Orchard Hill Reformed Church has occupied a stretch of Three Mile Road NW in Walker, just northwest of Grand Rapids, since 1989, when it was started on forty acres of farmland to be a "light on the hill" for the surrounding neighborhood. Twenty-five years later that calling still shapes everything the church does: Sunday morning worship that draws families from across the community, a children's wing called HillKids, weekly mentoring at Central Elementary right down the street, and a long list of partnerships that send volunteers, food, and prayer both around the corner and to the other side of the world.
Sunday Worship at 10 AM
Worship on Sunday morning begins at 10:00 AM, with doors open early enough that visitors can grab a cup of coffee and get settled. The Worship Center sits in the center of the building, with driveways and doors on both sides, so anyone can use whichever entry is more convenient. Inside, greeters wearing name tags stand ready to answer questions and walk newcomers to wherever they need to be. There are no assigned seats - find one you like and make yourself comfortable. Most people arrive in business casual, though suits and shorts both make appearances.
The service itself runs about an hour and fifteen minutes and gathers people from many different walks of life who have experienced the love of God in different ways. The church is candid that its worship "does not fit a particular mold," choosing instead to be "passionate and authentic" rather than contemporary, traditional, cutting edge, or old school. Music, prayer, Scripture reading, and preaching are woven together in a blended style led by Director of Music and Worship Arts Wendy Huizinga, who has shaped the church's musical worship since 2008.
Visitors are not expected to give. A collection plate is passed as an act of worship for members and regular attenders, but no one will look twice at a guest who lets it pass. After the service, the lobby fills with coffee, punch, and cookies for a long, unhurried fellowship hour.
Worship is also livestreamed for those at home or traveling, and recent sermons are available as a podcast and on YouTube.
What Visitors with Children Will Find
HillKids Nursery welcomes babies through age three in a newly renovated space staffed each week by multiple background-checked volunteers. The nursery is open before the service begins so parents can settle little ones and head into the Worship Center without stress. A separate Mom's Room features a television showing the live service feed for parents who need to step away with a baby.
Older children begin the service with their families. Preschoolers through fifth graders are released from the Worship Center after the musical portion of the service, following a blessing from the congregation, and head to the HillKids wing. Check-in happens at a desk in the lobby; first-time check-in takes about fifteen minutes because families are entered into the system, and after that a phone number is all that is needed. Each family receives matching guardian and child tags, and a family number prints out that can be flashed on the sanctuary screen if a parent is ever needed mid-service.
The children's curriculum is a chronological, three-year journey through the Bible called The Gospel Project for Kids, with the explicit goal of showing how the whole story points to Jesus. Preschoolers meet in the Pumpkin room; kindergartners through fifth graders gather for large-group teaching and then break into grade-based small groups with an activity and journaling time. Every volunteer working with children has been background-checked.
Middle School and High School Students
Orchard Hill Student Ministries is built around the conviction that "dozens of students" in the surrounding neighborhood need to hear the good news and become committed followers of Christ. Middle School Youth Group meets on Sundays from 4:00 to 5:30 PM (September through May) for sixth through eighth graders, filling the time with games, conversation, teaching from God's Word, and the practical question of how to follow Jesus during the school week. High School Youth Group meets Sunday nights from 6:00 to 8:00 PM for ninth through twelfth graders, with two hours that include hanging out, games, worship, and teaching, plus a year full of retreats, service projects, and mission trips. Youth Pastor Greg Salmon, who leads the family ministry team, oversees both groups.
A Discipleship Rhythm Called Connect Four
Whatever a person's age or stage, Orchard Hill funnels spiritual growth through a rhythm the church calls Connect Four. Members and regular attenders are encouraged to commit to four practices: Grow daily through Bible reading, prayer, and weekly worship; Connect consistently with other Christians for care, growth, and mission; Serve regularly by putting their gifts and talents to work in the church and the world; and Reach always - meeting the needs of the lost, the last, and the least and declaring the good news.
Adult groups are organized to fit those four practices. Community Groups are mid-sized, semi-regular gatherings for fun centered on faith, with built-in options for every stage of life. The Flock, led by Mackenzie Stubblefield, gathers young adults ages 18 to 25 every other Thursday in Studio 1. Connected in Christ serves adults ages 26 to 39, meeting the last Monday of each month for dinner and conversation. Hill Toppers, led by Wendy Huizinga, is a fellowship for seniors 65 and older that meets every other month for prayer, worship, and sweet treats. Men's Breakfast brings men eighteen and up together on the third Saturday of the month, and Women of the Hill gathers women of all ages on selected Thursdays for refreshments, teaching, and an activity.
Equip Groups are short-term gatherings designed to sharpen a particular calling. Couples' Ministry, Witness United (a faith-sharing group led by Pastor Laura Dilley), Parenting Ministry for parents wanting to raise Jesus-following kids, and Faithfully Fit for women who want to grow stronger in body, mind, and spirit all rotate through the church calendar. Small Groups are long-term gatherings that meet in homes and around tables to study Scripture and pray together; options include a men's Bible study, women's studies like Morning Roots and Seek First, and a Saturday morning Men's Table Fellowship. Discipleship Groups are the most intimate: groups of three to five same-gender believers who meet twice a month to ask one another accountability questions, share what God is teaching them, confess what needs to be cut out, and pray.
Reformed Beliefs, Covenant Sacraments, and the ARC
Orchard Hill is a member congregation of the Alliance of Reformed Churches (ARC), a growing community of congregations aligned together around a high view of Scripture, the call to make disciples who make other disciples, and the equipping of every believer for kingdom work. The ARC's Confessions include the Apostles', Athanasian, and Nicene Creeds as the statements that unite all Christians, the historic Reformed trio of the Heidelberg Catechism, Belgic Confession, and Canons of Dort, plus the Belhar Confession as a Reformed addition to the Belgic Confession and the Great Lakes Catechism on Marriage and Sexuality as an addendum to the Heidelberg.
The church's own statement of beliefs affirms the triune God - Father, Son, and Holy Spirit - and spells out a classic Reformed understanding of each Person. God the Father is the maker of heaven and earth who sovereignly watches over creation. The Son, Jesus Christ, was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of a virgin, fully human and fully divine, lived a sinless life, died on a cross, rose again, ascended to heaven, and will return bodily as King of Kings and Lord of Lords. The Holy Spirit indwells every Christian from the moment of salvation, illuminating, guiding, equipping, and empowering believers for Christ-like living and service.
Salvation is by grace alone through faith in Jesus: every person is sinful by nature and by choice and under God's wrath, but Christ shed His blood as the perfect all-sufficient atonement, and His resurrection defeated the power of sin and death. Faith involves repentance, confession before witnesses, and obedience to His Word; every Christian is a disciple entering a lifelong process of maturity. The Bible is the divinely inspired, error-free, clear, sufficient, and final authority for faith and life, and the most faithful reading of it is as a covenant book in which God enters into a covenant of grace with His people.
The church practices two sacraments: baptism and the Lord's Supper. Baptism is administered both to infants as a sign of God's covenant promises and inclusion in His family, and to adults as a profession of faith in Christ's atoning death and resurrection. The Lord's Supper is observed as a proclamation of what Christ's death accomplished, with the bread and juice understood as symbols of Christ's body and blood and Christ understood to be spiritually present.
Leadership gifts are given by the Holy Spirit to both men and women. The church holds that every human life is sacred from conception through old age, affirms that sexual intimacy is designed by God to occur only within marriage between a biological male and a biological female, and reserves final interpretive authority on the Bible's meaning and application to the Pastors and Governing Elders.
Local Outreach: Schools, Food, and Families
Although Orchard Hill partners with ministries abroad, its main outreach focus is right in its own backyard. The church partners directly with Central Elementary, which sits down the street from the building. Two programs anchor that partnership. Kids Hope matches adult volunteers from the church with an at-risk child at the school for one hour of mentoring each week, then matches that relationship with a separate prayer partner from the congregation. Hand 2 Hand provides weekend meals for hungry Central Elementary students; the church collects specific supplies (this season: spaghetti noodles, green beans, pasta sauce in non-glass containers, and peanut butter or cheese crackers), accepts donations through the Church Center app and an Amazon wish list, and gathers volunteers once a month to pack meal kits in the Grower's Room.
Other local partnerships fill in the rest of the picture. ICCF Community Homes helps Orchard Hill volunteers repair homes being sold or rented at affordable rates, and the church also serves residents of the Family Haven shelter. Safe Families for Children surrounds parents in a temporary crisis with Christian host families who open their homes to their children; volunteers from Orchard Hill serve as host families, family friends, mentors, and professional service providers, and a Community Care Closet at the church stocks clothing, diapers, formula, and toys for hosting families. Compassionate Christian Counseling is hosted in-house at Orchard Hill, offering pastoral and professional care to anyone who needs it.
A Care Closet at the church also helps families who come through Orchard Hill's doors in crisis, stocked with emergency food boxes, diapers of all sizes, wipes, and personal care items. A detailed list of what goes into each bag is published so volunteers can pack at home and drop off donations in the marked bin by the West Entry. Each fall the church also collects school supplies for teachers at Central Elementary, who often buy essential classroom materials out of their own pockets.
Global Mission: Guatemala, Iowa, and the Unreached
Two long-running global partnerships extend Orchard Hill's reach beyond Grand Rapids. Casa David, a ministry similar to a Ronald McDonald House, provides a safe home in Guatemala City for family members whose loved ones are receiving hospital care - many traveling great distances to reach treatment. Casa David offers clean beds, two meals a day, 365 days a year, plus a place to shower, do laundry, and be treated with respect and love. Evening devotions and prayer requests are part of the rhythm. Orchard Hill supports Casa David through prayer, financial giving, child sponsorship, mission trips, and an annual online auction each November. One More Child International partners with Orchard Hill to support a children's malnutrition center in San Juan Sacatepéquez, Guatemala, where children whose families cannot feed them are cared for by Guatemalan nannies and medical staff, typically for three to six months; Orchard Hill sends teams to serve the nannies, share the good news of Jesus, and serve local day cares and adult care day centers.
Each spring the church also sends an adult mission trip - in recent years to northwest Iowa, partnering with World Renew Disaster Response Services and the Clay County Long Term Recovery Group to rebuild homes affected by 2024 flooding. Volunteers of all skill levels (eighteen and older) tackle general reconstruction, sheetrock, mudding and taping, painting, framing, flooring, siding, insulation, landscaping, and demolition, with housing provided by local churches and meals prepared by the team.
Each spring also brings the 5K for the Unreached, a race/walk whose registration fees support a couple sent out from Orchard Hill to plant a church among an unreached people group. More than three billion people in the world have never heard the name of Jesus, including seven thousand people groups, and the church has committed to helping make one less people group unreached through this long-term partnership.
Pastoral Care and Counseling
Care at the church operates through several overlapping layers. Pastors Bob Karel and Laura Dilley are available for spiritual conversations and pastoral counseling. A pastoral care emergency line (616-649-2840) handles calls outside business hours and on weekends, with voicemail routed to the shepherding team. After Sunday services, teams of intercessors are available to pray with anyone who comes forward. Stephen Ministers are trained volunteers who walk with people through long-term crises such as the death of a loved one, health issues, or divorce through weekly one-on-one contact. Grief Share groups gather people who have lost a loved one for a structured season of support. Care Callers are individual volunteers who reach out to shut-ins and members who could use a friendly voice, and Visitation Coordinator Bev Buikema calls on members who are hospitalized or homebound. Compassionate Christian Counseling operates in-house at Orchard Hill for anyone who needs a professional ear. To send a prayer request, anyone can fill out a Connection Card in worship, respond at the invitation at the end of a service, speak with someone at the Connection Corner, use the prayer box, call the office, or email the pastors directly.
Arts Camp, Library, and Community Events
Each summer since 2008, Orchard Hill has run Arts Camp on the Hill, a creative and performing arts day camp that now serves three hundred to four hundred children a year with about 120 volunteers. The program is split into two camps - one for children entering second through sixth grade, who pick two arts electives and rotate through them all week, and a shorter camp for kindergartners and first graders - and wraps up with a Thursday evening tour of art projects and performances for families. Registration is intentionally kept to $10 per child to make the program accessible to the surrounding community.
The church also hosts an active community calendar. Trunk or Treat opens the building on Halloween night with themed stations for safe indoor trick-or-treating. The Lighted Christmas Path, free to the public, lights up the grounds on a December weekend with hot chocolate, music, a photo booth, and a manger. A Blue Christmas service offers a quiet service of hope and healing for anyone who has experienced loss. Christmas Eve worship is a candlelit gathering with drama and music. Jellybean Trail is a free, timed indoor Easter event for families that walks through the Easter story and finishes with games, inflatables, and goodies. Dinners for 8 forms groups of eight adults (mixed singles and couples, mixed ages) for a casual meal together several times a year; the hosts set the details and the coordinators mix up the groupings so that new friendships form. The church also maintains a lending library with fiction, non-fiction, and small-group leader resources searchable through an online catalog.
Becoming a Member and the 'Git 'Er Done' Campaign
Anyone interested in formal membership can find a video introduction to membership on the church's site or reach out through the Connection Corner or the online Connect form. Membership sits inside the broader Discipleship Pathway, which encourages every believer to Grow, Serve, Connect, and Reach through spiritual practices, a small group, a place of service, and daily witness.
Most recently the church launched a three-year "Git 'Er Done" campaign built around four goals: eliminate the building's remaining debt by raising $1,000,000, enlarge the Kingdom through one thousand new commitments to Jesus Christ across the surrounding neighborhood, expand the church's reach by adding one hundred new contributors, and empower every member's ministry by committing to ten minutes of prayer a day for Orchard Hill. The campaign is framed in 2 Corinthians 8:11: "finish the work so that your eager willingness to do it may be matched by your completion of it, according to your means." Whether someone is drawn by Sunday worship, the kids' wing, mentoring a student at Central Elementary, packing meals for Hand 2 Hand, joining an adult group, or serving on a spring mission trip, the path the same: become part of a church that has spent more than three decades trying to be a light on the hill in Walker, and that is now finishing the work it started.