Church suing church

PALMER — A pair of Valley churches have wound up in court, one claiming the other is squatting in its building and the other claiming the church is trying to sell its building out from under it.

Here’s what seems to be the bedrock facts on which the two sides agree:

• First Baptist Church of Palmer in 1980 bought a piece of land in Sutton on which to build a church.

• That church is now called Grace Bible Church.

• First Baptist wants to sell the Sutton church building for $300,000 and put the money toward paying debts and expanding its Palmer church.

Grace Bible, in its filings, says the plan had been to hold the church in trust, to protect it under the aegis of the larger church from any problems the young congregation might encounter. Grace Bible also says most of the work on the property was done by the congregation.

“Defendant (First Baptist) has less than $13,000 invested in the property. In spite of this paltry investment in the property, defendant has listed the property for sale for $300,000 and has stated its intention of keeping all of the sales proceeds for itself,” according to a filing from Grace Bible.

The church says it has a food pantry and prison ministry, that it is the only church in Sutton and that selling the building out from under it would threaten its existence. The Sutton church is asking the court to order First Baptist to keep title to the church and eventually convey it to the Sutton church.

But that’s not at all how First Baptist sees the situation. In its filings, the Palmer church says its mother organization, the Southern Baptist Convention, urges its churches to plant smaller seed congregations in nearby communities.

That’s what happened here. The idea was to eventually convey the church to another SBC-affiliated congregation. A conveyance is granted after the mother church weighs a number of factors.

“In addition to the relative financial strength of the new church is the factor of how committed the new congregation is to maintaining the new church as one affiliated with and giving financial support to the global mission work of the SBC,” according to First Baptist’s filings.

The Sutton church, First Baptist said, does not meet that criteria.

“The congregation splintered and the members dedicated to SBC affiliation, faith and mission work left the Sutton congregation,” according to First Baptist’s filings.

The remaining group has remained at the church, paying $250 a month to cover the increase in First Baptist’s costs to insure the building.

According to the Palmer church, when the sale was announced both churches sat down to negotiate a potential sale. They could not. After that, the Palmer church ordered the Sutton congregation out of its building by Aug. 31, 2012.

“The (Sutton congregation) refused to vacate and went into forcible holdover tenant occupancy,” according to the First Baptist filings.

More clearly put, the Sutton congregation is “in continuing trespass on the property.”

The case is next set for a hearing Monday before Superior Court Judge Eric Smith. It was first filed in June 2012. It is not uncommon for civil lawsuits like this to take multiple years to reach a conclusion.

Contact Andrew Wellner at 352-2270 or andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com.