The Senior Associate Minister is the Reverend Mike Raiter, who is also director of the Centre for Biblical Preaching.

[2] The foundation stone for St James was laid on 9 November 1839 by Charles La Trobe, the superintendent of the Port Phillip District (now the state of Victoria), in what was then still part of New South Wales.

There is still a small street called St James Lane,[2] which ran adjacent to the church's school on the next block to the north.

In May 1913 leaks and cracks led to an inspection by architect Thomas Watts which determined that the structure was unsafe and had to be closed.

[5] Essentially only the exterior stonework and the timber work was saved,[6] and the church was not rebuilt precisely the same, with; there were also a number of minor internal changes, reorientation from east west to north south, and changes to the tower[7] - the third stage of the tower was made square to match the base rather than octagonal to match to the top section, both square stages have two arches instead of three, and are taller, and the dome is flatter, altogether creating a taller square tower, rather than the previous narrow octagonal one.