File Hills Pastoral Charge was formed as a new United Church charge in 1925, as the File Hills Colony Mission Field, part of the Abernethy Presbytery. It primarily consists of the File Hills (Wanakepew) preaching place, near Kamsack, Saskatchewan. From about 1969 to 1979/1980, File Hills was part of Pheasant Creek Larger Parish, before being re-established as a separate charge.

In 1984, File Hills Pastoral Charge joined the new Plains Presbytery, which became part of the All Native Circle Conference when it was formed, in 1989.

The residential school was preceded by a small day school, opened by J.C. Richardson in 1884 on the Little Black Bear Reserve and closed soon afterwards. In 1886, R. Toms reopened the day school and it operated until 1889, when the Woman's Missionary Society with the support of the Foreign Mission Committee of The Presbyterian Church in Canada and the Department of Indian Affairs built a new school just outside of the reserve’s boundaries. This was operated by The Presbyterian Church until 1924 when its operation was transferred to the United Church of Canada who managed it until its closure in 1949.

Pheasant Creek Larger Parish was a pastoral charge created around 1969, from an amalgamation of Abernethy-Lemberg Pastoral Charge (with Abernethy, Lemberg and Neudorf points), Balcarres-Pheasant Forks Pastoral Charge (with Balcarres, Duff and Lorlie points) and File Hills "Indian" Pastoral Charge. Around 1980, File Hills separated to re-establish itself as a separate charge.

As of July 1, 1989, the charge was split into Abernethy-Lemberg (a.k.a. Lemberg-Abernethy), Balcarres, and Duff Pastoral Charges.