Free Methodist Church in Malaysia
The Free Methodist Church was first organised in Pekin, New York, in 1860 by former members of the Methodist Episcopal Church who had been expelled for too earnestly advocating what they saw as the doctrines and practices of authentic Wesleyanism.The church was initially led by the Rev B. T. Roberts, a graduate of Wesleyan University.The primary points of dissent was on the issue of slavery, the theology of Sanctification and pew rental, a practice whereby the best seats in a church was auctioned to the highest bidder as a means to raise funds, that was prevalent in the Methodist Episcopal Church then.[1] The Free Methodist Church shares the same doctrinal standards of evangelical Arminian Protestant Christianity and subscribes to the Methodist Articles of Religion, with emphasis on the teaching of entire sanctification as taught by John Wesley and are more overtly Arminian.[3] The Free Methodist Church in Malaysia is organised as a mission district of the Free Methodist World Missions and has yet to attain full autonomy as an Annual Conference or General Conference.