Why Your Church Has to Update Its

State Registered Service Agent With the

Secretary of State Today!

            Under Oklahoma law and the law of most states, the registered agent is the individual who is “served with process” if the church is ever sued.  If someone files a lawsuit against a church, they file the petition with the court clerk in the county where the church is situated or where an incident occurred.  The court clerk gives the plaintiff a file stamped copy of the petition and issues a summons.  The plaintiff serves the summons on the church with a copy of the petition.

            Oklahoma Statutes state that if the petition and summons is served on the “registered agent” who the church has named in its filings with the Oklahoma’s Secretary of State, the plaintiff has properly served the church. The church then has a certain number of days (usually twenty) in which to file their answer or response to the allegations in the petition that they legally owe the plaintiff money.  If the church doesn’t file an answer denying the allegations in the petition as filed, the plaintiff can wait until the “answer time” has run out.  The plaintiff can then go to the Court where the case is pending and request that the judge grant a default judgment against the church because it is in default by not having filed an answer denying the allegations.  No further pleadings or notice is required, and if the plaintiff proves to the judge that he served the church, the court can grant a default judgment against a church.

            In one case, a church had incorporated by filing its papers with the appropriate government office listing its pastor as the registered agent for the church.  Sometime later, after the pastor had left the church in less than friendly circumstances, someone filed a lawsuit against the church.  The plaintiff looked into the church’s corporate filings with the government, saw the individual the church had named as its registered agent for service and delivered a copy of the petition and summons to the individual named by the church years earlier.   For some reason known only to him, the individual named as the service agent never  informed the church that he had been served and didn't deliver a copy of the pleadings to the church. 

           The plaintiff took a $15,000 default judgment against the church before church leaders even knew they had been sued.  The judge's decision to grant a default judgment was upheld on appeal.  The appellate court took the stance that the church didn't deserve any grace because it was so negligent in the way it totally ignored the state's corporate filing requirements.  

            For Oklahoma Churches:  To read more and to download form resolutions, change of service agent form and a form letter to the Oklahoma Secretary of State to update your service agent click here.