Spreydon Baptist Church 1960-2000 - Knox Centre for Ministry and ...

‘brought to the Lord,’ 7 but they did not seem to translate into
new members or increased numbers at worship.
By 1968 there were only 67 members, many elderly.
However, the youth group, which barely had double figures in
1965 had grown to over 30 under a new youth leader and there
were 55 children involved in Sunday School. These two areas
were to provide the basis on which Murray Robertson was
able to commence to turn the fortunes of the church around.
2. 1968 to 1973
The church realising it needed to change called a young
man Murray Robertson as pastor, although a number, particularly
of the older women 8 were quite opposed, feeling he was
‘too young, too inexperienced and too academic’. 9 However a
group of men in their thirties felt that if they didn’t do something
different the church would just die, and managed to
sway the meeting that they needed to do more to meet the
needs of the young people. Robertson had gone to Edinburgh
to train for the Presbyterian ministry, because of the liberal
stance of Knox College in New Zealand. A change in his view
on baptism led him to seek ministry in a Baptist church on his
return. He had been given recognition by the Baptist Union of
New Zealand, after spending some time as an interim pastor at
Spreydon. In calling him they had declared that ‘the membership
is aware of the need for unity and is prepared to work and
7 This is one of many pietistic phrases used by evangelicals of this period
to describe people embracing the Christian faith or being converted.
8 Those identified earlier as the ‘petticoat government.’
9 Interview 27/04/00. The case studies in this thesis included a number of
interviews of either existing or former members of the congregations. In
order to preserve anonymity, interviews are identified by the date on
which they occurred.
NZJBR 9, Oct. 2004 6