About Us

Welcome to the Chinese Church of Thousand Oaks English Ministry web site. Please note that the Sunday schedule has changed. Service now begins at 9:50 AM and the Theological Seminars will follow at 11:30 AM.

History of CCCTO

The Chinese Christian Church of Thousand Oaks (CCCTO), located in Thousand Oaks, California is an independent non-denominational, evangelical Christian church. The church started from a Bible study group in 1977 by two Chinese Christian families. The Bible study group grew to as many as 40 people in 1978. On Easter Sunday 1979, the first Sunday worship service was held at the Conejo Valley Baptist Church by borrowing its facilities. The church was supported by several Chinese Christian families who envisioned a ministry to reach out and serve the needs of Chinese families in Ventura County, a major suburban community located northwest of Los Angeles. In 1981 Pastor Stephan Chen was installed as our first pastor to shepherd the Chinese-speaking congregation. The church building project and revision of church bylaw began in 1987. In 1988 the church building project was completed and the church building was dedicated on Thanksgiving Day of the same year. With an English-speaking group growing, Pastor Curtis Lowe was installed as the first pastor of our English-speaking congregation in 1990. Currently we have a worship attendance of 130 in the adult English-speaking congregation, 250 in the adult Chinese-speaking congregation, and 70 in the children’s ministry.

Weekly programs include Worship Services, Sunday School, Prayer meetings, Children Group, AWANA for preschool, grades 1-6, junior high, Youth Group for Junior High, High School, Young Married Group, Career Fellowship, Growth Groups (adult local group fellowships), Men’s Group, Women’s Group and Senior Group. Separate language fellowships are available for those who feel more comfortable speaking in either Chinese or English. Ministries include Chinese-speaking ministry and English-speaking ministry. The Chinese-speaking ministry focuses on Chinese from China, Taiwan and Southeast Asia. The English-speaking ministry originally focused on the American-Born Chinese and their descendants. With many non-Chinese members now a part of the English congregation, we welcome the Lord’s leading in expanding the scope of our English ministry to reach out and to serve the needs of Asian-Americans and the community at large.
Our most vibrant and growing programs are the AWANA, Children Group and Youth Group. The AWANA program began as a ministry for the children in our own church. The enthusiasm for the program has encouraged our children to invite their schoolmates and neighbors. It has been a great outreach vehicle. The Children’s Ministry has demonstrated phenomenal growth in the recent years. The Youth Group, partially junior high and high school have also shown growth in this year. Newcomers have sought out these groups merely by word of mouth.

Among the full-time missionaries we support, three are from our own church. Two of them are ministering in China. The other is ministering in Chicago. Others have taken up the call to be involved in short-term missions to various locales in China, South East Asia, Central Asia, and Europe. We also support missionaries who are non-CCCTO members in Taiwan, China, Southeast Asia, as well as locally.

The potential for continued growth of CCCTO is excellent in the light of the growing population of our community. The vision/direction of CCCTO in the next two years is to focus on reviving spiritual growth among our church members and increasing maturity through conversion of non-believers.

Statement of Faith

1. There is only one true and living God, Creator of the universe, who exists eternally in three persons -- the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit -- and that these three are one God

2. Jesus Christ, our Lord, is the only Son of God, who became flesh through the Virgin Mary, died on the cross as the atonement for sin, was buried, rose again bodily from the dead, ascended to the Father in heaven, and will personally returned to earth in glory and power.

3. The Holy Spirit, the third person of the blessed Trinity, the Comforter, dwells in every believer, and is ever present to testify of Christ.

4. The Bible -- containing the sixty-six books in the Old and New Testaments -- is inspired by God as originally written and is therefore infallible and inerrant. The Bible centers about the Lord Jesus Christ, and is the supreme authority in all matters of faith and conduct of the Christian.

5. Man was created in the image and likeness of God, but fell through sin and thus became eternally dead in trespasses and sins and subject to the power of the devil. Man’s redemption has been accomplished solely by grace through the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, and man’s salvation and eternal life come only through faith in Christ and through the regeneration by the Holy Spirit.

6. There is only one Church, which is the body of Christ, to which all believers belong, and whose mission is to witness concerning its Head, Jesus Christ, fulfilling His great commission by preaching the Gospel to all nations.

7. Baptism of believers by immersion and the Lord’s Supper partaken by baptized believers are the two scriptural ordinances to be observed in the Church.

8. The Lord Jesus Christ will be coming in the air to receive His own to Himself into Heaven when the dead in Christ will be resurrected and living Christians will be transformed, and that this event is the blessed hope set before us to which we should be constantly looking.