Council Corner
April 2025
Immediately after our congregational vote on 2/16, a small group started work on drafting the bylaws for St. John Methodist Church of Graniteville, SC. Our bylaws were drafted using a template received from our lawyer group (National Center for Life and Liberty – NCLL). The template was modified to include the normal business practices for our church. The draft of the bylaws was sent to a group of council members, and a Special Council Meeting was held on 3/4 to review them. During the meeting, several sections were discussed at length, and the bylaws were approved with only minor changes. Those changes were implemented, and the bylaws were approved the following day. The original copy of the bylaws is maintained in the church office. Following approval of the bylaws, the Council could now proceed with the approval of the other legal documents to officially change the name of our church and to dissolve the previous one(s). A Special Council Meeting was held on 3/7 to review the various documents with the full council and to approve the signing of them. All documents were signed immediately following the adjournment of the meeting, and scanned copies were submitted to the lawyers via e-mail.
On 3/13, we received notification from NCLL that our name change had been approved through the SC Secretary of State office. Following this receipt, the change of our name on all banking and vendor accounts was initiated, and the following day (3/14), this name change was recorded at the Aiken County RMC office.
On 3/17, NCLL issued a letter to the lawyers of the SC UMC conference informing them of our intent to separate from the UMC. The SC District Superintendent in turn notified Pastor John Williams that he was no longer our pastor since we were separating from the UMC.
On 3/18, we had a call with the NCLL lawyer, Jonathan Bailie, to further discuss our deeds. Our church property is covered by a total of seven (7) deeds listing various names for our church. However, the last two (2) deeds – one of which covers the property where the BPW building sits – were drafted and recorded after we had joined the United Methodist Church and include language concerning a trust for
the UMC. In other states, NCLL had filed quit claim deeds to change the church name on the deeds, but this strategy did not carry forward into SC due to the wording of the trust clause in the deeds. NCLL’s legal stance is that the church property belongs to the church and its congregation and that the UMC has no legal claim to it, and as such, there is no need to make any change to our deeds.
On 3/23, our lay leader, John White, reviewed the information contained in the separation letter with the congregation and encouraged those present to thoughtfully consider increasing their stewardship efforts so that we would have additional funds to help our church grow as we begin our journey as an independ-
ent church. Following John’s message, we had our normal Sunday service and greeted our first guest pastor, Pastor Butch Blackwell, who preached an excellent sermon that was very much in step with our trials as we move to become an Independent Methodist Church free of the UMC.
Church Council Meetings for the remainder of 2025
5/22 at 6PM
7/17 at 6PM
10/16 at 6PM – includes selection of committee membership and approval of church officers (Please note the annual congregational meeting will follow the 10/16 council meetings and will most likely be held on 10/25 or 11/1.)
If you have any questions, please feel free to speak with me whenever we are together or give me a call.
Peyton
(803-645-6396)