We continue our series of profiling local churches from our three Annual Conferences of The Methodist Church in Singapore. As we come to have a better understanding of each other’s history and ministry, there may be opportunity to forge cross-church partnerships and collaborations.
It started with one energetic pastor who was passionate about church planting – the Rev Prabhu Das Roberts, then pastor at Tamil Methodist Church, who went on to plant churches in Toa Payoh and Seletar, and one across the Causeway in Johor Bahru as well.
The Rev Das Roberts and wife sowed the beginnings of Ang Mo Kio Tamil Methodist Church (AMKTMC) as they met regularly at the residence of Mr and Mrs Muthiah with three other families.
They then went on to meet at rented premises at 24 Mayflower Rise, where AMKTMC was constituted by Bishop Kao Jih Chung with 30 members at its inception on July 6, 1979.
Two months later, Veronica and Daniel Poore opened their home at Mayflower Place to the young church, as they needed more space for their Sunday School and Adult Bible Study classes. Here, ten families met regularly for worship and fellowship. This was a regular practice in the 1970s and 80s, where members of Tamil Methodist churches in Singapore opened their homes as places of worship.
By April 1980, just months after they met at the Poores’, the church was relocated to its permanent premises at Ang Mo Kio Street 21. These premises were shared with a Chinese Annual Conference church and a Trinity Annual Conference church. This remains so till today, managed by a Joint Management Committee under the General Conference.
As the church continued to expand its ministries, the physical building went through a series of renovations – extending the main sanctuary in 1995, building a Chapel on the third floor in 1997, and placing a Children’s Chapel on the first floor in 1999.
Further to the demands of growing congre-gations and due to the escalating maintenance and repair costs, the Joint Management Committee by the three Annual Conferences agreed to rebuild the whole church building. We moved back into the rebuilt church in 2012.
Today, with a congregation of about 150 people, we continue to witness the leading of the Lord in our church and in our personal lives. In the journey of rebuilding the church building along with our sister churches, we have become more strongly knit in Christian love than before. As a witness to the Tamil-speaking community in Singapore, we firmly believe that the Lord has planted us here in Ang Mo Kio to reach the unreached and save the lost for the eternal kingdom of the Lord.
One of our main ministries is to the migrant workers from India, in particular those who speak Tamil. We reach out to them by teaching them spoken English.
Our hopes for AMKTMC are encapsulated in Psalm 23:6 – “Surely your goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.”
PRAY for Ang Mo Kio Tamil Methodist Church u in their efforts to reach Tamil-speakers for Christ.
Photos courtesy of Ang Mo Kio Tamil Methodist Church
Sam Asir Jeyaraj wears several hats at Ang Mo Kio Tamil Methodist Church. He is Secretary of the Local Church Executive Committee and also serves as a Sunday School teacher. He is married to Ajitha and they have one son.