Fall 1947: Dr. K. Schilder, theologian in the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands (liberated), visits the Protestant Reformed Churches (PRC) at their invitation. Schilder speaks at ministers’ conferences, lectures to large audiences, mostly of Protestant Reformed people, and preaches in congregations throughout the denomination. Schilder promotes his distinctive doctrine of a conditional covenant.

Protestant Reformed minister Rev. A. Petter begins a series of articles in the Protestant Reformed periodical Concordia, defending Schilder’s and the liberated churches’ doctrine of a conditional covenant against the established Protestant Reformed doctrine of an unconditional covenant. Thus Petter launches the controversy over the covenant in the PRC that will culminate in the adoption of the Declaration of Principles and in schism.

1948: The PRC begin working in missions with mostly liberated, Dutch immigrants in Ontario, Canada, with a view to organizing them as Protestant Reformed congregations.

May 1, 1949: Prof. G. M. Ophoff, professor of theology at the Protestant Reformed seminary, begins his public response to Petter’s defense of a conditional covenant. Ophoff’s response in the Standard Bearer is titled “Open Letter to Rev. Andrew Petter.” In the fifth installment of his response to Petter in the July 1, 1949 issue of the Standard Bearer, Ophoff writes that the truth of the unconditional covenant is established doctrine in the PRC. He writes also that the difference regarding the covenant “between the Protestant Reformed and the Liberated…is fundamental.” And he calls the conditional covenant doctrine of Christian Reformed theologian Prof. W. Heyns and of the liberated “heretical.” Thus the controversy over the covenant heats up.

June 1950: The synod of the Protestant Reformed Churches adopts, provisionally, a document called “A Brief Declaration of Principles of the PRC.” Synod composes and adopts the document in response to the request of the denominational mission committee for a “form” to be used in organizing a “Protestant Reformed congregation.” The occasion of the request is the work of the mission committee with liberated immigrants in Canada. The Declaration establishes from the creeds the basic truths of the covenant doctrine of the PRC, a covenant doctrine that the PRC have confessed and preached from their founding. All churches organized by the PRC or affiliating with the PRC must be in heartfelt agreement with this doctrine of the covenant. Synod decides that, after being examined by the churches for a year, the Declaration will be adopted, decisively, by the synod of 1951.

January 1951: The recently organized Protestant Reformed church in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, whose members are almost entirely former members of the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands (liberated), summarily deposes its pastor, Rev. H. Veldman, and Elder S. Reitsma and severs relations with the PRC. The reason is the commitment of the consistory and congregation to the liberated doctrine of the covenant and their detestation of the Protestant Reformed doctrine of the covenant.

April 1951: Rev. H. De Wolf, one of the three pastors of the large and influential First Protestant Reformed Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan, preaches a sermon promoting the doctrine of a conditional promise of the gospel, thus taking up the cudgels on behalf of the liberated covenant doctrine in the controversy that is ongoing in the PRC and contradicting the covenant doctrine of the Declaration of Principles. Members of the congregation protest the sermon, but a bitterly divided consistory cannot render a verdict on the protests.

June, September, and October 1951: A lengthy and recessed synod of the PRC adopts the Declaration of Principles, decisively, as had been envisioned by the synod of 1950. Synod revises the Declaration somewhat, without changing the doctrinal content of the document as provisionally adopted by the synod of 1950. As a synodical decision, the Declaration is official, binding confession by the PRC that the covenant of God, having its source in God’s eternal election, is governed by election and is therefore established unconditionally with Jesus Christ as head of the covenant people and with the elect in him. It condemns the doctrine of a conditional covenant as heretical.

November 1951: Schilder writes an article in the paper of the liberated Reformed in the Netherlands stating that the relations between the PRC and the liberated churches are now at an end, because of the adoption by the PRC of the Declaration of Principles.

September 1952: De Wolf preaches another sermon teaching conditional salvation, in support of the liberated doctrine of the covenant and in opposition to the doctrine of the Declaration of Principles, which the synod of the PRC had decisively adopted in 1951. This sermon causes still more strife in First Church and in the denomination. Also this sermon is protested by members of the congregation, but a divided consistory is unable to pass judgment. Half of the elders support De Wolf.

April and May 1953: Classis East of the PRC judges appeals against the refusal of the consistory of First Church to condemn the statements and doctrine of De Wolf in his sermons in April 1951 and in September 1952. Classis condemns the offensive statements and the doctrine of De Wolf as heretical. Classis advises the consistory to demand a public apology from De Wolf for the statements on penalty, for refusal, of suspension from office. Classis also advises that the elders who support De Wolf in his false teaching are to concur in his apology.

June 1, 1953: A committee of Classis East meets with the consistory of First Church to deliver, explain, and urge adoption of the decisions of Classis East concerning the heretical statements of De Wolf and concerning the action to be taken by the consistory, including requiring their pastor to make a public apology. The consistory takes a decision acquiescing to the decisions of classis.

June 21, 1953: In a worship service of First Church, De Wolf gives what he presents as the public apology advised by Classis East and required by his consistory. In fact, his statement from the pulpit of First Church is not an apology. De Wolf does not read the apology that had been drawn up for him by the consistory of First Church. Against De Wolf’s pseudoapology, there are objections by members of the congregation.

June 22, 1953: The consistory of First Church fails on a tie vote to reject De Wolf’s purported apology.

June 23, 1953: The consistory of First Church (consisting of Rev. H. Hoeksema and Rev. C. Hanko and of the elders who, having voted to carry out the advice of Classis East, also voted to reject De Wolf’s pseudoapology) suspends De Wolf from office and deposes the elders who support De Wolf, rejecting the advice of Classis East. Because De Wolf and the elders who support him are not informed of this consistory meeting and are not present at it, this meeting and the actions taken at it come under severe criticism both in First Church and throughout the denomination. Present at this meeting of the consistory are the committee of Classis East that had been appointed to help First Church with its difficulties and a neighboring consistory, which approves the suspension of De Wolf and the deposition of the elders who supported him.

June 28, 1953: The now-divided congregation of First Church holds separate worship services. The smaller part of the congregation worships under the auspices of the consistory whose ministers are Hoeksema and Hanko. The larger part worships under the auspices of a consistory whose minister is the suspended De Wolf. This congregation does not recognize the suspension of De Wolf. The group meeting with De Wolf temporarily retains the church building. This is fully developed schism in First Church.

June 1953: The annual synod of the PRC meets in the charged atmosphere of the developments in First Church, which are common knowledge. On the agenda of synod are a number of protests against the adoption of the Declaration. Classis West, one of the two classes of the denomination, informs synod that it supports the protests against the Declaration and that it “considers the Declaration to be illegal.” In view of the fact that the Declaration was adopted by majority vote at the broadest assembly of the denomination, the statement by Classis West is revolutionary. Synod is deadlocked. Every vote concerning the Declaration is a tie. For this reason and in order, if possible, to avert the impending schism in the denomination, synod recesses until March 1954. It puts the matter of the protests against the Declaration into the hands of a study committee, which is to give advice to the reconvened synod in March 1954. The study committee consists of three ministers who are avowed foes of the Declaration.

September 1953: Classis West of the PRC decides that it will not recognize the suspension of De Wolf and the deposition of the elders who support him. Thus the churches and members of Classis West, with a few exceptions, separate from the PRC, making themselves guilty of schism in the body of Christ. Classis West, of course, has no jurisdiction over a church in Classis East. Interfering in the disciplinary work of a church in Classis East, the churches of Classis West make themselves guilty of hierarchy. Article 84 of the Church Order of Dordt reads: “No church shall in any way lord it over other churches, no minister over other ministers, no elder or deacon over other elders or deacons.”

October 1953: Two delegations appear at the meeting of Classis East, both presenting themselves as the lawful delegation of First Church in Grand Rapids. Classis East recognizes and seats the delegation from the consistory whose pastors are Hoeksema and Hanko. Classis rejects the delegation from the consistory whose pastor is De Wolf. Upon this decision of Classis East, a number of pastors and elders, supporters of De Wolf and foes of the Declaration, withdraw from the classis. Thus schism now occurs also throughout Classis East. The schism is denomination wide.

January 1954: Ministers of the schismatic churches hold secret meetings with leading ministers and theologians of the Christian Reformed Church (CRC) negotiating agreement over the doctrines that historically have divided the PRC and the CRC, undoubtedly with a view to the eventual return of the schismatic churches to the CRC. One of these meetings, perhaps but not definitely the first, took place January 15, 1954. This is barely three months after the schism in the PRC became a reality throughout the denomination (by the actions of some at the October 1953 meeting of Classis East).

March 1954: The schismatic faction, still claiming to be the legitimate PRC, holds a synodical meeting, as though their synod were the continued session of the synod that had recessed in June 1953. This synod of the schismatics postpones repudiating the Declaration to their synod of June 1954.

The reconvened synod of the PRC meets. Synod appoints a committee to advise synod on the report of the study committee appointed by synod at its meeting in June 1953. The report advises synod to accede to the protests against the Declaration, thus declaring the Declaration null and void in the PRC. The committee appointed by the reconvened synod of March 1954 will fail to carry out its mandate and will eventually be discharged. The synod of the PRC, therefore, never judges the protests against the Declaration that were on the agenda of the synod of 1953.

June 1954: The synod of the schismatic churches declares the Declaration to be “without force” in their churches.

1957: The synod of the schismatic churches, still calling themselves the PRC, addresses the CRC asking for “ecumenical contact” with the CRC.

1960: The synod of the schismatic churches meets in special session to decide on a proposal to return to the CRC. The proposal fails on a tie vote.

1961: The schismatic churches return to the CRC, expressing that they do not object to the three points of common grace and that they will not agitate against them. Thus these churches come to an ignominious end, a mere eight years after their separation from the PRC. Thus also their noisy claim at the time of the schism and for some years thereafter that they were, and intended to remain, Protestant Reformed is exposed.

1954–2000: The Declaration fades into the background in the PRC. There is little reference to it. Little use is made of it. Few study it. It is not impossible that some members of the PRC wrongly dislike the document as the cause of admittedly very painful strife and division—strife and division that affected families. “Wrongly,” because the Declaration was not the cause of the schism. The cause of the schism, as is so often the case in the history of Christ’s church in the world, was the introduction of false doctrine into the churches—false doctrine concerning the covenant of grace.

2000: With the surfacing in almost all the reputedly conservative Presbyterian and Reformed churches in North America of the heresy of the federal vision, occasioned by the publication of the book by Norman Shepherd, The Call of Grace: How the Covenant Illuminates Salvation and Evangelism (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R, 2000), the Declaration becomes a vitally important document both for the PRC and for the wider Reformed community. For the Declaration exposes and condemns the covenant doctrine that is the root of the federal vision. The federal vision openly denies justification by faith alone and the five doctrines of grace that are confessed by the Canons of Dordt. Where the federal vision reigns, or is tolerated, the Reformed faith goes under. But the Reformed faith is Holy Scripture’s gospel of salvation by sovereign grace as confessed by the Reformed creeds.¹