The NRC Of Kalamazoo, Michigan (1)

Situated in southwestern Michigan some forty miles from Lake Michigan and midway between Detroit and Chicago, Kalamazoo is a pleasant, medium-sized city of some eighty thousand inhabitants. Originally “Kalamazoo” was an Indian name which means “boiling or bubbling water.” The earliest residents of the area were “moundbuilders,” an early race of Indians that subsisted on farming. A number of earthen mounds attributed to these Indians still exist in the area, the most well-known being found in downtown Kalamazoo’s Bronson Park.

Over a period of a few centuries, other Indian tribes coming from the north, such as the Mascoutin and the Miami, exterminated the mound-builders. When the first white men arrived in 1680 in what is now called Kalamazoo County, the land was occupied by the Pottawatomi tribe, a branch of the greater Algonquin people.

The Indian Treaty of 1821, known as “The Chicago Treaty,” opened the area to white settlers and became the basis for many of the county’s land titles. Another treaty with the Indians in 1833 arranged for the exchange of five million acres of Indian land for $40.00 in trinkets and trappings — that is, one penny for every 125 acres!

In 1829 Titus Bronson built the first white man’s permanent cabin on the present site of Bronson Park. The county itself was organized by an act of the territorial legislature and approved by the governor on July 3, 1830. The town of Bronson was officially designated the county seat the following year. Five years later, an influential group of men in town, dismayed by the apparent eccentricities of Titus Bronson, had the town name changed to “Kalamazoo.”

After the arrival of Michigan Central Railroad (1846), the number of foreign immigrants to Kalamazoo increased sharply, especially with the arrival of several thousand Dutch farmers in the 1850s who made the area famous for celery. About that time, various industries began to arise, of which paper manufacturing became the unchallenged leader by the 1870s. In 1886, the Upjohn Drug Company, now one of the world’s leading pharmaceutical firms, was founded. Today the Upjohn Company is the largest employer in Kalamazoo County, hiring seventy-six hundred people, including several from our Netherlands Reformed congregation.

Presently, the population of Kalamazoo County numbers 220,000. More than four hundred manufacturing firms actively employ workers. In addition to pharmaceuticals and paper products, major industries today include chemical products, fabricated metals, transportation equipment, aircraft controls, plastics, and bedding plants. Five institutions of higher learning accommodate fifty thousand students. The county has 250 churches representing fifty denominations.

One of the older churches in Kalamazoo is our NRC which dates back to 1889. On August 6 of that year a group of twenty-one Dutch Reformed men met together to discuss the possibility of forming a new congregation. The group had in common a respect for Reformed experiential truth and a dissatisfaction with the churches they were attending due to a lack of pure Reformed teaching and improper Christian discipline. Included among their number was Rev. Klaas Kreulen who had formerly served as a minister in the Reformed Churches Under the Cross in the Netherlands.

By a nearly unanimous vote, this founding group, who had already heard Rev. Kreulen preach in an informal setting five times to their satisfaction, decided to ask him to serve as their pastor. Rev. Kreulen acknowledged he was willing to serve them providing all were agreed to abide by the Word of God, the Three Forms of Unity, and the Church Order of Dort. All present concurred.

The group then considered their need for a place of worship and a parsonage. One member, Mr. J. Robijn, responded generously, for he not only offered a suitable piece of property for a church, but also made available the home in which he was presently living as a parsonage! Moreover, since the minister’s family was still in the Netherlands, the group agreed to pay their transportation costs. It was agreed that the minister’s salary would be whatever was remaining from the Sunday collections after the costs of the meeting place had been deducted.

The centennial commemorative volume of the Kalamazoo NRC, Our Hope for Years to Come [hereafter: Our Hope],1 authored by Elder Garret J. Moerdyk, informs us of further details that led to the group’s organization as a congregation:

A subsequent meeting was held on August 27 to proceed further with the organization of a congregation…. Fourteen men with their families, and one widow, fully convinced of the necessity of this move, made their decision at that time to become members of the new congregation….

At the third meeting on the following Tuesday evening,… voting for office-bearers resulted in Dirk Poel and Jan Vlieg being elected as elders and Jacob Bergers and Cornelius van Lente as deacons….

Several other meetings took place in the following month…. A store owned by a Mr. Fransen appeared to be suitable for a meeting place….

The first recorded consistory meeting was held October 29, 1889, but details are very minimal. However, an attempt was to be made to affiliate with the True Dutch Reformed Congregation of South Holland, where Rev. E. Meinders was minister….

With some impatience the reply was awaited, but finally a meeting was called on December 9 to inform the congregation of the letter which had been received from Rev. Meinders. He expressed some objections regarding this, but their consistory was willing to meet together with the Kalamazoo consistory to discuss it further….

The meeting was held January 15, 1890. Both sides agreed that God’s Word was the only standard for faith and life, with the Three Forms of Unity and the Church Order of Dordt as the basis for church formation. After much deliberation, it was agreed that each congregation keep its own name for the present, at least until a general meeting could be arranged for approval of a common name. This name would then also require approval by the male members of both congregations. Since Rev. Kreulen had arrived from the Netherlands as a member of the Christian Reformed Church and had formerly been a minister in the Churches Under the Cross, the consistory of South Holland requested not only to see his credentials, but also an opportunity to examine him regarding his soundness in doctrine. This was done the following day; there were no objections, and approval was given for the affiliation. Rev. Meinders would officially install Rev. Kreulen in the Kalamazoo congregation in the near future. Additional regulations were made, stipulating that no members of secret organizations were to be admitted as members of the congregations, nor was insurance of life and possessions to be allowed, unless it were the requirement of a mortgage contract for a period of time.

Installation and inaugural services were held in January or early February of 1890 for Rev. Kreulen, and afterwards the members were confirmed and the office-bearers officially installed in their respective offices. Family visitation was also to be done by the minister and an elder, after which the sacraments would be administered….

After other possible locations were considered, property was purchased at 923 South Burdick Street for the sum of $1,900, and arrangements were made to erect a church building there for the sum of $1,325. The building was to be 36 feet by 50 feet, with a stone foundation.

In 1892 the decision was made to affiliate with the Holland Christian Reformed Church, whose Classis was held in Grand Rapids, and in November the congregation [which then consisted of twenty-five families] united with them and became a Christian Reformed Congregation. In these years following the organization of our congregation, members were added from time to time, but also on occasion disciplinary action was required against certain members.

In 1893 there was also discussion about beginning a Sunday school and about such matters as the addition of stalls behind the church for horses, which would be at the disposal of designated members of the congregation. A group of young people were given permission to use the church one evening per week (7:30 to 8:30) for practicing singing together. However, it was stipulated that they would be required to pay for the lighting used, that they would sing only psalms, would behave decently, and would make a donation to the church for the use of the building.

It was at a consistory meeting of July 12, 1893, that Rev. Kreulen informed the consistory members that he had declined a call to Eastmanville, Michigan. However, provided there were no major objections or evidences that his decision would be contrary to the will of the Lord, he was inclined to accept the call which he had received from the congregation of Zeeland, Michigan. No objections were made, and, to the sadness of the congregation, their pastor departed from them.

In accordance with a proposal from the consistory, Rev. H. H. Dieperink-Langereis of the Beaverdam, Michigan, congregation was invited to preach, and in August was called to be pastor. Annual salary was to be $500. He declined that call. A month later the proposal was again made that he be called with a salary of $700 annually. Some members objected because a duo nomination was not presented to the congregation, but the call was sent, and was accepted.

Rev. Klaas Kreulen

(1833-1901)

Klaas Kreulen was born on March 15, 1833, at Nieuwleusen, which is a village in the province of Overijssel, The Netherlands. Little is known of his early years, but at the age of twenty-eight years he was declared a candidate for the ministry. His ministerial studies were at the theological school at Kampen. This was a school of the Christelijke Afgescheiden/Christelijke Gereformeerde Church. He served in a number of congregations of the Christian Reformed Church in the Netherlands — Putten (September 1861 to August 1864), Giessendam (August 1864 to August 1866), and Zierikzee (August 1866 to May 1869).

In May of 1869, he was deposed from the ministry of that denomination because of a transgression against the seventh commandment. However, in that same year he was installed as pastor of a congregation in Wissenkerke, Noord Beveland. This congregation was associated with the Reformed Churches Under the Cross, who were led by Rev. C. van den Oever, the minister in the church which later was to be Rev. G. Kersten’s congregation. After five years as their minister, Rev. Kreulen broke ties with Rev. van den Oever and the congregation in Wissenkerke, and returned to his home town of Nieuwleusen.

In the years following, Rev. Kreulen made several attempts to be reinstated in the ministry of the Christian Reformed Church, but they refused to readmit him. Therefore during the years 1874 to 1888 he served as an exhorter for a congregation in his home town. This group also desired to have him as their minister, but both Classis and Synod turned down their request. In 1888 he emigrated to America and there sought to be readmitted to the ministry by the Christian Reformed Church, but he was not accepted.

It was through a minister in Grand Rapids that he was then introduced to a group in Kalamazoo, and we find him at the first meeting when the congregation of Kalamazoo was formed. It was then August 6, 1889. At that meeting he gave himself to serve as their minister, and in January or early February of 1890 he was re-ordained as minister by Rev. E.L. Meinders of South Holland, Illinois.

Under the leadership of Rev. Kreulen, the Kalamazoo congregation affiliated with the Christian Reformed Church in 1892, but the following year Rev. Kreulen accepted a call to serve the North Street Christian Reformed Church in Zeeland, Michigan. Some years later in 1898 he accepted a call to the Noordeloos Christian Reformed Church near Holland, Michigan, but became emeritus two years later at the age of sixty-seven years. He passed away on June 15, 1901.

— Our Hope for Years to Come, pp. 83-84

The new minister was installed on Sunday morning, October 22, by Rev. W. Grave of Grand Rapids, with the text of Matthew 28:20; the inaugural sermon was preached in the afternoon, with the text from Isaiah 52:7,

“How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings, that publisheth peace; that bringeth good tidings or good, that publisheth salvation; that saith unto Zion, Thy God reigneth!”

Thus, after a brief vacancy of only a few months, the congregation was again privileged to behold their own shepherd and minister among them.2

Such were the birth-pangs and be ginnings of another part of God’s vineyard. Despite trial and persecution, also in the midst of this Kalamazoo congregation God would sovereignly and graciously perform wonders for more than one hundred years. But more of this next time, D.V.

1For most of the information in this and subsequent articles, D.V., we are dependent upon this centennial volume. Its full title is, Our Hope For Years To Come: One Hundred Years as a Congregation; Netherlands Reformed Congregation of Kalamazoo, Michigan 1889-1989. Copies are still available from the church for $8.00. Write Netherlands Reformed Congregation, 108 Pratt Road, Kalamazoo, MI 49001.

2Ibid., pp. 4-9.

Dr. J.R. Beeke and Rev. J. den Hoed are continuing a series of articles on the histories of individual Netherlands Reformed Congregations.

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