About Our Church
Our Vision
To work together with God, relying on the power of the Holy Spirit, to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ, and to build a spiritual family that glorifies God and is healthy and filled with the Lord's love.
Our Beliefs
Our church holds to the pure faith, with the Bible as the supreme authority, and the Nicene Creed, the Westminster Confession of Faith, the Larger Catechism, the Shorter Catechism and the Heidelberg Catechism as descriptions of our faith. The ten articles of our confession of faith are:
- The Bible: The sixty-six canonical books of the Old and New Testaments are all inspired by God and without error, and are the supreme authority for faith and life.
- God: The one true God is triune — Father, Son and Holy Spirit — who creates, upholds, redeems and judges all things.
- Christ: Fully God and fully man; he was crucified for the sins of the world, rose again and ascended into heaven; he is King of kings and our great High Priest.
- The Holy Spirit: He regenerates people, convicts them of sin and leads them to repentance and faith; he dwells in believers, guiding and teaching them, and gives them power to live godly lives.
- Man: Created in God's image, mankind fell completely in Adam; only through regeneration by the Holy Spirit and faith in Jesus Christ can a person be justified.
- Redemption: Christ's shed blood, substitutionary death and resurrection are the only foundation of justification and redemption; salvation rests entirely on the grace of God's sovereign election.
- The Sacraments: Baptism and the Lord's Supper are sacraments the church is to observe. They have no saving efficacy in themselves, but are means of grace.
- The Church: The holy catholic church, made up of believers called and regenerated through the ages, with Christ as its head, fulfilling the mission of the gospel.
- The Return: Christ will return personally and bodily to judge the living and the dead and to renew all things.
- Eternal Life: In the resurrection of the body, believers are raised to eternal life and unbelievers to eternal punishment.
Our Values
Lives renewed, lives built up, lives matured, lives passed on.
Through proclaiming the gospel, lost lives are renewed, built up and brought to maturity in a family filled with the Lord's love, and life influences life; God's love is made visible through every member of His family, and renewed lives bear witness to the gospel.
Our Pastor and Officers
Pastor Junjian Liu — A native of Henan, China, he came to the United States in 2000 and received his theological education at Reformed Theological Seminary (Orlando). He came to pastor the Chinese church in Tampa in early 2006 and was ordained as a teaching elder by the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church in 2007. He graduated from Zhengzhou University's School of Foreign Languages (B.A. in Literature), Reformed Theological Seminary, Orlando (M.A. in Biblical Studies), and Erskine Theological Seminary (equivalent M.Div.), and earned a doctorate in education (Ed.D) from the University of Central Florida.
Pastor Liu's wife, Xinxiu Huang, is from Taiwan. After further study at seminary she devoted herself to missions in mainland China; the two met and married within the house-church community there. They have one son, Bo'en Liu.
Elders: Pingou Yang, Shijie Song, Zhichao Li, Xuelei Wang
Board of Deacons: Chonghuai Li, Yi Jin, Qixian Jin (Paul), Yonggang Ma, Yefei Zhu, Guozheng Huang, Yan Xing, Mei Chen, Yunfeng Chen (Wendy), Bo Qiang, Siling Chen (Stan)
Children's Sunday School: Qian Li
Youth Counselor: Liyang Wu
Our Church
Tampa Chinese Presbyterian Church is a traditional evangelical church worshiping primarily in Mandarin Chinese. It belongs to the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church (ARPC) denomination and is the only Chinese church in that denomination. We currently borrow the building of Trinity ARP Church in Tampa; the two churches help and support each other in ministry, and in English ministry and children's Sunday school in particular we rely on the help of Trinity Church.
Use of the building: Trinity Church's Sunday worship is 9:30am–10:30am, during which the Chinese church holds adult Chinese Sunday school; from 11:00am–12:30pm the Chinese church holds its Chinese worship service while Trinity Church holds English Sunday school.
The church began as Tampa Chinese Christian Presbyterian Church, formed by a few families worshiping at Trinity Church in the United States, committed to the ARP denomination. In 2006 Pastor Junjian Liu accepted the call to serve as the church's preacher; in 2007 the Florida Presbytery of the ARP ordained him as a teaching elder and appointed him as church-planting pastor; in 2008 the church re-registered under the name Tampa Chinese Presbyterian Church.
Our church follows the ARPC's Form of Government as its charter for church governance.
If you come to Tampa, please contact Pastor Junjian Liu (813-465-9918) or one of our elders and deacons — we welcome you to join our gatherings!