Van Milligen to Retire from Thrive
After 35 years of service to the Christian Reformed Church in North America, Rev. Lesli van Milligen, Thrive director, has announced her intention to retire in May 2026.
“We want to celebrate with Lesli for her years of dedicated and faithful service to Christ’s church,” wrote Al Postma, executive director-Canada, and Dan DeKam, U.S. director of ministries, in a memo announcing this decision. “She has served in a wide variety of roles – and always with a heart for the flourishing of the church.”
Van Milligen graduated from Fuller Theological Seminary with a master of divinity degree in 1988 and continued her education for three more years at Calvin Theological Seminary. In 1991, when she was ordained as an evangelist, she was the first woman to enter ordained ministry in the CRCNA.
Her career has included several different kinds of roles. She worked in pastoral and youth ministry roles at congregations in Grand Rapids, Mich.; Los Angeles, Calif.; Troy, Mich.; West Chester, Ohio; Sharonville, Ohio; and Guelph, Ont. While serving in these positions, van Milligen also worked as a Spanish teacher, a cheerleading coach, and a supply teacher for many years.
“Because my husband and I have always job-shared our pastoral positions, each working half time, I have also usually worked at another complementary part-time job,” said Lesli about her ministry career and her employment partnership with her husband, Rev. Tom van Milligen.
In 2015, Lesli began working for the CRCNA as a regional catalyzer with what was then known as Faith Formation Ministries. In this role she connected with seven CRC classes in Ontario and supported them in their desire to foster and develop the faith of their members from childhood, through youth, and into adulthood.
In 2022, when the CRC’s nine specialized ministries were reorganized into a shared entity, she became the Canadian director of what was then called Congregational Ministries. And when that group of ministries officially became the CRCNA’s newest agency, Thrive, van Milligen became its codirector and later its director.
“In these past few years, Lesli has been instrumental in pulling Thrive together into a cohesive shared agency,” wrote Postma and DeKam. “Long story short: we will miss her tremendously.”
Van Milligen indicated that this feeling is mutual. “It has been such an honor and a blessing to serve the church in all of these roles over the past decades,” she said.
When asked to share one or two highlights from her years of service, van Milligen said it would be hard to choose, but added,
“I am so grateful to have been able to serve the CRC on both the congregational level and then more broadly in Faith Formation Ministries and Thrive. It has been a joy to work alongside my husband as a copastor in three congregations. Helping to lead nine ministries into becoming a robust team as a new agency called Thrive has been an incredible adventure. My colleagues on Thrive are some of the most talented people I have ever had the privilege to work with.”
Van Milligen’s retirement date is being finalized and will likely be set for mid- to late May. A recruitment team for her replacement is being developed, with a goal of having a name to present to Synod 2026 in June.
