The Right They
Presented By
Stalcup, Brewer, Wallace & Lang, PLLC
This paper is presented by Stalcup, Brewer, Wallace & Lang, PLLC as a service to churches. At Stalcup, Brewer, Wallace & Lang, PLLC., we are church lawyers. Together, our attorneys have over 100 years of experience working with high-profile churches and ministries. Our lawyers leverage their experience, relationships and knowledge to benefit our clients. Our work includes acting as general counsel and advising on matters such as Entity Formation and Structuring, Federal and State Tax Exemption, Mergers and Acquisitions, Significant Business Transactions, Corporate Governance, Liability Prevention, Intellectual Property Rights, Executive Compensation and Financing Transactions.
While we are lawyers, we also bring more than our legal expertise and experience to our clients. Two of our partners, Dennis Brewer and Curtis Wallace also have extensive experience as executives with large ministry organizations. As a result, our clients benefit not only from our experience on the business side of ministry, but also from our extensive relationships with leaders and executives across the church and media landscape.
Disclaimer: This Paper is presented for informational and educational purposes only. Nothing in this paper is intended to be or should be construed as legal advice. Every situation is different and fact specific. Please consult with a qualified attorney to receive advice specific to your situation.
There will surely be no debate that having the right “They” in your life is essential. This of course applies to your close personal friends. But as a Senior Pastor, it also applies to a select group of professional friends.
The right medical doctor should quickly come to mind. You’re facing a serious, maybe life-threatening, medical situation and you need an on-the-spot referral to the best specialist or treatment facility; or you find yourself in the more common situation where you’ve caught a bug going around and you need to quickly get started on prescription medication. In either scenario, or similar ones in between, it is a huge advantage to have a trusted physician that knows you, knows your medical history, and who you can call and reach twenty-four seven. You want to have the same type of relationship with your lawyer.
Be Ready. When the need for legal advice or legal help arises, more often than not, time is of the essence. This is not the hour to begin your search for the right lawyer. You will be at a tremendous disadvantage if you are scrambling to find him or her in the midst of a crisis or when you can avoid a crisis with a quick opinion or answer from a trusted lawyer who already knows you well and is familiar with the details of your ministry. And not just any ‘Ol lawyer…You want the right lawyer.
Start with great character. The old saying, “choose your friends wisely” certainly applies to choosing your lawyer! There are all types of characters out there with a law license. Some of the best people you will ever meet are licensed to practice law. However, some of the most dangerous individuals you will ever meet have a law license on their wall and a bar card in their wallet. You have a choice. If you don’t already know your attorney candidate well, get to know him or her. Select an attorney who you’ve taken the time to determine is of outstanding character. Find out what’s going on in their life; what organizations they belong to; what boards they serve on; where they attend church; are they active in their church (do they know their pastor’s name); who are their mentors; what are their interests; what are they passionate about.
Choose a lawyer experienced and skilled in the area of church law. Great character is the starting point in the analysis, but there are other boxes that need to be checked. The knowledge and experiences of lawyers varies dramatically: from the solo practitioner with a paralegal or two, to the law partner in an international firm with enough lawyers and support staff to quite literally populate a small town; from the strictly transactional lawyer to the trial lawyer; from the bill board advertising high volume personal injury lawyer (sometimes referred to as “ambulance chaser”) to the highly skilled, high stakes damage suit specialist ; from the boutique firm specialist to the jack-of-law-trades; from the criminal law specialist to the civil law specialist ; from the tax lawyer to the traffic ticket lawyer. Other examples flow, but you get the idea! There are many areas of practice and expertise, and the various practice areas and experiences of lawyers span an enormous spectrum. Just like you don’t select a dermatologist to perform heart surgery or a brain surgeon to do a knee replacement, you don’t select an attorney who is in unchartered waters when it comes to the fine points of the law and practical aspects that uniquely impact you as a minister and the entity you lead, the church.
Leverage technology to select from a large pool. Proximity is not the cure all. There are top drawer attorneys very likely in your congregation with great character and all sorts of knowledge and experience but know very little about the nuances that impact you as a minister of the Gospel, or the laws and practices that impact the church you lead. Don’t restrict your search for the right lawyer, you’re go-to lawyer, to the pool of lawyers in your congregation or even in your community. He or she might be right there sitting on your front row and if that is the case, great. However, he or she might be halfway across the country and only a skype, text, or old-fashioned phone call away. Distance these days is not much of an issue, but accessibility and familiarity are very much two of the relevant issues.
Speaking of accessibility and being a phone call away…Some people and yes, some lawyers, are terrible at timely returning calls or timely responding to written communications. On the other hand, some, certainly the right “They”, live by the rule of returning phone calls and responding to written communications promptly. There are lawyers who intuitively understand and value the practice of religiously returning calls promptly. It’s their nature. Others have been taught to do so or have had the importance of doing so beaten into them and have as a result put it into practice. Lawyers are in the communication business. They should be great communicators which includes being timely in their communications, yet grievance committees across the land, administrative bodies that deal with complaints filed against lawyers, will tell you that a failure to return calls and communications of all sorts is an all-too-common complaint that gets lodged against attorneys. Yes, by the way, lawyers really do police themselves with fee dispute committees and grievance committees. You can read about lawyers in Texas, for example, who are publicly reprimanded, suspended, and worse yet, disbarred for various wrongdoings perpetrated against clients.
Hopefully your lawyer has a life outside their law practice, and if they are an effective lawyer, their time will be in demand, in which case they won’t always be immediately available. So, what about those occasions when they are indisposed? There should always be a plan “B”: a text after missing your call, for example, that inquires as to the urgency of the call with an appropriate follow-up; or a text that sets up a time window to return the call or sets up a specific time on the calendar to conference as the situation calls for. And there should be an understanding that if there is an urgent matter at hand, the day or hour makes no difference. Your lawyer can be called twenty-four seven.
Beware! A word is in order regarding the “junk-yard-dog” attorney. The right lawyer for you knows when to be aggressive and most definitely knows how to be aggressive…and then there is the “junk yard dog” (JYD). There is certainly a demand for the JYD and there are many who at times think that is what they need. However, the question must be asked, “who owns the junk-yard dog?” If you are the client, you certainly don’t! The JYD plays by the rules of the junkyard. That might well work for you…or it just might work terribly against you. The JYD is scrappy and scary and as you can imagine, not well liked by lots of other lawyers, and yes, not well liked by lots of judges, mediators, arbitrators, commissioners, councilmen, and people generally. They typically know and practice only one speed, one tact, one approach and it’s extremely aggressive. Their approach may pay off by scaring away an antagonist or punishing an antagonist into submission. On the other hand, their one speed fits all approach often proves very costly for some of their clients, both as to fees and as to outcome. You might say that hiring the JYD is at best, a crap shoot. A parting thought on the subject: Have you ever noticed how many people look like their pet? The argument can be made that this same similarity exists between people and the lawyer they choose!
Be armed! On the other end of the spectrum is the self-billed “Christian lawyer”. Before you take offense, please understand this is not to say you don’t want a lawyer who is a Christian. To the contrary, you most certainly want your lawyer to be someone who has made Jesus Christ the Lord of their life, who holds you in high esteem and who loves the Church. As used here, the term “the Christian lawyer” refers to that lawyer who rests his or her laurels on being a Christian, whose calling card is that they are a Christian, and who has limited skills, passion, or expertise as a practicing attorney. Here is the deal: there are many great lawyers who first and foremost are Christians and have honed their skills as an attorney and counselor of the law. They are committed followers of Christ who are excellent lawyers, and in that sense are indeed a Christian and a lawyer, and an excellent one as they should be. That is who you want.
Your lawyer Your lawyer should be a believer who walks the talk, who loves what you do, who loves the bride of Christ, who reflects your character, who, like our Savior, is tough and tenacious, and who has multiple “speeds” or approaches, depending on the circumstances. Your lawyer should have a reputation as someone whose word can be trusted, is respected as someone you don’t want to go up against in a fight but at the same time is someone who will come to the conference table to rightfully resolve a matter or dispute.
Your lawyer should be someone who knows the ropes, so to speak, and the playing field. If they are not familiar with the city council, the commission, the taxing authority, the city attorney, police department, district attorney, or judge, you’re dealing with, they know how to quickly bring in or consult with the right “others” who do. The right lawyer for you will know many of the other professionals who might come into the picture or who are needed to be on your team. This comes with experience within the world you operate, and connections made over time within that world. If they or their firm are not proficient in certain practice areas, they know highly effective specialists in those areas of law such as complex estate planning, income tax, ad valorem tax, alternative dispute resolution, risk management, or litigation, who are proficient and can be called upon if needed.
The Rest of the Right They Your lawyer will likely know how to assist, if need be, in bringing in the other right professionals to have on your speed dial so to speak. You, or your business administrator or business pastor, will want to have a relationship similar to the one you have with your lawyer with several other very important professional friends: an outside CPA, an insurance broker, and a banker.
There are accounting issues peculiar to the church and ministers that many well educated and experienced CPAs are not familiar with, at least to the degree you want them to be. Like lawyers, there are CPAs who specialize in working not only with nonprofit organizations, but more specifically, churches. It is a CPA or accounting firm from that circle you want to have an ongoing close relationship with. You want that CPA or accounting firm that has expertise in church and clergy accounting and tax matters.
The right Insurance broker is important to you as well. The broker is not the insurance carrier. Your broker is your representative and your advocate in the insurance world. A great broker for you is one who is with a firm that has the clout necessary to shop from a broad market and is able to use the leverage of their firm to find you and the church the best priced coverage with a carrier that they can work with effectively in order to maximize coverage. The broker is not only your intermediary with the carriers but should be a highly effective advocate for you when seeking coverage on a claim. You want a broker who knows the type of coverage to secure for you, the staff, and the church. The right broker will not only make sure you are given the best choices of coverage but will assist you in determining what coverage you should have and how much you need. But their job shouldn’t end there. When a claim arises, they should step into the role of “adviser” and if the decision is made to file the claim with a carrier, they should step into the role of your “advocate” and doggedly assist you in timely collecting on your claim.
Rounding out your collection of close professional friends is the right banker. Ideally, he or she is a decision maker with the entity you finance your church business with. This might not be possible If, for example, your lender is a large national bank. Even still, it is a great advantage to have a relationship with a professional in the banking business you can call in a crunch for advice or suggestions regarding banking matters. You will want to find that person who fits the bill and keep them close. If your banking “friend” is the CEO or President of your lending institution, consider it a great bonus. But even if you don’t have your financing with a local or regional bank, and it’s not practical or possible to cultivate a close relationship with an officer of your lending institution, look to establish such a relationship with an officer in one of the local branches of that institution, or even still, with a local banker who is not working for your lender. Ultimately the right professional banking friend will be able to assist you on the spot with issues that arise and decisions you must make on the lending, depository, and savings front.
With your lawyer, CPA, insurance broker and banker in your close circle of professional friends, you are in a position to be considerably more effective, much better protected, and you can now sleep a little more easily at night.
