Our Church Timeline

William F Oldham arrives in Singapore with Rev & Mrs. Thoburn, sent by the South India Annual Conference and starts meeting with a group of Indians on Saturdays, and also begins to hold regular services in the prison on Sundays for Tamil prisoners.

The first formal Tamil Methodist worship service is held: a Tamil Methodist congregation – the Tamil Methodist Society – is formed with Rev C W Underwood, a Tamil preacher from Jaffna, Ceylon (now Sri Lanka), as pastor.

Rev Underwood undertakes the church’s first missionary trip as he visits Tamil workers in sugar plantations in Perak, Malaya (now Malaysia).

Funds are raised for an inexpensive parsonage costing $2,000 in Serangoon Road, opposite the present Kandang Kerbau Market on a piece of land which had previously been occupied by a Hindu temple.ev Underwood undertakes the church’s first missionary trip as he visits Tamil workers in sugar plantations in Perak, Malaya (now Malaysia).

The first Tamil Quarterly (now, Local) Conference is held.

The Women’s Foreign Missionary Society engages a Tamil Bible Woman to evangelise to Tamil women.

The Epworth League (later, Methodist Youth Fellowship) is started with 43 members. It soon attracts several students from the Medical School.

The members decide to purchase the land at Short Street (front half of the present site) and build a church on it to meet their growing needs.

The new building, comprising the Sanctuary, a hall and a parsonage, is completed. Address: No. 1 (later, No. 14), Short Street. Rev. S. S. Pakianathan pastors the church.

TMC starts Pasir Panjang preaching point at Alexandra Brickworks. The Pasir Panjang Tamil Methodist Church is constituted in 1972. Pastoral leadership is given by Rev. M R Doraisamy.

TMC starts Seletar preaching point at RAF Seletar Base which is later constituted as Seletar Tamil Methodist Church.

TMC starts Sembawang preaching point at Sembawang Naval Base. The Sembawang Tamil Methodist Church is constituted that year.

Rev (later, Bishop) T R Doraisamy is appointed the pastor and later becomes the first Tamil Bishop of the Methodist Church in Singapore and Malaya.

The Batak congregation begins worshipping at the church premises.

Bilingual (Tamil and English) worship services replace the separate Tamil and English worship services. Introduced by Rev R. Prabhu Das to step the falling membership. Vacation Bible School is introduced.

Outreach work begins at Jurong; the preaching point is constituted as Jurong Tamil Methodist Church in 1977.

“The Methodist Church in Malaysia and Singapore is constituted into separate national churches: The Methodist Church in Malaysia and The Methodist Church in Singapore. The Emmanuel Tamil Annual Conference – (ETAC) is constituted. Evangelistic Outreach work begins in the Ang Mo Kio neighbourhood; house-church services conducted by Rev Prabhu Das. AMKTC is constituted in 1980”

“TMC applies to the Commissioner of Lands for the alienation of the land behind the church for an extension project. Evangelistic Outreach work begins at Toa Payoh; the preaching point is constituted as a church in 1982.”

The Commissioner of Lands offers the land to TMC for the Building Project. The church starts an evening Tamil service.

TMC temporarily moves to the school hall of the Christ Church, Dorset Road, which has been made to resemble the Sanctuary at Short Street.