In 1937, Schaeffer transferred to Faith Theological Seminary, graduating in 1938. This seminary was newly formed as a result of a split between the Presbyterian Church of America (now the Orthodox Presbyterian Church) and the Bible Presbyterian Church, a Presbyterian denomination more identified with Fundamentalist Christianity and premillennialism. Schaeffer was the first student to graduate and the first to be ordained in the Bible Presbyterian Church. He served pastorates in Pennsylvania (Grove City and Chester) and St. Louis, Missouri. Schaeffer eventually sided with the Bible Presbyterian Church Columbus Synod following the BPC Collingswood and BPC Columbus split in 1956. BPC Columbus reorganized as the Evangelical Presbyterian Church in 1961, and Schaeffer followed the EPC into the Reformed Presbyterian Church, Evangelical Synod when the Bible Presbyterian Church's Columbus Synod merged with the Reformed Presbyterian Church, General Synod in 1965, a denomination which would merge with the Presbyterian Church in America, in 1982.