Hervey Bay Bible Church
Bible Camp & Retreat Center
how we started
Hervey Bay Bible Church (HBBC) was formerly ‘Hervey Bay Church of Christ’ which was founded in the mid nineteen seventies. One of the current pastoring elders of HBBC was an elder in the original church since 1997 and pastored the church in interim periods and then full time since 2013.
In the nineties the Queensland Churches of Christ was adopting a more liberal view of scriptures and with widening diverse views on issues that were affecting many churches (such as same sex, women in ministry, etc). Increasingly the Churches of Christ were also becoming ecumenical as strongly depicted in their magazines.
The Hervey Bay local church through successive pastors remained biblical and unchanging in these issues. Successive leaderships of the local church stood somewhat apart from any association, but yet the ‘affiliation’ with the Queensland Churches of Christ remained.
In later years it was discovered the denomination was paying monies to the World Council of Churches which conflicted with the statement of faith for the local church. Thus over time the leaderships began to inform the people as to the differences in doctrine and philosophy wherever it was necessary.
In 2012 we changed our name to ‘Hervey Bay Bible Church’ (HBBC) by a large majority vote to better reflect the teaching and doctrine we had always had. (This was done with the full endorsement of the Churches of Christ Queensland headquarters).
The following year HBBC began inquiries to the possibility of having the title deeds returned to us for the property owned and paid for in full decades ago by the church membership.
This began a series of unfortunate events which culminated in the Churches of Christ evicting HBBC from the property and taking the elders names off the bank accounts. (The story is told in ‘The Day They Evicted Our Church’ which is available on request).
A large majority voted to leave and recommence services in a local CWA hall. The first service saw 39 people attend. In the weeks following the church immediately began to grow. Within the first year the leadership began looking for a larger more suitable hall. At that time the Urangan Community Hall in the Botanical Gardens became available. The timing was perfect. The facilities contain a modern hall and kitchen and catering facilities.
