We are members of a denomination called the Christian Reformed Church of North America.  Currently, there are over 320,000 members and over 900 churches throughout North America, including 18 in Colorado.  The roots of the CRC are in the Netherlands.  In 1848, four congregations in Holland decided to contract with moving and shipping companies in order to move to North America.  They found land in Western Michigan and appropriately named their new settlement Holland, Michigan.  In 1857, they organized into a denomination.  The Christian Reformed Church grew rapidly with the waves of immigration in the late 1800s.  Today you can find a number of Dutch last names among our members, but you will also find names from many other heritages:  African-American, Korean, Vietnamese, Hispanic--in other words, people from all over the world.

Why a denomination?

The word "denomination" is a bad word among many Christians today.  With too many stories of infighting, liberalism, denominational churches having little to do with other churches and the perception of sending financial resources away to an impersonal office in some other state, the word "denomination" may deserve some of its bad press. However, we do not throw the "baby out with the bath water."  We're very grateful to God for our denomination.  We can do things together that we could never do on our own. Here are some of the things we do better together:

1. Send out missionaries who can concentrate on establishing growing churches rather than spending time raising money.  We are very mission-minded for both local home missions (in North America) and world missions.
2. Hold each other accountable and support each other. If a church begins to teach things that are unbiblical, the other churches will work with them, bringing them back to the standard of truth of God's Word.
3. Train pastors under the watch of the churches. The Christian Reformed Church of North America has its own seminary, Calvin Theological Seminary, which is over 125 years old. Connected with the seminary is Calvin College, which is committed to taking the light of God's Word to every subject. It is an excellent college that yearly makes the top 100 list for small colleges.
4. Develop Christian education materials and establish a network of youth ministries (through Faith Alive Christian Resources and Youth Unlimited).