[6] During his eight years at St. Ninians he became one of Scotland's foremost religious controversialists, publishing for the first time tracts systematically setting out what were the doctrinal beliefs of the Relief communion and why they were scripturally correct when different from those of other Presbyterian denominations.
[7] He largely withdrew from the printed fray in May 1783 upon removing to become minister at Paisley,[8] a rapidly expanding town that required greater pastoral attention.
The Burgher Synod replied with a pamphlet denouncing the Relief as unprincipled in its fellowship and conducive to immorality, to which Hutchison responded with A Few Animadversions on the Re-exhibition of Burgher-Testimony,[13] and in 1780 he published A Dissertation on the Nature and Genius of the Kingdom of Christ,[14] asserting that the form of the church should be consistent with its first foundation as described in the New Testament.
James Stewart for his Anderston, Glasgow, congregation but added a further fifty-one hymns (including twenty by Isaac Watts and five by Charles Wesley) chosen by Hutchison.
James Dun, who had the same compilation printed for the Relief congregation at Campbell Street, Glasgow: both editions carried a Preface by Hutchison justifying the use of hymns in public worship.
[21] In 1843 Struthers opined that “To Mr Hutchison, more than to any other author of the last century, the religious public of Scotland is indebted for correct and scriptural views of the constitution of the church of Christ”.
[22] By that year initiatives were already afoot that, in 1847, saw the (now combined) Burgher and Anti-burgher denominations merge with the Relief to form the United Presbyterian Church, a communion that was liberal in instinct, evangelical in practice, concerned to redefine its relationship with civil institutions, and committed to congregational singing.