Image credit: Resurrection Life Church
When Resurrection Life Church gathered on a mid-July evening at Grace Church in Cary, North Carolina, the congregation sang, prayed, and sat under the preached Word, just as it did every week. This time, though, the congregation began the service as a church plant and ended the service as a particular church.
After years of prayer and process, the North Carolina church formally joined the PCA as a particularized body in Eastern Carolina Presbytery.
Pastor Mark Knetsch grew up in a Dutch Reformed community in southwestern Ontario. His family has belonged to the Christian Reformed Church in North America for a long time.
“I could trace back my lineage of Dutch Reformed-ness many generations,” Knetsch said. He and his wife Heather – originally from North Carolina – met as students at Calvin College (now Calvin University), and after a few years of ministry in the CRC in Canada, the couple began to sense a call to plant a CRC church closer to her North Carolina family.
Resurrection Life started in the Knetsch home in 2014 with about 20 people. Growth was steady until the COVID-19 pandemic brought outdoor worship, smaller gatherings, and other challenges.
“[After the pandemic] it was basically like restarting,” Knetsch said.
From the beginning, Knetsch sought mentors. A mutual connection led him to call Geoff Bradford, senior pastor of Christ the King (PCA) in Raleigh, North Carolina. Bradford immediately agreed to walk alongside Knetsch.
“Say ‘yes’ to church planters seeking mentors,” Knetsch urged, recalling that vital early connection.
Christ the King gave Knetsch preaching opportunities, hosted informational lunches, and even affirmed its own members who felt called to join the new CRC work. The partnership provided the stability and momentum needed for Resurrection Life to move forward.
Knetsch appreciated the support from Christ the King, but remained strongly committed to building a CRC presence in the Southeast. When a pastor suggested he join the PCA, the suggestion felt like an insult, so deep was his loyalty to his family’s history in the CRC.
But the challenges of planting a church from a largely-Northern denomination in a Southern setting unfamiliar with the CRC became more apparent over time, especially after the pandemic when attendance dropped and questions about the plant’s sustainability grew.
“There was a ‘mayday’ moment,” Knetsch said. “I realized if we wanted to be part of a church planting movement here, we needed to be linked with like-minded Christians here.”
As connections with PCA elders in the area deepened, the possibility of changing denominations became a persistent consideration.
“It went from me being insulted by the idea to asking the question myself, and praying about it,” Knetsch said.
When he approached Bradford about what a transition into the PCA might look like, Knetsch discovered that Bradford had also been praying about the idea, and Resurrection Life began a formal conversation with Eastern Carolina Presbytery. Upon finishing his doctoral degree in 2023, Knetsch immediately began preparing to transfer his ordination into the PCA, a season he describes as extremely rigorous.
During this time, Jeff Smith, a ruling elder at Peace Presbyterian Church in Cary, North Carolina, served with Bradford on Eastern Carolina Presbytery’s Mission to North America Committee. The committee tasked Smith with serving as a liaison to Knetsch and helping him prepare for the complex process of denominational transition. Knetsch and Smith – himself a teaching elder candidate with an interest in church planting – quickly realized that they shared a vision for planting in the Apex-Holly Springs area.
“It’s really a remarkable story of God’s providence,” Smith said. “We get along great. Our gifts are complementary. We were both interested in seeing a Reformed church get established and flourish in or around Holly Springs. ‘So let’s work together,’ we said.”
Resurrection Life hired Smith as director of ministries in November 2023. In March 2024, Knetch transferred his ordination credentials and was received as a member of Eastern Carolina Presbytery. A Presbytery-appointed temporary session was installed, and Resurrection Life was suddenly a PCA mission church.
Over the following 18 months, the mission church nominated and trained officer candidates, and on July 13, 2025, the congregation celebrated a special service of particularization, in which two ruling elders and four deacons were ordained and installed. On September 7, 2025, the church called Smith to be its associate pastor.
Knetsch acknowledges this transition was not something he took lightly.
“I lost sleep over the decision,” he said. “Leaving something you love is hard.”
He remains connected with friends and leaders in the CRC, who he says have been supportive throughout Resurrection Life’s unique journey.
“I really admire Mark… to transfer into the PCA after a lifelong history in another denomination required a lot of moral courage and integrity and care and devotion to Christ alone,” Smith said.
Knetsch emphasized that the move was about realigning locally for mission, not severing ties.
“I want to be a bridge builder,” he said.
Last year, Resurrection Life helped launch Missions Together, a nonprofit that encourages churches of different denominations to partner for evangelism and community service.
The church continues to meet at Apex Middle School while exploring long-term facility options, including a new high school in a growing part of Holly Springs. Today, elders and members are focused on outreach and discipleship as the church moves into a new season.
“The elders want to invest in spiritual building before physical building,” Smith said.
For Knetsch, the journey reflects both continuity and change. His theological commitments remain the same, as does his care and esteem for the CRC. But new partnerships are rooted in a local presbytery network.
“Without Christ the King, we might not have existed,” he said. “We sensed the Lord calling us to link arms here – to plant, to train, to serve.”