Role: Elder

I’m Matt Pearce, originally from Lancashire. I’m married to Vanessa who is also actively involved in Seagate Church. We moved to Troon in 2010 with our oldest daughter Madison who was a baby at the time. A couple of years later we had our second daughter Isla, so she is the only Scottish one in the family!

It was our job that brought us to Troon, Vanessa and I are both Air Traffic Controllers, we were working in Manchester previously. In 2010 our company relocated us and just over 100 families to Ayrshire. Shortly after arriving we were welcomed into the Seagate Church Family and the Lord has been blessing our lives as we endeavour to serve in the local community ever since.

In 2018 I was asked to become one of the Trustees of Seagate Church, a role which I planned to serve in for many years. However God had other plans for me and I was asked to become an Elder of Seagate Church in 2020, stepping down from the Trustee role at the same time.

I feel very blessed to be given the privilege to serve and glorify God with the Seagate Eldership team. It is my prayer that I do this humbly and with God’s guidance.

Vanessa and I, along with the Seagate Family are passionate about reaching out into the local community, sharing the Good News of Jesus and welcoming the lost into God’s Kingdom.

Please join us at one of Seagate’s events or chat to us anytime.

I’ve been worshipping in Seagate since 2016. Before coming to Seagate I was Pastor at Riverside Evangelical Church, Ayr for 20 years previously having been a secondary schoolteacher of Physical Education and Religious Education in Hamilton for 25 years.

I genuinely feel really blessed, after some health issues over past 5 years, to still be able to serve God and His Church. A double bonus is still being physically able to pursue two of my great loves of cycling and and preaching – sometimes even at the same time.

I have a son Ross whose wife is Christine and two granddaughters Grace and Elizabeth.

I have been an Elder on two separate occasions at Seagate, this being my second, and I was the Youth Worker with the church back in 1995 for three years fulltime and then part time for another years, while I studied.

I’m still married to Jenny, who has stuck with me since school days when we met. We have four great children, Calum, Laurie, Bryony and Angus.

I’m originally from Kirriemuir where my parents ran a church (Strathmore Christian Fellowship). In 1989 when I left school, I went off to Eastern Europe for a year to work with Operation Mobilisation, with a team who used to smuggle Bibles into Eastern Europe. This was a life changing year for me as I saw God work through ordinary young people to bring hope to the hopeless and freedom to captives.

I studied theology at Glasgow Bible college for 4 years and was heavily involved in the Navigator student ministry in Glasgow as well as playing football in the Churches league.

After bible college I became the Youth Worker at Seagate and the Meadowgreen Foundation, a job I did for four years. This was a such an encouraging time as we had a great group of young people and volunteers who were all journeying in their growth in Christ.

I have worked in Social work for 22 years, firstly with North Ayrshire, where I was team leader for Young Persons Support team, and the Youth Justice and finally became a Senior Manager, while I also studied Cognitive Behaviour Therapy. In 2019 I moved to South Ayrshire Health and Social Care Partnership to become the Head of Service for Children’s Health Care and Justice Services.

I’m committed to seeing Seagate Church and its people become a place of healing, restoration, comfort and hope for all who recognise their need for Christ and greatly value the opportunity of serving Christ at this time.