A J Scott's father was minister of this church. Scott's first sermon after ordination was for J M Campbell at Rhu church. Campbell was so impressed he employed him as his assistant for a short time. Scott then met Edward Irving from London and went down to join him ministering to the poor. Scott had begun to believe that salvation was available to all, but there began to form in his mind a new revelation, that the Gifts of the Spirit were available for now, and we're not just for apostolic times.
At the end of 1829, Scott came up to his father's manse in Greenock and spoke for Campbell at Rhu and also at Port Glasgow, speaking for the first time on the Gifts of the Spirit being available for today. This new teaching had a considerable influence on the religious feeling, being partly responsible for the outbreak of tongues and prophecy in the area.
'Religion had at this crisis taken a hold upon the entire mind of the population, which it very seldom possesses. It was not only the inspiration of their hearts but the subject of their thoughts, discussions, and conversations. ’They seem not only to have been stimulated in personal piety but occupied to an almost unprecedented degree with those spiritual concerns which are so generally kept altogether apart from the common tide of life. On such a state of mind Mr Scott’s pregnant suggestion fell with the force that might have been expected from it. That which to the higher intelligence was a matter of theoretical belief became in other hands an active principle, wildly productive, and big with results unpremeditated and unforeseen.' ('The Life of Edward Irving.' Volume 2, page 107, by Mrs Oliphant).
Scott was thrown out of the Church of Scotland in 1831 for heresy due to his believing in salvation for all. he pastored a small congregation in Woolwich until 1846. He then became an academic, ending up as principal of Owen's College, Manchester. He died in 1866.