Kong Hee Podcast

The fourth statement of the Apostles’ Creed is this: Jesus suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried.

Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor of Judea during the first century AD, was the one who presided over Jesus’ trial and gave the order for His crucifixion. Why must He die on the cross? Hebrews 9:22 says, “Without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins.” Isaiah 53 says that the Saviour will have to suffer physically, psychologically, morally, and spiritually for the sins of all humankind. By being crucified, Jesus really died and was really buried. His work of salvation was completely finished on the cross once and for all. Everything that happened at Calvary authenticated all the claims of Christ. The next time you utter this statement in the Apostles’ Creed, you can do so with the utmost gratitude knowing that if everything Jesus claimed actually happened at Calvary, then you can also be certain that one day, He will return again in power and glory to receive you into His everlasting kingdom, just as He has promised!

The third statement of the Apostles’ Creed is this: Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary.

Jesus was conceived by the direct action of God. There was no physical consummation between Joseph and Mary. His was a supernatural conception! In order for Jesus to be our Saviour, three conditions must be fulfilled, and the supernatural virgin birth guaranteed that Jesus fulfilled all three conditions, which I will share with you in this video. 

Because Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit, He is fully God. Because Jesus was born of Mary, He is fully human. Without the incarnation, Jesus Christ could not die for us, and the cross would become meaningless. The incarnation shows how much God loves us and has made a way for us to be redeemed through His Son. The next time we recite this statement in the Apostles' Creed, may we be immensely grateful for the great love that the Father has bestowed on us!

The second statement of the Apostles’ Creed is this: "I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord." Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is the second person of the Trinity. He is not a created being. On the contrary, He is the eternal, unchanging, all-powerful God. But if God did not create Jesus, why then is he called the “Son”, and specifically, the "only" Son? In this video, I will break down this second statement in the Apostles' Creed and explain it to you as succinctly as possible. Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ is crucial for your salvation, and I hope that the next time you profess "I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord," you will be awestruck by the Saviour and Lord whom we love and believe in!

The first statement of the Apostles’ Creed is this: "I believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth." When we say “I believe,” it speaks of something that is deeply personal. Christianity is a personal faith between you and God. No one can believe in God on your behalf – you must personally believe in him! But who is this “God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth” that Christians believe in? I hope that after watching this short video snippet, every single time you recite this first line of the Apostles’ Creed, you will find yourself being strengthened in your faith as you reaffirm your belief in this one true God.

Someone once said that if life is a journey, and the 800,000-word Bible is the exhaustive map with everything in it, then the 115-word Apostles’ Creed is its simplified road map. In the next few posts, I will be sharing about the Apostles’ Creed. The word “creed” comes from the Latin word credo, which means “I believe”. As such, the Apostles’ Creed comprises statements that affirm what a Christian believes. I pray that by the end of this series, you will have a revelation of what each statement of the Apostles’ Creed means, and henceforth, you will recite it during every holy communion with utmost faith and conviction!

Again, the word here for “women” in the Greek is 𝘨𝘶𝘯𝘦, meaning “wives”. Straightaway, we see that this is not a blanket ban on the female gender speaking in church. Paul was referring only to the married women, and not the single (unmarried) females. Within the biblical structure of a marriage, a wife must submit to her husband. Can a married woman serve in church as a spiritual leader? Absolutely! As long as she is submitted to her husband in the marriage, she is qualified to assume any position of leadership in the church, to which God has called her.

Why were the wives forbidden to speak here in 1 Cor 14? The word “speak” in the Greek is 𝘭𝘢𝘭𝘦𝘰. The Liddel & Scott’s Lexicon defines 𝘭𝘢𝘭𝘦𝘰 as "chatter" and "babble", which could mean talking continuously in an excited or incomprehensible way, while a service is underway. Paul was correcting these married women of Corinth for their inappropriate or disruptive behaviour in the services, which was distracting both speakers and hearers.

Was Paul disallowing the female gender from having a public ministry, or the spiritual authority to preach, teach, and lead? Absolutely not! The fact that he says in 1 Cor 11:5 that women could pray and prophesy, and in 1 Cor 14 that two or three could prophesy in worship, shows that women are allowed to minister publicly in a service.

In conclusion, both men and women are created in the image of God and are of the same value in God’s sight (Gal 3:28). Though the roles of men and women in a family unit is different, the Bible does not put the emphasis on gender as a requirement for spiritual leadership in the church. The emphasis is first on the character and lifestyle of the person who wants to lead, as well as evidence of a clear divine calling and gifting (Eph 4:7-8; 1 Cor 12:4-5).

In CHC and THN, we fully support women in spiritual leadership, whether they are home CGLs, pastors, preachers, or Bible teachers.

The word used for “woman” here in the Greek is 𝘨𝘶𝘯𝘦, which specifically means “wife”. So, right off the bat, this passage does not apply to single, unmarried women. It was not a blanket ban on the female gender preaching, teaching, and leading in the Church.

Paul does not allow the wife to have authority over the husband in the marriage. The word “to have authority” in the Greek is 𝘢𝘶𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘰̄, which is only used this one time in the entire Bible. It doesn’t mean “to have spiritual leadership”. The old KJV translated it correctly – it means to “usurp authority”, or to be seditious, in a marriage.

In a marriage, there is no question that wives should submit to their husbands (1 Cor 11:3-16; Eph 5:22-24; Col 3:18; 1 Tim 2:11-15; Tit 2:4-5; 1 Pet 3:1-6). As long as there is genuine marital submission, these married women can still be spiritual leaders in the house of God, and even become top spiritual leaders over God’s people. This was true of Deborah in the OT, Junia in the NT, and many female bishops, archbishops, and general superintendents of major Protestant denominations today.

What does the Bible say about women in church leadership? Can a woman be a preacher, a Bible teacher, a pastor or an ordained minister?

There is no denying that the Bible is filled with examples of women leaders. Miriam, Deborah, Huldah, and Esther had spiritual authority over God’s people. In the Early Church, Priscilla taught Apollos the Word of God. Phoebe was a deacon. Junia was considered an apostle. Tryphena, Tryphosa, and Persis were Paul's co-workers in his apostolic ministry. Lydia, Mary, Chloe, and Nymphas were house church leaders. Euodia and Syntyche were leaders in the Philippian church.

Church history is filled with many mighty women leaders, like Thecla, Ammia, Perpetua, Felicitas, Syncletica, Marcella, Proba, Paula, Melania, Hilda, Hildegard in Germany, Argula von Grumbach, Katharina Zell, and Teresa of Avila, etc. They were great leaders, Bible teachers, preachers, theologians, writers, disciple-makers, evangelists, miracle-workers, prophetesses, and church-planters.

Today, almost all major Protestant denominations recognise and ordain women pastors and ministers, like the Anglican, Assemblies of God, Church of God, Foursquare, Lutheran, Methodist, Presbyterian, The Salvation Army, and even some among the Reformed and Baptist. Many among them have women general superintendents, bishops, and archbishops.

This is the final instalment on why we (in CHC) are Pentecostals. One distinctive of Pentecostalism is its doctrine concerning the second coming of Christ.

In spite of the advancement of the gospel, this “present evil age” will get ever darker, and lawlessness will abound (Gal 1:4; Mt 24:12). Jesus, however, will come again to end world history, raise the dead, judge the wicked, and usher in a reconstructed universe. This second coming will be preceded by a rapture and a resurrection (1 Thess 4:13-18), and Christ will defeat Satan and his Antichrist, false prophet, and evil forces (Rev 19-20). At His return, Jesus will set up His 1,000-year reign here on earth (Rev 20:1-6). This interval is called the “millennium”. It will be a time when Jesus reigns in righteousness and peace. After that, He will usher in the eternal state of the new heaven and new earth (Rev 21-22). This is the clear and plain teaching of the Bible, as well as the Early Church, in the first five centuries.

Almost all Classical Pentecostals are premillennialists! We reject the theories of idealism and preterism because they don’t interpret the Book of Revelation literally, but only allegorically and symbolically. Preterism believes that all end-time prophecies have already been fulfilled by AD 70, with the fall of Jerusalem. It teaches that the second coming of Jesus has already “taken place” (symbolically), and there is no rapture or 1,000-year reign of Christ. This goes against the clear biblical witness and we can’t accept it.

A quick recap:

(1) As Protestants, we believe in salvation by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone.

(2) As Evangelicals, we believe in the inspiration, infallibility, and inerrancy of the Scripture. We reject liberal theology in all its forms.

(3) As Pentecostals, we believe in (a) the baptism in the Holy Spirit as a second blessing, with tongues as the initial, outward evidence; (b) the appropriateness of speaking in tongues corporately; (c) Arminianism, not Calvinism; and (d) premillennialism, not preterism.

Maranatha! Even so, come, Lord Jesus!

Almost all Classical Pentecostals are Arminians; we are not Calvinists! We believe that Jesus died for all, and He wants us to share the gospel to all, so that faith will arise in people’s hearts to freely choose to receive Christ as their Saviour. We don’t accept Calvinism’s idea of a “limited” atonement, which believes that Jesus didn’t die for the whole world (He went to the cross only for some).

(1) As Arminians, we believe in the sovereignty of God. The crucial difference here is that God, in His love, chooses to be sovereign even over His own sovereignty. He limits His own power to permit humans to freely choose, even if it means that they might oppose His will. Nothing less than the genuine freedom of choice is required for this love to be real.

(2) As Arminians, we believe in predestination. The crucial difference here is that we don’t believe that God has “predetermined” who will go to heaven and who will go to hell. We stand firmly on Rom 8:29 that says, “For those God foreknew He also predestined”. The clear Bible evidence here is that God’s foreknowledge is the ground of His predestination. Those He foreknew, who will freely respond to His saving grace, He elected for salvation.

(3) As Arminians, we also believe in total depravity, in salvation by grace, and in the assurance of this salvation. We just cannot accept the Calvinist’s interpretation of them, which we feel is not consistent with biblical witness.

As Pentecostals, we at CHC and THN, are very serious about the Holy Scripture. We seek to contend for the gospel which has been entrusted to us (Jude 1:3). We desire to preach the gospel to the whole world (Mt 28:18-20), expressing a divine love which, unconditionally and genuinely, draws all people everywhere, allowing them to freely choose Him.