Ruth Vander Hart

There's my apple, Mom!" We were halfway through singing the first hymn when my son's eyes caught sight of his creation. I could hear the pride in his voice. "It's for Adam and Eve," he announced. As I quieted him, I smiled to myself, remembering his wide grin as he carried his apple forward as part of the offering on the first Sunday of Advent.

Reaching out—for many Reformed churches that's become the focus of the nineties. Congregations who in the past seemed content to minister to their own and to those in distant places are now taking a closer look at the men, women, teens, and children who live and work in the church's neighborhood.

No longer is it safe to assume, as it was in former decades, that the majority of these people have church homes of their own. Surveys have shown that the numbers of people with no church ties continue to grow.

We talk with Rev. Brian Wren in the subdued luxury of the Manor House "parlor" on the Calvin College campus in Grand Rapids, Michigan. "It's a room that tells you, 'We don't have to work,'" Wren remarks smilingly.