The story of Graafschap Church is a   uniquely American tale. It is a story of immigrants seeking a better life, and   the freedom to live out their faith together. It is a tale of taming a   wilderness, of building a town, of new industries, of learning a new language   and assimilating into American society.          

Yet   throughout this story there have been constants: unshakable faith, a commitment   to the community they helped build and a willingness to serve God’s Kingdom in   all fields of endeavor.          

On   March 15, 1847 a small band of men, women and children from Graafschap Bentheim   and Drenthe, two regions in the Netherlands near the German border, left for   America. There were 104 of them on the sailing ship Antoinette   Maria, and   they arrived in New York after a 49 day passage across the North   Atlantic.         

After   their arrival, they journeyed up the Hudson River to the Great Lakes, following   their leader, the Reverend Albertus Van Raalte. Van Raalte had gone ahead to   Michigan to scout possible locations for what they thought of as their “colony.”   They followed the Great Lakes, sailing through the Mackinaw Straits and down the   east coast of Lake Michigan until they reached their destination, Black Lake   (which would later be renamed Lake Macatawa).       

There   were sand bars blocking the channel between Black Lake and Lake Michigan, and so   the immigrants had to be ferried to shore. Once they had all landed, they prayed   and sang psalms of thanksgiving on the shore of Black Lake for God’s providence   in bringing them to their new home.        

The   first night they made shelters of evergreen branches and suffered from the June   mosquitoes. The next day, flatboats carried them up Black Lake a few miles to   the town of Holland, which mostly consisted of log cabins. The group wanted to   stay together, and so they found a site a few miles south and west from Holland   to build their new village. They called it “Graafschap,” after their home town   in the Netherlands.      

Graafschap   Church began as a small, log cabin worship space (a replica of which sits on the   Graafschap Church’s property today). For more than 160 years we have been   living, worshipping and serving God together here. We have seen Civil Wars and   World Wars. We have lived through industrialization, economic booms and   depressions. We have learned a new language and have become Americans, while   remembering and still being shaped by our immigrant experience. We were one of   the first of four congregations that formed a new denomination, the Christian   Reformed Church, that has touched people and communities around the   globe.         

We   are still here, the descendants of that first pioneer band. Others have joined   us along the way, and today Graafschap Church is an integral part of the Holland   area. We are grateful for God giving us this home, so many new neighbors, and so   much to share together.       

For   more about the  early Holland colony, the pioneer experience and   Graafschap Church, please visit our Heritage Center.