The Best of all is God with us

  Kingsley Thesiganesan Muttiah was born on May 7, 1935, as the 3 rd Son of Rev. and Mrs. D.N. Muttiah of the Methodist Church Sri Lanka. He was Inducted as the President of the Methodist Church Sri Lanka in August 1990 and led the church with distinction. His untimely death took place while he was in office in the final year of his term as the President of Methodist Church Sri Lanka. The 29th Death Anniversary falls on the 29 th of October. This article is written in celebration of our personal friendship with him, Grace his wife, David, Niruban and Jessica. In January 1984 I was stationed in the Kandy Circuit of the Methodist Church. This was my second posting and the final year during the three-year probationary period before ordination. Having worked under a strict but very caring superintendent minister like the late Rev. L. Victor Salgadoe in the first two years of probation, I was rather apprehensive about how things would turn out between me and Rev. Kingsley Muttiah th...

  Judgement in Zephania’s prophesy I received through social media another Bible verse or a prophecy which is circulating with reference to Gaza – the disputed land between Israelites and Palestine. It quoted Zephaniah 2:4 “Gaza will be abandoned…” with a note saying “The truth is here in black and white written 2000 years ago…” This seems to be an excellent verse from the Bible to support the Israelites' destruction of the Palestinians. But it is a miserable position if anyone quotes only Zephaniah 2:4 without reading the entire book’s message. Zephaniah prophesied during the reign of King Josiah (640–609 B.C.), a Judean king who wanted a religious reformation together with acceptable worship practices before God (2 Kings 22:1–23:30). From the following Timeline you could see that the Prophetic ministry of Zephaniah occurred between the fall of the Kingdom of Israel and the fall of the Kingdom of Judah - both were the chosen people of God. Despite having seen the dest...

                                     Pray for the Peace between Israelites and Palestinians “The festival site - with three stages, a camping area and bar and food area - was in the Negev desert, near Kibbutz Re'im. It was not far from the Gaza Strip, from where Hamas fighters crossed over at dawn to launch their attack. They infiltrated towns and villages, taking dozens of people hostage.” The violent conflict in the contentious Gaza strip has restarted as a result of the Hamas's unexpected attack on an Israeli music celebration.   Israeli reports claim that Hamas is holding 150 hostages at now. This unexpected attack has exposed Israel's intelligence shortcoming and destroyed its sense of invincibility. Even though this conflict has been ongoing for a while, every time it flares up, it stings the residents of Gaza and ...

  Who will bell the cat? The idiom “Who will bell the cat?” originates from the fable The Mice in Council. The mice decided to put a bell around the murderous house cat so that he could no longer sneak up on them. However, the trouble starts when it’s time to decide which mouse will risk his life to put the bell around the cat’s neck. The moral is clear: making plans for a great outcome is not good enough. It should be achievable despite the risks involved. Otherwise, it serves no purpose. Easter Sunday, April 21, saw a horrific bomb attack in Sri Lanka on unarmed civilians who were in Churches and hotels. I heard the news while at the Methodist Centre, Kumbichangkulama, Anuradhapura. I had gone there along with my wife Sharmila and Rev. Anura Perera, Chairman of the Southern District, to celebrate Easter with the Methodist community. A week before, on Palm Sunday, April 14 th , while I was worshiping with them, we were attacked by a group of young people. It was perpetrated by a...

Straight talk in the Church   A few years ago, I met with two other senior church leaders to have a straight talk with another senior church leader. He had deliberately made his way through a loophole to get what he wanted, and that was disturbing his church. Having started with a general conversation, we moved on to say that we needed to have a heart-to-heart, straight talk with him on the above-mentioned After five minutes, he moved out, saying, "I have another engagement." It seems like one of the dysfunctions in churches revolves around the topic of "hard conversations". Especially we who are pastors have a shepherd's heart, and we do not enjoy difficult conversations. We dread them. They can give us "sleepless nights and knots in our stomachs", which are hard to explain. We are expected to be diplomatic and kind. We are called to extend God’s grace and forgiveness to others. But when it comes to correction, rebuke, or confrontation, to say it’s ...

  And are we yet alive, And see each other's face? Glory, and thanks to Jesus give For his redeeming grace! This is the traditional opening hymn that is sung by all Methodist Conferences around the world. Since 1982, I have been a member of the Methodist Conference in Sri Lanka, and I have sung this hymn heartily ever since. We who participate at Methodist Conferences must ask whether we understand the relevance of this hymn to our Methodist gatherings. I was sad to see this hymn being sung as the processional hymn at a Methodist Conference held recently. Most of those who walked in the procession did not even sing because they had to "watch their steps". The majority of the audience was more interested in watching those going in procession. Only a very few sang the hymn but never smiled or acknowledged the presence of others while singing "And are we yet alive". This shows that even the leadership of the Conference has not captured the meaning or purpose of thi...

                              The First Methodist Conference of Sri Lanka, 1814            The month of August every year is significant for the people called Methodists in Sri Lanka. The Annual Conference of the Methodist Church meets in Colombo for its annual deliberations. The Methodist clergy and lay leaders representing different parts of the island gather for deliberations on the mission work of the church. The gathering elects the President Bishop, the Vice-President and other officials for a term and is the supreme decision-making body of the Church. The annual Conference is a great tradition of Methodism, introduced by John Wesley in 1744. John Wesley has recorded the following: "In June 1744, I desired my brother and a few other clergymen to meet me in London to consider how we should proceed to save our own souls and those who heard ...