Closing CRC Blesses Recovery Mission With its Property, Building

John Calvin Christian Reformed Church, of Truro, N.S., which held its final service April 27, is donating its property to Souls Harbor Rescue Mission, a ministry with over a dozen active and developing locations across Nova Scotia. Matt Forrest, a pastor and manager of Souls Harbour’s current Truro site, said it will allow them to serve about 20 men in a live-in, year-long recovery program. “This initiative will significantly expand our ability to address addiction at its root—through a holistic, Christ-centered approach that nurtures spiritual growth, daily disciplines, and long-term recovery,” Forrest said.

The church’s closing committee landed on Souls Harbour as the best fit after receiving four or five proposals from different organizations, all with previous connections to the church. Tom van Milligen, a specialized transitional minister who served John Calvin CRC through the winters of 2023-24 and 2024-25, said it helped the congregation to see that the people who might be served by using the facilities it had stewarded “weren’t strangers but people they’d supported” and partnered with. John Calvin CRC had taken up offerings for Souls Harbor, and some parishioners volunteered at the existing emergency shelter in downtown Truro.

Forrest said Soul’s Harbour was grateful to have the opportunity to present its need to John Calvin CRC, especially as it found out about the request for proposals after the period for applications had closed. He feels “God laid the groundwork for collaboration” because a Christian school that had also made a proposal for the property decided to withdraw its application in favor of Souls Harbour.

Forrest said minimal renovations are required to prepare the former John Calvin CRC as a residential recovery center—essentially just installing showers and laundry facilities. He expects they’ll be able to begin hosting participants as soon as six to eight months after they acquire the building. The facility will be named The Helm-Truro, in keeping with Souls Harbour’s first recovery center in Halifax, also named The Helm.

Andrew Alkema served as chair of John Calvin CRC’s final council and is on its closing committee. He said the hand off to Souls Harbour will come after a judge grants the dissolution of the church as a legal entity as part of the committee’s work of distributing assets. “We will apply to the court on May 20, and the judge will set a period of time for any claims to come forward, but we don’t know how long that will be.” Alkema said someone will likely be able to report on the final details of the closure at the fall meeting of Classis Eastern Canada.

Van Milligen said when John Calvin CRC called him for the first winter term as a bit of an experiment, there had been some hope to restore ministry and renew vision after a parting with a previous pastor. “But it became apparent that they were tired,” he said, noting the denomination’s human sexuality report recommended to the churches in 2022 as a factor. “The HSR made them question leaving the CRC, and when they saw how much work” that would entail, they began to “think it’s time to close.”

Van Milligen said “the ministry of presence” is a big part of what a transitional pastor offers, even when a church is closing. He said a final worship service is “sort of like a funeral for the church.” At the April 27 service, where van Milligen estimated there were about five times the typical number of people, they shared memories through slides and read a litany of lament and thanksgiving together. Some local CRCs and neighboring churches sent people to bear witness with John Calvin CRC.

“There was definitely an element of remembrance,” van Milligen said, while his sermon from 1 Peter 1:1-2—the apostle Peter writing to exiled believers—reminded that God can use moments of dispersing believers as an act of sowing seeds in new places.