[4] The building is located just off Denby Dale Road in Calder Grove, Crigglestone, on the south-west edge of Wakefield.

R.J. Mackie's fourth son was John, who received an education at Wesley College, Sheffield plus the gift of Cliff House which carried attached benefits.

Thus Mackie was a landowner, the owner of Cliff Colliery and of the Freeclay works in Crigglestone, and a local benefactor.

While at Calder Grove, he served as a Sunday school teacher, was at one time a delegate to the Diocesan conference, and in 1899 was elected Wakefield YMCA's president.

[5] During her married life in Calder Grove, Mary Mackie organised yearly soirees in the new schoolroom for the local working people, and founded the Criggleston Girls' Friendly Society.

[5] Plans were approved for a church in the "Early English style of architecture" by the Ecclesiastical Commission in April 1892 at a building cost of £1,300.

The Wakefield Conservative MP Colonel Albany Hawkes Charlesworth donated the land and gave £100 towards costs.

The church was consecrated by the Bishop of Wakefield on Tuesday 23 May 1893; his sermon was based on John xvi.14, He will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you.

[7][8] William Swinden Barber (1832–1908) was a Gothic Revival and Arts and Crafts architect based in Halifax and Brighouse, who had a long career in which he produced many churches and other buildings in the area.

A combined lean-to on the south side houses the organ chamber and vestry, which share an arched opening into the chancel.

The exterior combines a simple Victorian low church aspect using just the basics of Gothic Revival architecture.

[20][21][22] On entering this small and unassuming building, the unexpected glory of the interior for the visitor is the scissor-truss roof,[23] which after more than a century retains rare stencil paintings by Powell Bros of Leeds on the chancel beams.

The east window of 1893, dedicated to John Mackie the husband of its benefactor, shows Jesus Christ and the Lamb of God.

[49][50] Gosling attended Merton College, Oxford, attaining his BA in 1894, and his MA in 1897; he was ordained priest at Ripon in the same year.

After him came the youthful James Albert Kings (1906–1987), serving under the economically devastating conditions of the Great Depression from June 1930 to April 1934.

[39] There used to be after-service refreshments served in the church hall next door, but that building, which used to be hired out for events, was pulled down in 2014.