John Gray to re-locate megachurch after legal stoush
By Danielle Jarvis
December 18, 2019
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After being
caught up in a legal stoush with the former pastors of the church he has taken
over, John Gray will be relocating Relentless Church to a new venue.
The pastor, who took over from Ron and Hope Carpenter in May of 2018, was served an eviction notice, even though the church claimed it is up to date on all of its bills.
The former pastors of the South Carolina megachurch gave Pastor John Gray and his wife Aventer 30 days to vacate the premises, including telling followers that they are excited about taking over the church.
WYFF4 reported that Relentless Church will move to a new campus in Greenville next year and start a new church in Atlanta, Pastor John Gray announced Sunday.
Gray did not
share where the new location would be, but did show renderings to the
congregation of what the inside of the new buildings in Greenville will look like.
The Carpenters
headed to Jubilee Christian Center in San Jose, California, handing the
Greenville megachurch, which was founded in the 1990s, to Gray. They re-named
their church Redemption Church.
It is alleged that Gray was given full control of the assets, the vision and the future of the ministry. Gray engaged law firm McGowan, Hood and Felder, LLC to act on his behalf. The law firm issued a letter to the Carpenter’s solicitor, dated December 5, 2019.
Redemption, the
Carpenter’s new church, authorized their legal counsel, Katari D. Buck, Partner
at Asiatico Law, PLLC, to issue the following statement:
“Since The
Relentless Church began operating on Redemption’s Greenville campus in May
2018, the two churches have worked toward Relentless taking control and
ownership of the Greenville property. Despite nearly two years of negotiations,
however, the parties have been unable to fully agree on the terms of this
transition.
“Because
the parties have not been able to agree on a date for Relentless to vacate the
property, Redemption has taken steps to protect its property rights by sending
a notice of lease termination to Relentless through legal counsel, which
requires Relentless to vacate the property by December 31, 2019. If Relentless
does not vacate the property by December 31, 2019, Redemption will begin the
necessary court process to have Relentless removed from the property in
accordance with South Carolina law.
“Redemption
is in receipt of the letter to its counsel from J. Stephen Welch on behalf of
Relentless dated December 5, 2019. Redemption disagrees with the legal
positions taken in the letter and is preparing a response. Redemption does not
believe it benefits either party for this legal battle to be waged in the
media, however, and instead will look to the court process for resolution.”