Shenzhen Christian Church

Introduction to the Shenzhen Christian Church (SCC)
The gospel of Jesus Christ was introduced to the city of Shenzhen by Basel Mission and Rhenish Mission in 1846, which set up 27 churches and places of worship mainly in Bao’an.

Founded in 1898 as a Rhenish church, the SCC used to be located in Luohu. It built its new church building at No.22, Heping Road, in 1949 and was forced to stop religious activities during the Cultural Revolution from 1966 to 1976, during which its staff went back home to do farm work.

The church took back its properties from the government in 1983 in line with Beijing’s post-Cultural Revolution policy of freedom of religion and resumed religious gathering on May 27, 1984, making it the first church in Shenzhen to resume worship service.

At that time, the church occupied an area of mere 120 square meters, with only 70 attendees to the service in the very beginning, and held Sunday service once a week. Later the SCC founded the church choir and Evergreen Choir, set up baptism courses for Truth Seekers’ Class, and offered Lay Leaders short-term trainings.

With the number of believers increasing exponentially, the church relocated to a rented workshop on Songyuan Road in April 1997, where the church made big advances in ministries by setting up the Sunday School and a book shop and saw a surge in followers, with the number of attendees to the Sunday service topping 3,500.

In 1998, the government granted a 4,400-sq.m land (including the green space) to the SCC to build a new church building on the foot of Huaguo Mountain in Meilin. The church was broken ground on July 3, 1999, built up in Aug. 2000, and put into use on Dec. 9, 2001, with 90% of the RMB 30-million construction spending were contributed by believers in the city.

The church paid back all of its debts derived from the construction of the church in the first half of 2003, and it held a thanksgiving service to inaugurate its new home in August of that year.

The new church sprawls across a total construction area of 8,265 sq.m. The main part of the church is 28 meters high, plus the huge cross its total height is 70 meters. The main and the auxiliary halls can accommodate over 2,000 people.

It is a multi-functional building that can be used for various activities such as worship services, meetings, and reception, with a parking lot. From the appearance, it looks like Noah's Ark, standing quietly on the foot of the Huaguo Mountain. It is magnificent, concise, and stylish. It is a major landscape in Meilin.

Now the church holds regularly various activities like four worship services (with about 6,000 attendees), Sunday School for children and juvenile, and Korean fellowship on each Sunday, and sister fellowship, Teochew fellowship, youth fellowship, children fellowship, English fellowship, businessmen fellowship, Cana fellowship, Bible Study, orientation courses, and life growth classes etc. on weekdays.

Besides, it has seven choirs, a book store, an evangelical team, and a belief consultancy team. The church offers two Truth Seeker’s classes and baptizes more than 1,000 believers each year.

It has seven ministers, 15 employees, and some 1,000 Lay Leaders. May the SCC grow into a church that witnesses and honors the God!