On May 15, churches that made up Classis Grand Rapids East of the Christian Reformed Church in North America met at Eastern Avenue CRC one last time to worship together as 10 churches were disaffiliated and more than 50 active and retired pastors were released from or acknowledged as leaving the CRCNA.
The movements were precipitated by decisions of Synod 2024 that required repentance or disaffiliation from any member congregation not acting in line with previous decisions of synod that affirmed as confessional the teaching that same-sex sexual relationships are unchaste, and therefore sinful.
“No church in Classis Grand Rapids East desired these congregations to disaffiliate; no church in Classis Grand Rapids East desired all these pastors to be released from ministry,” said Mike Abma, pastor of Woodlawn CRC. “Our classis has always functioned in a loving, harmonious, respectful manner,” he continued. Abma said he wanted people to understand that this has been devastating for the entire classis. “We have always put our identity in Christ above all things,” he said.
Synod 2024 placed officebearers from congregations acting against the previous decisions of synod on a limited suspension, which disallowed them from being delegated to broader assemblies and gave a year to see demonstrated movement toward repentance or disaffiliation. “We knew that each of these congregations felt forced out by the denomination,” Abma said. Woodlawn CRC remains part of Grand Rapids East, although Abma said they are currently discerning whether it’s possible to continue in the denomination.
Kristy Bootsma, pastor of faith formation at Eastern Avenue CRC, one of the 10 now disaffiliated congregations, had similar reflections on what happened. “We are mourning the loss of something that had been so beautiful and so good for so long,” Bootsma said. David Bolt, an elder at Eastern Avenue, said that the May 15 worship service was both Spirit-filled and somber. “Worshiping together is a wonderful and joyful act that binds us together in the unity of the church universal, even through a time where we are being forced apart.”
Bolt said the classis has been intentionally celebrating and mourning with each other. Congregants of Eastern Avenue church put a timeline of the church’s history in the fellowship hall “to help us understand that we are still the same church doing the same work of God in our world, even if our denominational affiliation is different after 147 years,” he said.
Len VanderZee, serving as a part-time, interim pastor at Church of the Servant, another disaffiliated church, said there was a sadness over the May 15 meeting and its intertwined worship. “I got the feeling that most of the other churches that are staying are sad about it as well. A lot of them were quite willing to live with the differences,” he said. VanderZee served five CRC congregations and the denomination as a whole as editor-in-chief for Faith Alive Christian Resources until he retired in 2011, and then went on to serve as an interim pastor and, for one year, editor of The Banner. He moved his ordination to the Reformed Church in America in February. VanderZee said the disaffiliations and transfers of ordination will change the character of both the CRC and the RCA.
Bootsma also moved to the RCA, North Grand Rapids Classis. She said she interned at an RCA church during seminary and that moving felt like “coming home.”
Eastern Avenue church currently has no denominational affiliation while it discerns a way forward. “We are considering all of our options at this time,” elder Bolt said. He also explained that the 10 disaffiliated churches are actively supporting each other in "a covenant of care," which is open to including churches outside the classis that are also leaving the CRC.
Abma said that pastors from remaining and disaffiliated congregations of Classis Grand Rapids East have been meeting monthly for mutual support since 2022. He wonders if the support shown to differing churches is what attracted scrutiny from other parts of the denomination by way of overtures to synod and online discussions. “We sometimes felt that this is one of the reasons Classis Grand Rapids East was such a target—people saw a community of churches that did not necessarily agree on many of these issues and yet it was a classis that loved one another, that worked well with one another, and that presented a model for how things could have been within the CRC.”
Synod rejected suggestions about working together with difference on same-sex relationships, such as Overture 29 to Synod 2023, which requested that synod “declare that a classis of the CRCNA, in response to local needs and circumstances, may … (allow) officebearers from local congregations who disagree with the decision to continue serving and ministering within their local contexts without being subject to discipline.” Quoting the Acts of Synod 1976, Synod 2023 said “synods have the ability to interpret what the confessions teach. Note: ‘No one is free to decide for himself or for the church what is and what is not a doctrine confessed in the standards. In the event that such a question should arise, the decision of the assemblies of the church shall be sought and acquiesced in’ (Acts of Synod 1976, p. 69).”
Andrea Bult, a pastor at Madison Church-Square Campus, described how the impact of the disaffiliations is affected by the closeness of the classis. “The church I grew up in is in a far-flung classis along with churches a thousand miles away. In Classis Grand Rapids East almost all of our churches are packed into a three-mile radius. This means our lives overlap in countless ways outside of classis meetings. For me, I think that added to the gravity of the moment. It felt like we were losing a limb.”
While Madison is currently one of the churches remaining, their discernment process is still ongoing. “There is a lot of listening that has to happen—to the Holy Spirit and to one another,” Bult said. “One of our core values has been welcoming leaders from a wide range of Christian traditions, and we want to be sure we can continue in that path.” Of the May 15 worship, Bult said she witnessed love, mutual honor, and respect. “This meeting felt like an embrace within the departure.”
As of May 15 the remaining Grand Rapids East congregations are Celebration Fellowship, Madison, Plymouth Heights, Seymour, Shawnee Park, Victory Fellowship, Woodlawn, and the just-declared organized Living Water CRC, which emerged in 2013. Much of the classis leadership was provided by officebearers from the departing churches. The May 15 classis minutes note that ministry team leaders from disaffiliating congregations will continue in their roles until July 31, when new leaders and regular team members would then be needed for four classis teams: leadership development, starting and strengthening churches, disability concerns, and safe church. The minutes acknowledge “a potential need to adjust the ministry team structure to correspond with emerging priorities and current resource levels.” Abma is serving as interim classis president, and Shirley Roels, an elder of Shawnee Park, is interim vice president.
There has been some discussion about the possibility of forming a new Grand Rapids City classis with some congregations from neighboring Grand Rapids classes. The informal work toward that is the subject of a communication to Synod 2025. The next meeting of Classis Grand Rapids East is scheduled for Sept. 18.
About the Author
Callie Feyen is a writer living in Ann Arbor, Mich. She attends First Presbyterian Church of Ann Arbor. Callie writes news for The Banner and contributes to Coffee+Crumbs, and T.S. Poetry Press. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing and is the author of The Teacher Diaries: Romeo and Juliet, and Twirl: My Life in Stories, Writing, & Clothes.