A Brief History of The Gate

“…a desire to see God move as He had done in the early New Testament church, where the Holy Spirit was continually being outpoured into God’s people and where healings and miracles were a regular occurrence.”

Stewart and Mairi Brunton

In the early 1970s, Stewart and Mairi Brunton were working with the Christian Literature Crusade (CLC) in London where they came into a new experience of God through the baptism of the Holy Spirit. Shortly after that, they moved to Scotland to work at the CLC shop in Dundee. Through sharing their experience of being baptised in the Holy Spirit, they found that others were similarly blessed.

God began to speak, not only to Stewart and Mairi, but also to a small group of other people about starting a church. Following His lead, they began meeting in the CLC basement in April 1976. Six people attended. By and by, the numbers grew. The church moved into the Tent Mission Hall, then to the YMCA Hall, and finally bought its present premises on Perth Road in 1984.

Before the church could use this new facility, a huge restoration task had to be undertaken. The beautiful wooden facings, pillars and pews that give the building so much of its character all needed to be stripped. The whole place needed to be rewired, plumbed and decorated by church members in their spare time.

Why Was The Church Called ‘The Gate’?

While Stewart and Mairi were thinking about what to name the church, they were also studying Ezra and Nehemiah, which tell of the rebuilding of the city walls and gates. They were looking for a name that would connect the church to Dundee without being overly specific. If you take some time to travel around Dundee, you will notice that many of the streets are named ‘__gait’s’, so the name ‘The Gate’ was decided upon.

The Gate was, and indeed is, different in many respects to its contemporaries. It began as an independent church with a statement of faith that could evolve as its members grew in Christian maturity. Key to its functioning was a desire to see God move as He had done in the early New Testament church, where the Holy Spirit was continually being outpoured into God’s people and where healings and miracles were a regular occurrence.

Gordon and Fiona Stewart

In 1993 our present church leader, Gordon Stewart became the full-time youth pastor and later joined the Leadership Team to work with his father-in-law, Stewart, and the rest of the eldership. In 2002, Stewart handed the leadership baton over to Gordon. Later that year, Stewart went to be with the Lord, leaving behind a church that had grown from 6 people in 1976 to roughly 400 adults regularly joining together to worship on a Sunday morning.

For many Christians in Dundee, Stewart was a man of great faith whose investment in them and their lives helped them develop their faith and understanding. He left behind a thriving church that is bucking the trend of declining church attendance; a church that believes, as he did, that God will pour out His Spirit and again bring revival to Dundee.