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Life is good with Jesus

In the early 2000’s, many of our young Tamil community members were involved in street gang activities. It was, in fact, a big issue for our Tamil diaspora teenagers during that period of time, where they were lacking guidance and searching for their own identity. In the recent time, our teenagers take everything for granted, but for our previous generations was not as easy as it is now. They had many barriers, such as languages problem, poor education background, financial issues and difficulty adapting to their new culture. As they were caught up in a difficult lifestyle, they were pulled into wrong path and their destinies changed forever. It is hard to change this kind of lifestyle. Few of them overcame from this struggling life and one of them is John Pathmanathan. As a matter of fact, who is he?

John Pathmanathan is a pastor based in Toronto, Canada, ministering around the World and he is currently working with The Gideons International in Canada since 2014 where his goal is to distribute as many as possible free Bible around the world. He also raising funds for his campaign Gospel for India.  He found Jesus in 1998 through the same Gideons Bible ministry and since then, he didn’t stop serving the Lord through his ministry. 

                                             “There is a love that actually refused to give up on humanity, a love that actually stop giving up on humanity, I am a product of that love ” (John Pathmanathan, Youtube)     

He was born in Sri Lanka in the early 80’s and moved to Germany at the age of 10 months due to the civil war that occurred in the country. He was raised by his single mother. They moved to Toronto, Canada in 1992. Soon after, he was trying to find his own identity when he was initially attacked by his peers by racial comments on his first day of school. In high school, he started hanging out with the wrong people and involved in street gangs activities. He wanted to be accepted by others and wanted to defend himself.

      In 1998, he was arrested for the first time by the police for opening fire in a school parking lot. Meanwhile, his mother attended a Tamil Christian church service in Toronto and start praying for him. By God’s love and mercy, she found the peace that she was looking for her and her son. Meanwhile, in the prison, discouraged, he found the love and peace of Jesus through Gideons Bible distributed by the Bible ministries. He started going to church with his mother, but he was still living his old lifestyle, where he got into a bigger mess, suicidal thoughts, his family lost hope on him and once again end up in the jail in 2001. But the Lord’s love and mercy found him again and touched him with another Gideons minister’s Bible. He decided to give his life to Jesus as he was sitting in the prison cell. From that day, he saw his life changing for good and he allowing Jesus to live through him. His full testimony can be found online.

Montreal Visit in 2016

Pastor John visited Montreal Tamil churches for the first time in March 2016. We had the opportunity to welcome him to our Church (PLCC) Youth service on Sunday morning. He is a very humble Minister of God.  I was blessed to attend the service and witness his love for God and the Bible. I was able to feel his relationship with God throughout his message. It was an eye-opening service for many of us who had the chance to listen to his message. As we all know, worship is when we sing and praise God, but he actually gave us a different definition. For Pastor John, worshipping is not only singing and praising the Lord, but it is a unique relationship that we experience with God. He also mentioned about second life. He gave us an example about the second-hand smoke kills more people than people who actually smokes. Alike, our second-hand life will kill us. As Christians, we have to live only for the Lord. Another thing I liked in his message is when he said that we should not let the Satan question us, because when he start questioning us, he can distract us from our destiny. By all means, life is great with Jesus. Please do watch his testimony, because he is an inspiration for many as well as me.

                We are hoping to see him once again in Montreal for another powerful and blessing message.