We call ourselves the Christian
Reformed Church in North America. What does that mean?
We call ourselves Christian because
we are followers of Jesus Christ. We believe that Jesus was the Son of
God and that he is the center of human history.
We’re called Reformed because we
grow on a branch of the church tree that emerged from the Protestant
Reformation in sixteenth-century Europe.
We’re a Church because we believe
God has called us together to be a people who belong to him and live for
him.
North America tells you where we
are situated; but it also tells you we’re connected with other Reformed
denominations in other places around the globe.
What unites these diverse people
across North America? What binds them into one entity?
Among other things, we agree on
certain core beliefs. That is one of the reasons we gather to worship
and to work, pursuing God’s plan for this world. We believe in the
Bible as the authoritative
Word of God. And we speak with a Reformed accent.
What We Believe
Biblical Standard
We believe that the bible is the
authoritative Word of God. It contains all that people in any age need
to know for their salvation. We call the Bible God’s Word, believing
that, by the power of the Holy Spirit, God speaks to us through this
book.
The Bible has two major sections
that at first glance seem quite different from each other. The Old
Testament records God’s work through centuries of Israelite history
until about 400 B.C. The New Testament picks up with God’s work through
the life of Jesus, the coming of the Holy Spirit in power, and the
subsequent spread of the church over the first century A.D. You could
also think of the Bible as a library of sixty-six unique books of
various kinds by many authors in different contexts over thousands of
years. But it is only one book: the whole of it forms one richly
textured story of God’s loving purpose in relation to humans and the
whole creation.
Ecumenical Creeds: Our church
subscribes to the following three creeds:
Apostles Creed
Nicene Creed
Athanasion
Creed
Doctrinal Standards: Out church
subscribes to the following three confessions:
Heidelberg
Catechism
Belgic
Confession
Canons Of Dort
Contemporary Confession
Our World
Belongs to God - A Contemporary Confession
