The Trust Clause in Methodism and the Church of the Nazarene

Like many other Protestant denominations, the Church of the Nazarene has a “trust clause” embedded in its book of order. This feature is absent in denominations with a congregational polity, but it is generally present in those that are connectional in nature.

The trust clause means that local trustees hold church property in trust for the denomination and the exclusive use of its congregations and ministers. When a congregation leaves a denomination, either voluntarily or by expulsion, they may want to take local property with them, but in connectional churches, the “trust clause” prevents that in most cases.

Denominations with trust clauses include the Episcopal Church, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the Presbyterian Church USA, the Presbyterian Church in America, the Reformed Church in America, the Orthodox Church in America, the United Methodist Church, and many others.

For nearly 250 years, the trust clause has been a basic feature in Methodism and its various offspring: the African Methodist Episcopal Church, the AME Zion Church, the Free Methodist Church, the Wesleyan Church, and the Church of the Nazarene, among others. Where did it originate, and what purpose does it serve?

The trust clause in Methodism originated with John Wesley. The first Methodist building was erected in Bristol in 1739. Originally, it was vested in Wesley’s name, but he understood that this was tenuous, and in 1763, the Methodist Conference adopted a Model Deed. Later still, Wesley appointed one hundred Methodist preachers, known as the Legal Hundred, to supervise Methodist property in the United Kingdom and to appoint preachers of sound Methodist doctrine to the pulpits of these chapels and churches.

Methodists in America utilized Wesley’s Model Deed at the outset. The General Conference of 1796 adopted the Deed of Settlement, which asserts that local trustees hold title to property for the exclusive benefit of the denomination and cannot divert that property to other uses.

This principle was a non-negotiable for Phineas Bresee, who brought 35 years of experience as a pastor and presiding elder (district superintendent) in the Methodist Episcopal Church with him into the Church of the Nazarene.

Bresee often relied on familiar patterns at the beginning of the Nazarene movement along the Pacific coast. His first Manual, dated 1898, declared that “no church or congregation shall withdraw from the Church of the Nazarene, nor in any way sever its relation therefrom.”(1)

His second Manual, dated 1903, repeats this statement but makes a more explicit statement about church property, requiring written approval by a general superintendent before any church property is sold.(2)

Bresee’s 1905 Manual was more explicit still: “In case an individual church becomes disorganized or ceases its functions, any church property which shall exist shall in no way be diverted to other purposes, but shall pass to the control of the General Assembly for the use of the church at large, as the General Assembly shall direct.”(3)

In 1907, he agreed to explore a merger with the Association of Pentecostal Churches of America, a group largely centered along the Atlantic coast. The APCA had a congregational form of government in which churches could readily join or leave the denomination.

In April 1907, the two groups adopted a Basis of Union that guaranteed general and district superintendents and allowed churches to call their own pastors (though subject to approval by the district superintendent).

The Basis of Union also stipulated that the fifty or so APCA churches in the East were exempt from the trust clause should they so desire, but that no church organized afterwards in the East or elsewhere could be exempt.(4)

For Wesley and Bresee alike, the trust clause was a vital aspect of honoring the intentions of donors, who give money to erect churches and buy parsonages in order to support and facilitate a particular understanding of the gospel. The trust clause guarantees that when a local group no longer honors that commitment, the property reverts to an entity which can continue to honor donor intentions by reinvesting the assets in ways that align with donor purposes and intent. The trust clause is part of the connectional thread that weaves a denomination together across space and time.

Dr. Stan Ingersol, Ph.D., is a church historian and former manager of the Nazarene Archives.

1. Manual, Church of the Nazarene (Los Angeles: 1898): 27.

2. Manual, Church of the Nazarene (Los Angeles: 1903): 39-42.

3. Manual, Church of the Nazarene (Los Angeles: 1905): 64-65.

4. Manual, Pentecostal Church of the Nazarene (Los Angeles: 1907): 17.