You’ve been finding out your Bible. Maybe you’ve listened to standard Calvinist lecturers and preachers. You’ve turn into satisfied {that a} Calvinistic soteriology, generally referred to as “the doctrines of grace,” faithfully expresses what Scripture teaches. God elects from all eternity and offers religion by his Holy Spirit, enabling us to consider within the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Now what? The place can you discover like-minded believers who perceive the gospel in the identical approach?
Whereas I can’t probably checklist each Reformed or Presbyterian denomination, in what follows I present a consultant pattern of a number of the most outstanding.
The origins of Reformed denominations
Distinctives in doctrine and observe result in denominationalism. Protestant denominations can hint their origin to the Reformation, when Luther broke with the Roman Catholic Church. Different Reformers adopted swimsuit. Typically denominations stem from geographic separation, and generally they stem from irreconcilable doctrinal disagreements.
Reformed denominations are largely divided into two teams: Presbyterian and Continental. These two teams are doctrinally in a lot settlement, and many individuals might comfortably transfer between them with out altering their fundamental system of religion and doctrine. Many of those church buildings are in fellowship with one another by means of organizations just like the North American Presbyterian and Reformed Council (NAPARC).
Each teams typically maintain to a Calvinistic soteriology and a few type of covenant theology. Their sacramental theology is broadly Calvinistic as nicely, which entails toddler baptism and a perception in the true religious presence of Christ within the Lord’s Supper, versus views of bodily presence (e.g., transubstantiation) or a mere symbolic memorial view. The extra conservative denominations listed under strongly affirm the authority and precedence of Scripture, following the Reformational precept of sola scriptura—the authority of Scripture over all human creeds, councils, and confessions.
Presbyterian denominations
Presbyterians hint their roots again to the English Reformation and the Scottish type of church polity. Presbyterians maintain to the Westminster Requirements, which had been formulated by a church meeting at Westminster in the course of the English Civil Warfare within the 1640s.
The Presbyterian church is ruled by a gathering of ministers referred to as a presbytery (from the biblical presbyteros, “elder“). If the area is massive (as an example, spanning an entire continent), the denomination could also be divided into a number of presbyteries that meet often as a Common Meeting to conduct church enterprise.
Presbyterian Church USA (PCUSA)
The older “mainline” denomination from the Presbyterian custom is the Presbyterian Church USA (PCUSA). Controversy erupted within the PCUSA in 1909 when the denomination licensed three candidates who didn’t affirm the virgin delivery of Jesus. An ensuing decades-long battle within the PCUSA drove many conservatives (together with the Orthodox Presbyterian Church in 1923) to depart the denomination.
Affiliate Reformed Presbyterian Church (ARPC)
The Affiliate Reformed Presbyterian Church (ARPC) has direct roots in Scottish and Irish Presbyterian church buildings, who immigrated to Pennsylvania within the mid-1700s. The ARPC has 250 congregations in North America and had 25,975 members as of December 2024. Their worship model is usually conventional, utilizing each psalms and hymns.
Orthodox Presbyterian Church (OPC)
The OPC was based in 1936 when J. Gresham Machen broke with Princeton Theological Seminary over controversy concerning theological liberalism. The OPC has remained a bastion of Presbyterian conservatism ever since. As of December 2024, it contains 300 congregations and 32,965 members. The OPC’s worship is usually conventional with hymns and psalms, although some variety in model from congregation to congregation exists.
Presbyterian Church in America (PCA)
Based in 1973, just like the OPC, the PCA separated from the mainline Presbyterian church buildings due to the difficulty of theological liberalism. In 2024, they’d 1,667 congregations and 400,751 communicant and non-communicant members. The worship model in PCA church buildings is numerous, with some following a extra conventional worship, but additionally many modern worship companies.
Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America (RPCNA)
The RPCNA descends instantly from the Scottish Covenanters within the Reformed Presbyterian Church of Scotland. Its first presbytery was shaped in 1774. RPCNA worship may be very historically Reformed, characterised by unique psalmody (the usage of solely psalms for congregational singing) with no musical devices for accompaniment. As of 2021, the RPCNA had roughly 100 congregations and seven,000 members.
Continental Reformed denominations
Continental Reformed denominations stem from church our bodies on the European continent, and most of them are within the stream of the Dutch Reformed custom. The Dutch Reformed church buildings maintain to the Three Types of Unity as their confessional requirements. These three requirements are the Heidelberg Catechism, the Belgic Confession of Religion, and the Canons of Dordt.
Continental Reformed polity is analogous in some ways to the Presbyterian polity, with considerably completely different terminology (e.g., a “presbytery” is roughly equal to the Reformed “classis,” and a Presbyterian “Common Meeting” is equal to a Continental “Synod”) and slight variations in process.
Christian Reformed Church in North America (CRCNA)
The CRCNA was based in 1857 by Dutch immigrants in America, a lot of whom had fled non secular persecution in Europe.
Over the course of its existence, the denomination has undergone quite a lot of change and controversy in its outlook on social points, and these battles rage on even at this time. Due to theological shifts within the CRCNA, together with the approval of girls’s ordination, NAPARC suspended and finally terminated CRCNA’s membership. Since then, wrestle within the CRCNA between confessionalism and extra liberalizing tendencies continues.
The CRCNA is the most important Continental Reformed denomination, with 981 congregations and 183,710 members. Worship in CRCNA congregations follows conventional types, although these have a tendency to seek out expression in numerous modern kinds of music and liturgy.
Reformed Church in America (RCA)
The RCA is the oldest Dutch Reformed church physique in North America. Previously referred to as the Reformed Protestant Dutch Church, the RCA modified its identify to the Reformed Church in America in 1867. As of 2025, the RCA had 553 congregations and 74,762 members. RCA worship companies are conventional, with psalms and hymnody, together with different historic components of their liturgy.
United Reformed Church buildings of North America (URCNA)
The URCNA was shaped in 1996 by congregations and ministers who had largely damaged with the CRCNA over the theological shifts in that denomination. Points included inspiration and authority of the Scripture, ordination of girls, and evolution. URCNA worship is conventional, with psalms and hymnody.
Theologically adjoining denominations
Reformed Baptists
Reformed Baptists maintain to the 1689 Baptist Confession. They’re Calvinistic of their soteriology, however maintain strictly to credobaptism, the baptism solely of those that actively make a confession of religion. There isn’t a official Reformed Baptist denomination, and congregations are autonomously ruled, although some might affiliate with each other informally, or could also be members of a corporation just like the Reformed Baptist Community.
Anglican Church in North America (ACNA)
The ACNA has its roots within the English Reformation and the Anglican Church, and quite a few their ministers maintain to broadly Reformed doctrine. Their doctrinal commonplace is the Thirty-9 Articles of Faith, and its polity is episcopal (rule by bishops). Their worship is guided by the liturgical custom present in the E-book of Widespread Prayer, however the model of worship inside that custom is numerous. As of 2024, the ACNA had 1,027 congregations and 130,111 members.
Communion of Reformed Evangelical Church buildings (CREC)
The Communion of Reformed Evangelical Church buildings was based in 1998. They’ve a broad imaginative and prescient for Reformed ecumenism, and will subsequently obtain congregations that maintain to any of a number of Reformed doctrinal requirements, together with the Westminster Requirements, the Three Types of Unity, the Thirty-9 Articles, and the 1689 Baptist Confession. Their polity is considerably presbyterian, however pastors are members of their very own congregations slightly than of a presbytery. As of October 2025, there have been 125 congregations and about 15,600 members within the CREC. CREC worship tends to be conventional in character. The CREC is without doubt one of the few Reformed or Presbyterian denominations by which most congregations train or enable for paedocommunion (i.e., they admit all baptized individuals, together with kids, to the Lord’s Supper).
A Reformed catholic religion
In the Nicene Creed, to which all Reformed and Presbyterian church buildings maintain, we acknowledge and confess the church “catholic.” This refers to not the Roman Catholic Church, however to the wholeness of Christ’s physique all through the world. In confessing this, we are saying that we’re all members of 1 physique with others who confess and worship the triune God, though separated by oceans and even essential theological variations.
Jesus prayed that the church could be one (John 17:11), and God the Father will grant the request of Jesus Christ his Son. Jesus continues to purify his church. So we search for a day when denominations are not wanted and the church is united visibly, whilst it’s united spiritually in Christ by means of the Holy Spirit whereas we, at current, select congregations and denominations by which to worship.
Assets on Presbyterian and Reformed denominations
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