Morgenster

Reformed Good Shepherd Church in Grootegast from 1958. Important late work in the oeuvre of Egbert Reitsma (1892-1976), designed in collaboration with his son LH Reitsma. Large, octagonal hall church with a tent roof in the form of a central construction. On the left in front of the church is a freestanding, openwork bell tower. Typologically rare in Reformed church architecture due to the application of the pure central construction form.

Of the Romanesque tuff stone church only the tower remains. The side wing on the north side of the tower was probably demolished in 1808. The saddle roof of the tower is not original, the tower seems to have had a brick spire at one time. The nave and choir date from later times. In the church there is a sarcophagus and a Dik organ from 1866.

The Reformation also drove out the priests in Sebaldeburen. It is not known how the service was performed at that time. In the year 1602 Nicolaus Petri took charge of the service here. At that time there was a combination with Grijpskerk. This probably lasted until 1606. Then there is mention of a joint minister for Grootegast and Sebaldeburen: Thomas Joannis. The stamp above the entrance was left by Rev. Nicolaus Westendorp on the reformed congregation when the new church was put into use in 1807. Because it was this Rev. Westendorp who, when he became minister of Sebaldeburen in 1797, was very annoyed by the dilapidated church he found there. He says it like this: "When I came to the Community (in 1797) I had considered the pitiful condition of the Church with the saddest emotions. This feeling became tormenting, as often as I imagined the approaching moment when the care for our lives would force us to avoid it. There was no repairing it: it was not possible to establish a new one from the church goods and income, because they were not even sufficient to maintain the Parsonage and Sacristan. There was also no expectation of the Community; because it was small, burdened by other institutions and consisted mainly of peat and laborers."