It was replaced by the present building in 1841 built by Herman Schuette and the original tower was retained.

The Groote Kerk lays claim to housing South Africa's largest church organ, which was installed in 1954 At first the colonists, landing beginning in 1652 at the Cape of Good Hope, relied on a lay preacher (sieketrooster, Dutch for "comforter of the ill") named Willem Wylant.

Other sieketroosters who served the community were Pieter van der Stael, Ernestus Back, and Jan Joris Graaf.

The small congregation longed for its own preacher, until the Lord's Seventeen of the Dutch East India Company in Amsterdam decided to send the first full-time pastor to the Cape.

In 1672, services began to be held in "De Kat" (Dutch for "The Cat"), a section of the Castle of Good Hope, since the foundations of the first church building would not be laid until 1678.

The current pulpit, made from the best Indian wood at the cost of £708 by the sculptor Anton Anreith, was unveiled in November 1789.

In 1952, celebrated as the congregation's tricentennial (later, the foundation was more correctly rendered as 1665), there were more than 2,000 members served by three pastors in the mother church.