The Ministry of the late Revd. David Hugh MacGregor
by Dave Doveton, Diocese of Port Elizabeth.
David MacGregor, a leading figure of the charismatic movement both here in Southern Africa and New Zealand where he was ordained, passed away to be with the Lord he served earlier this month.
David was born in Sri Lanka and after an initial education in India and travels to England where he trained as an aircraft pilot, he joined the family business as a tea planter. One day as he was busy stocktaking in an office, he heard the Lord call him by name 3 times. Thus began a deep conversion to Christ and a commitment to serve him, wherever the Lord sent him.
After studies at St Johns College, he was deaconed in 1972 then priested a year later. David and his wife Mary led a Christian community in the parish of Wanganui, where he served. In 1977 Bishop Bruce Evans extended an invitation to him and his family to join the diocese of Port Elizabeth, where he took rectorship of the parish of St Hugh’s Newton Park. Under his leadership St Hugh’s became a leading parish in the Renewal movement – a centre of teaching and ministry development. He raised up leaders many of whom who later went on to become ordained ministers in the diocese. He later moved to the Diocese of Pretoria as Dean of St Albans Cathedral under the then Bishop Richard Kraft. After other appointments in the Dioceses of Natal and Christ the King, David returned to Port Elizabeth where he served in parochial ministry until his retirement in 2002.
In retirement he continued a ministry in music and online publishing – setting up a news blog which was avidly read by Christians in many parts of the world. David was especially gifted in pastoral oversight and in the manner in which he could gather people together to pray and worship. He believed fervently in allowing the Holy Spirit to manifest through the gifts of the Spirit, was a gentle and firm pastor – always making his stand clear. His ability to discern the spiritual drift of the prevailing culture became especially clear as the Anglican Church began in the late 1990’s to be sucked into the confusion around human sexuality and he correctly saw the problem as the abandonment of the authority of the Bible. His insights were very helpful to those Anglican leaders who were warning and writing on these and other issues of the day – he encouraged especially the formation of Anglican Mainstream Southern Africa, later to become the FCA (Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans). The weekly prayer group that met in his and Mary’s home provided support for the FCA and its work and for the cause of orthodox Anglicanism everywhere.
His spiritual stature was inspiring to many Anglicans, lay and ordained who continued to seek him out for guidance and advice even in retirement.
Unfortunately his weakening lungs were not able to sustain him and this gentle giant passed into glory on December 12th, 2016 after a short illness. He leaves behind his wife Mary, daughter Jenny and sons Michael and Richard.
[Note from Andrew Symes: David MacGregor was personally a great encouragement to me when I was living in Port Elizabeth from 2000-2006. His home was just a short walk from the small theological college where I taught, and I would often visit him for a chat. He was as Dave Doveton says, a prophetic thinker about church and culture. He foresaw the conflicts that would result when church leaders try to accommodate opposing theological views in the church, and his website and regular mailings which sought to inform people of what was going on in global Anglicanism became a model for Anglican Mainstream. I’m told that a great many people came to celebrate his life and ministry at the funeral on Tuesday 20th, and that a moving tribute and rousing sermon lifted up Christ his Lord and Saviour, which is what he would have wanted.]
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