about us
In 2010 September, SELBL (Society for English Learning through Biblical Literature) director Jenny Wong launched the Bible-based ESL course (known as ACE course) at Sandyford Henderson Memorial Church, which is located close to the University of Glasgow. The ACE course attracted a number of Cantonese speaking Chinese students from Mainland China, Hong Kong and Macau, who would like to have gatherings in their mother tongue. As such, the first fellowship meeting was held in November 2010, and in February 2011 the Glasgow Cantonese Christian Fellowship was registered as a society on the campus of the University of Glasgow.
Despite the growing number of Chinese students and Chinese workers in the UK, there are only a handful of Chinese churches in each city which could hardly cater to the growing pastoral needs. We have seen Chinese people who, without the supporting system of a faith community, feel isolated or even seek to commit suicide. Others who join English speaking fellowships find it hard to be integrated into their faith community owing to language barrier, cultural differences and identity issues, thus dampening their spiritual life in a foreign land. As such, Glasgow Chinese Grace Church is born to cater to such needs, with the first worship service being held on 14 June 2015 in the East end of Glasgow. The Sunday service was suspended between January 2016 to August 2017 in search of the Lord’s guidance, and was relaunched in the West end of Glasgow on 17 September 2017.
You are warmly welcomed to our churchPlease feel at home wherever you come from
Beliefs and Vision
Gospel into China
Our vision is to gather, equip and build up overseas Chinese so that they can bring the gospel back to China, and bring about transformation as a salt and light to the country. We link up with Chinese churches in Mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan etc so as to help Christians integrate back to their country of origin when they leave the UK.
Our means of outreach include launching Bible based ESL course (ACE Course), Chinese Bible studies, prayer meetings, among others.
Gospel out of China
We strive to expand the Christians’ horizons in missions by partnering with various mission organisations who are welcome to share their visions and send out workers to reach out to people in different corners on the earth.
Cross-cultural training
While setting our foothold in the Chinese culture, we are connected with Christians of other nationalities at large. Our church is a member of Minority Ethnic Christians Together in Scotland. Other than training up local British Christians to reach out to Chinese through teaching English using the Bible, we also partner with pastors of different nationalities (including African, Tamil etc) to reach out to Chinese together. Christians who are nurtured in this cross-cultural environment are more capable of serving in cross-cultural missions to fulfill God’s commission to make disciples of all nations.Theological Education
We hope to provide theological and evangelistic training (such as partnering with seminary school) to equip Christians to be all-rounded church leaders who are spirit-filled and knowledgeable. Our church is an independent congregation, which serves as an interdenominational platform that allows overseas Christians to form an understanding of different denominations through theological forums and exchanges.Ethnic Minority Resource Centre
A church should carry out its social function to care for the needy in the society. As such, a resource centre is set up to serve the needs of both Chinese and ethnic minorities, providing social services to help them integrate into the society, such as immigration and citizenship advice, translation and interpreting service, English classes, spiritual healing, career advice etc.
About the Pastor
Dr Jenny Wong
Jenny Wong was Assistant Professor at the School of Translation at Hang Seng Management College. Prior to this, she was Assistant Professor at Beijing Normal University – Hong Kong Baptist University, United International College from 2008-2012. She had taught media translation and advanced commercial translation at different universities. Her research interests lie in the study of Bible and English literature which grew out of her two postgraduate degrees: MA in Translating and Interpreting (Newcastle) and PhD in Literature and Theology (Glasgow). She is the founder of SELBL, a non-profit organisation based in Hong Kong that promotes the cultural significance of the Bible among international students.
She was ordained into ministry in Hong Kong upon graduating from Divinity School of Chung Chi College, Hong Kong in 2009 with an MA in Christian Studies. She has extensive experiences in student ministry, prison work, hospital chaplaincy, Sunday school, etc., and frequently gave training on cross cultural mission work (by teaching English through the Bible) and on parenting special needs children. She has conducted mission work in or led mission teams to 5 continents by setting up Bible based English camps or training courses.
Recommendations
I am pleased to hear the good news from our sister Jenny Wong that she has finally started a Chinese church service in Glasgow. I am grateful for this which has also brought back my memory from the old days in Scotland 26 years ago.
June 1989 was a very sensitive time then. I was a Year 2 student at Evangel Seminary at that time. During the summer vacation, I applied for a 2-month COCM short-term missionary trip in the United Kingdom. 1 week out of which I visited the Chinese church in Edinburgh. I met quite a number of Christians who were overseas students there who could only attend fellowship but not church service. Their spiritual life lacked holistic pastoral guidance. We prayed that the Chinese community there could have church service available in their own language. And God has done great things today!
That short-term missionary trip in fact impressed me a lot and expanded my concept of ministry. Because of that, after graduation, I went to Macau with my wife for a mission and spent 20 years there. We came back to Hong Kong 3 years ago, and now we are doing full-time pastoral work and part-time doctoral study in pastoral theology. Please keep each other in prayers.
Rev. David Wong
Senior Pastor
Bethel Mission of China (Tsun Lei Church)
Thank you Lord for the formation of Chinese congregation in Glasgow, Scotland, that is great news for Chinese people working or studying there. Although Chinese people are considered as ethnic minorities in Scotland, God knows our needs by providing us pastor in serving the Chinese community. I met Sister Jenny Wong at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. She has an excellent character and has been outstanding in her studies, ministry and love for people. She has formed the Society for English Learning Through Biblical Literature (SELBL) which has benefited a lot of learners, and now by the grace of God, she has become the pastor for the Chinese church in Glasgow.
I hope the Chinese church service will be blessed so that it will take root below and bear fruit above to glorify His holy name.
Elder Wong Fook Yee
President
Tsung Tsin Mission of Hong Kong
12 June 2015, in Basel, Switzerland
Encounter, understand and follow. May all brothers and sisters overseas be able to encounter God, know Him and follow Him!
Chu Siu Ming
Executive Officer
Hong Kong Bible Conference
Jesus said: “I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst.” John 6:35
I truly wish the Chinese ministry can become a blessing for Chinese in Glasgow and let more Chinese people know God. At the same time, may God bless Dr. Wong’s ministry and receive strength upon strength and grace upon grace.
Prof. Ying Fuk-Tsang
Director
Divinity School of Chung Chi College
The Chinese University of Hong Kong
Oak Hill Theological College, London
Dear Ministerial colleagues and brothers and sisters,
The debut Chinese Sunday service is being held today, may God be with you all.
In Chapter 6 of the Book of Isaiah, Prophet Isaiah saw God appear to him, the first thing he did is then to cry out ” Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts: the whole earth is full of his glory.” The Lord of hosts is all knowing, all wise and almighty, our hearts and minds are in the hands of God and there is nowhere to hide. That was why Prophet Isaiah at the time immediately admitted himself as a sinner and ask for God’s mercy. God was willing to forgive his sins, so as to make him sacred. God then appointed him, sending him out as a prophet.
Therefore, the primary goal of the church is to magnify God, to whole-heartedly worship Him. Since our Lord Jesus Christ has redeemed us with His blood, turning us from sin and enable us to become the children of God and a royal priest. Where we stand and what we have now are grace from God with unconditional love and there is nothing we can boast. The only thing we can do is to truly admit our sins, repent, go back to God, and to worship and serve Him. In that way we can experience God’s grace just as what Prophet Isaiah did.
The Holy Spirit always reminds us in Christ how to love God and our neighbours. In Chapter 5 of John 1, we are told to obey God’s commandments, that is to love Him. When we love each other, we can experience God’s love among us, and the love of God motivates us to love our neighbours and our community. And then the light of God will become a lampstand attracting sinners to repent through the church. How joyful this Christian ministry can be.
At last, do not forget to do everything for the glory of the Christ and do it not for our own sake or any earthly glory. The Holy Spirit and all kinds of blessings from God will be with us forevermore. Amen.
Thomas Ho Hang Kwong
Oak Hill Theological College, London
14 June 2015
May all of you be filled with plentiful grace of God!
Best wishes from Prof. Ho Kin Chung
Dean
School of Science and Technology
The Open University of Hong Kong
May God use SELBL’s work to bring more to know Christ and be blessed!
Janice Lee
Christian and Missionary Alliance Tai Wo Church
To establish a healthy-growing church is in accordance to God’s will, and it is a concrete response to the Great Commission of Jesus. I truly believe that our Father call Pastor Jenny Wong to work among you is to complete His plan and will. When we all uphold the truth, rely on the Holy Spirit, uphold Jesus Christ, take root below and bear fruit above, build from within and expand externally, we will ultimately make disciples of all nations and glorify our Trinity God!
Rev Joshua Ting
CCCOWE Chief Executive (Chinese Coordination Centre of World Evangelism)
Congratulations to the debut Chinese Sunday Service in Glasgow!
I am elated by the love of God rooted within all of you, my dear! May the love of God be filled in every corner through all of you to help people have eternal life and triumph in Christ. Let us encourage each other with the following bible verse:
“If then, we have a kingdom which will never be moved, let us have grace, so that we may give God such worship as is pleasing to him with fear and respect.” Hebrews 12:28
Rev. Mickey Mak Ming Ki
EFCC Tsim Fook Church
Dear Jenny,
I believe that in the latter day, Muslims and the Jehovah’s Witnesses are well familiar with the philosophy embedded in the Chinese proverb “know your enemy and know yourself”. If we keep remaining passive in ministry, heresy and paganism will grow in popularity, and the harvest we reaped will be taken away; today churches in England seem not to realise that our next generation is trapped, Christians with immature faith including overseas students may be lured away from God. Do you recognise the risk?
Today we no longer experience much hardship in reaching Muslims in South-asian and European countries- they are now much easier to be reached. We have to seize the opportunity given by God and build up relationships with overseas students and friends, so that they can benefit through life-on -life interaction, and so that one day when they ask what makes us have hope, we can make clear the virtues of Him who took us out of the dark into the light of heaven.
May all of you become a channel of blessing from God and the Church.
In Christ,
Rev. Pang Tai Ming
East London Alliance Church
“See, I am doing a new thing; now it is starting; will you not take note of it? I will even make a way in the waste land, and rivers in the dry country.” Isaiah 43:19
I am grateful for the Lord’s establishing church service for the Chinese in Glasgow. Thank you Lord for opening the door to evangelism. Today we do not have to go far to reach out to Chinese , because God brings them to us. I wish the church will serve as a bridge for them to know Jesus Christ and equip them to become God’s disciples. May God be revered and praised in Glasgow. Amen.
Rev. Chun-Kuen Cheung
Chinese Church in London – Hammersmith (Cantonese Congregation)
May His church be fed, be rich in spirituality, be zealous in preaching the gospel, may His kingdom come.
May God’s name be all the more dignified, glorified, May His grace be all over the earth.
Rev. Samuel Chu
Director, Hong Kong Bible Seminary
It is significant to have the debut Chinese Sunday service to be held in an international church as it leaps over cultural borders; it is also very inspiring to have a woman preach a sermon on the debut Sunday service as it is a breakthrough in gender equality in church.
May God bless the Church and let different ethnic groups, and men and women to receive the grace of God; May God also unite people’s mind in giving the good news and be a channel of God’s blessing!
Elaine Yip
Deaconess, Un Chau Estate Baptist Church
May God use you greatly, allow more Chinese to meet Jesus Christ in this place. I also pray that the Holy Spirit pour on Dr Jenny Wong, let her be passionate about serving God, so that it pleases the Lord and the congregation.
Francis Ching-Wah Yip
Associate Professor
Divinity School of Chung Chi College
Chinese University of Hong Kong
Be the salt of the earth and light in the world and glorify God and help people;
Let the little light of us shine for God and transform the world for Him.
Pastor Samuel Poon Kwong Mo
Hong Kong Bethel Wing Kei Church
I came to know all of your faith and contributions towards God through missionary sister Jenny. I would like to make use of this opportunity to pray for God’s blessing on you all so that all of you can continue to be witness for His grace, may glory be to God.
Lawman Lo
Chief Editor, Christian Times
