjoyed six weeks of all-age summer services, including joining the Baptist church for a brilliant Duggie Dug Dug science praise party!
Autumn Term: Our term began with learning about the power of the Holy Spirit, complete with flame crowns and zooming balloons! The Light Party was a highlight: neon face paints, glowing games, fluorescent glitter jars, and learning that Jesus is our light in the darkness. We closed the year with a creative look at Christmas from different perspectives and a fantastic Nativity service. Thank you, Judith, for your brilliant storytelling and direction, as well as all the wonderful actors and actresses of course!
Friday Tots: Our Tots group continue to meet each Friday morning, usually in different people’s homes. Thank you to those involved in both hosting and co-ordinating this group. If you are interested, please contact Catherine and she’ll point you in the right direction.

Freedom Kids by the numbers:

·Nearly 60 children registered, with at least 45 children attending most weeks.
Supported by an amazing team of 25 volunteers, but we need more as we grow!
Our family is growing … we have celebrated many new babies into our church family over the last year too!

Our Highlights of 2025:

Amazing Church Weekend Away
Beautiful family time in the prayer space
Fun filled Light Party
Engaging and interactive Nativity
Learning more about God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit
Building relationships with each other

Looking Ahead...

We’re excited for all God has in store for 2026 as we continue to grow in faith and community.

How you can help:

Prayerfully consider volunteering with Freedom Kids.
Pray for our team and for more volunteers.
Pray for our wonderful children to grow in understanding and love for God.

Youth

There has been lots of change in 2025 for Freedom Youth. With our Youth Pastor, Zoe, preparing for and then celebrating the arrival of a baby, we’ve had to draft in a bunch of quality volunteers to the team to help cover her leave.

The Maxwells returned to the Freedom Youth team for six months, and the Leadership team have chipped in to support the team and our young people. Joe and Izzy Land-Jones will also be helping out regularly moving forward.

We'd like to extend a massive thanks to Geoff, Michael and Kirill who have been totally dedicated to making sure our young people continue to be able to meet together, and receive the fun, care and support that they deserve!

Zoe returns from leave at the end of March- I’m sure the young people and the team will be delighted to have her back in the room!

Youth is presently running twice weekly on Sunday mornings and Tuesday evenings.

Thanks to everyone who has helped, fed, supported and made our young people feel valued as part of the church family. The young people are presently keen to serve on Sunday mornings, with some of them now helping out on the welcome team, tech team and kids team. Please encourage them when you see them having a go!

Our highlights from last year:

Flynn and Austin getting Baptised.
Kirill’s Bible Challenges.
Our summer programme including
The Church Weekend away.
A trip to Southampton Waterside.
Arcade session with a photo challenge and a Nando’s.
A winter climbing session at Golden Gecko.
A splash at the new forest water park.
Linking up with other youth groups.
Learning about God’s character and the Fruit of the Spirit.
Any time that we got to spend at the Lovell’s farm!

How can you support Freedom Youth in 2026?

Join the Youth team! We’d love some more female role models and friends on the youth team.
Encourage our youth when you see them attending/serving in church
Pray for our young people to develop deep friendships with one another and a continued desire to love and serve Jesus. 
Welcome Zoe back onto team and give her good Freedom Church love and encouragement!

Speak to Ben for more information or email him: ben@freedomchurch.uk

Events

What an incredible Church Weekend we had in July this year at Lockerley Water Farm - our biggest one yet!

Even with so many people, there was a strong sense of family as we ate together, had fun together, shared communion, prayed, and worshipped our God together.

Our conversations about the Church being like a family were beautifully reflected in the four outdoor baptisms. We witnessed a grandad baptise his grandson, a son baptise his mum, a husband baptise his wife, and a son being led to faith by his mum. Each moment was deeply special.

On Sunday 5th October, we began a Week of Prayer centred on “The Spirit who helps us to pray,” exploring what it means to pray in step with the Holy Spirit.

People entered through a Tunnel of Preparation - a darkened walkway designed to help them pause and prepare their hearts for prayer. Inside, a variety of prayer stations focused on overseas mission, the next generation, the Bible, building Freedom, peace, and community outreach. There was even a bike to ride while praying for the work of CAP and breaking the cycle of poverty.

Thank you to everyone who helped create such a meaningful and reflective prayer space, and to all who made time during the week to come to the Centre and pray.

For the first time ever, on Sunday 28th September, we closed our Sunday morning service and instead over 80 members of our church family laced up their walking shoes to Walk the Test Way together.

The result? An amazing £5,723.51 raised, greater awareness across the town of our new building project, and a whole lot of memories made along the way. Shoes were lost, blisters were earned, and laughter was in abundance - all in the name of growing our church in Romsey.

An incredible effort from an incredible church family!

Finance

Thank you for your incredible generosity and support of the work at Freedom Church throughout the year. Through your faithful tithing, donations, and grants to the Freedom Centre, we received an income of just over £418,415 towards our General Fund plus a further £191,913 towards our Building Fund.

We are pleased to report that we had a surplus of around £35,079 for the year. This was much higher than the break even that we had originally budgeted for. Staffing costs remain our biggest outgoing, followed by rent costs associated with hiring the Romsey School every Sunday and leasing Unit 6 for our Freedom Centre.

If you would like to receive a more detailed set of accounts, please contact Kirstie Chart, our Finance Manager, at finance@freedomchurch.uk

As part of our commitment to being a generous church, we give grants through our Freedom Fund. In 2025, we were able to distribute almost £14,000 to support people locally and across the globe:

£5,950 Overseas to MAF (Papua New Guinea), Hope Lebedyn (Ukraine), Heart of the Father (Philippines), Serve Direct (Uganda), The Penny Trust and to fund a trip to Ukraine
£1,200 to the work of 24-7 Prayer
£6,750 Locally to provide white goods, new flooring, removals and more for those facing hardship, plus grants to Cupernham School and Romsey Young Carers

If you would like to start giving regularly or to adjust your current giving, please click here or email us:  finance@freedomchurch.uk

You can choose to give a regular monthly amount or make a one-off donation. And don’t forget to GIFT AID your donations if you are able to.

Your generous and regular giving truly makes a difference. Thank you!

Freedom Centre Programme

The last year continued to see a greater synergy between all the various projects that we are responsible for at the Freedom Centre and out in the community.

These projects, although with their own specific aims and goals, also work closely with others to ensure that we create something of a ‘one-stop shop’ where people facing personal crisis in our local community, know they can get help. Whether it be for Job Support (DWP Drop In), Food Poverty (Romsey Foodbank & Community Fridge), Financial Help (CAP Debt Centre & Money Course) or help with their benefits (Citizens Advice).

We are so grateful for the amazing team of staff and volunteers who all work so hard to help deliver this programme, and for the generosity of our local community – individuals and organisations who continue to support our work in various ways.

So, a big thank you always to all those that partner with us to provide support in times of crisis; encouraging, enabling and equipping people to become ‘unstuck’ where they are ‘stuck’. The dream is to see people ultimately reconnect with their purpose and find hope.

Click here for more details about the Freedom Centre Programme generally, or feel free to get in touch with us at office@freedomchurch.uk with any queries.

Download Freedom Centre Report

278 Households supported

855 Adults

722 Children

149 First time referrals

18,736 kg of food

£159,200 Financial gains for households

KEY STATS: