What We Believe



The Protestant Reformed Churches

The Protestant Reformed Churches hold a unique place in the worldwide Body of Christ because we proclaim many truths of historic Christianity which are now refuted by the vast majority of today’s Christian churches.  We proclaim beautiful truths such as the sovereignty of God over all things including man’s salvation.  We also believe that God calls, through faithful preaching, only those whom He has chosen to be his spiritual children (election); and those whom He has not chosen He has sovereignly condemned to spend eternity in Hell (reprobation).  Man in his pride seeks to reject this doctrine of double predestination which teaches us that God, according to His good will, saves only those whom He desires to save.  The Lord of heaven and earth irresistibly calls His own people in Jesus Christ, and does not stand idly by waiting to see who will choose to serve Him. He has sovereignly ordained those who will serve Him.

The official PRCA website hosts a vast wealth of information about our denomination, along with many other online resources.


The Three forms of Unity

These truths are clearly laid out with scriptural proof texts in the Three Forms of Unity which clearly summarize many of the fundamental doctrines of the Reformed faith. The three forms include:

The Heidelberg Catechism

The Canons of Dordrecht

The Belgic Confession



The Creeds

In addition to these important confessions, there are church creeds which were developed in the early centuries of the New Testament Church. They show God’s faithfulness in guiding His church in the development of doctrinal truth throughout the course of the new dispensation.

We Believe

We confess and proclaim the doctrines of double predestination, limited and effectual atonement, total depravity, irresistible grace, and the perseverance of saints as fundamental truths of the gospel of grace. We believe that we are called, both as a church and denomination of Reformed churches, to stoutly defend and enthusiastically proclaim the historic, creedal, and distinctive doctrines of Calvinism. We rejoice whenever we see men and women standing not alone for “conservatism” but for the faith set down in the Heidelberg Catechism, the Belgic Confession, and the Canons of Dordt.

The biblical doctrine of the covenant is precious to us. We regard it as a truth that is central in Scripture, basic to the Reformed faith, and fundamental to the life of the believer. The doctrine of the covenant has been developed in the PRC. We conceive it, not as a contract mutually agreed upon by God and men and dependent upon the fulfillment of stipulated conditions by two parties, but as a living relationship of friendship between God in Christ and the elect church, established and maintained by the sovereign grace of God alone. We deny that faith is a condition to the covenant, but believe that faith (the “gift of God” in Ephesians 2:8) is the means by which God realizes His covenant, as well as the means by which the elect enjoy the covenant and willingly carry out their part in the covenant.

Among the practical implications of this covenant view is the calling of the church to promote and defend marriage, the earthly symbol of the covenant between Christ and the Church (Ephesians 5:22ff.), as a life-long unbreakable bond. On this basis the church should (and can) oppose the evil of divorce and remarriage in her communion — an evil that devastates churches today, angers God, and disgusts godly men and women. Thus also, the family is safeguarded for the sake of the godly rearing of the children, who are included in the covenant (Malachi 2:14-16; Matthew 19:3-15).

Members of the PRC believe that good, Christian schools are important and therefore have established a number of Christian grade schools and high schools. In areas where their own schools are not possible, parents use the existing Christian schools.

We Reject

We reject the teaching of “common grace” which says that God is gracious in the preaching of the gospel to all who hear the external proclamation. Although the gospel ought to be preached to all and although all ought to be confronted with the command to repent and believe, God is gracious in the preaching to the elect alone (“particular grace”).

We recognize Arminianism as a serious threat to the church. Despite the rejection of Arminianism as false doctrine by the Synod of Dordt, and the condemnation of it by the Westminster Standards, it makes deep inroads into churches by the popular doctrines of:

1) A universal love of God for sinners revealed in the gospel

2) Jesus’ death for all men without exception with appeal to John 3:16

3) The dependency of God in salvation upon the decision of the sinner (“free will”). If free will is not openly espoused, all too often there is deep silence in the churches’ preaching and confession with regard to predestination (election and reprobation) and the other doctrines of sovereign grace

Our church notes with alarm:


1) The widespread abandonment of the doctrine of the inerrant inspiration of Scripture by churches both in the United States and in Europe.

2) The openness of Reformed churches to the charismatic movement, the involvement of churches in ecumenicity that allies them with other churches which are hostile to the distinctively Reformed doctrines, with churches which are theologically “liberal” (churches in the National and World Councils of Churches), and even Rome.

3) The sheer worldliness of life now tolerated (and even promoted) by churches, contrary to what the churches once exhorted as the “antithesis” — the spiritual separation from the world of a holy life (this last evil is what Francis A. Schaeffer deplored as the evangelical churches’ “accommodation” to the world, in his The Great Evangelical Disaster)