Embattled International House of Prayer-Kansas City (IHOPKC) admitted it likely mishandled some past reports of misconduct and promised to make structural changes during an announcement Sunday at IHOPKC’s Forerunner Church.
IHOPKC Spokesman Eric Volz told the Forerunner congregation that IHOPKC’s initial “historic review of reported misconduct” revealed that “a few” reported incidents “likely were not handled properly.”
But Volz said that “most of those incidents happened under the watch of leaders who are no longer here.” He also claimed that the “number of known incidents” is “low,” given the size of IHOPKC, its 25 years in operation, and more than 20,000 staff who have served at IHOPKC.
Two recent high-level IHOPKC leaders—Executive Director Stuart Greaves y David Sliker—resigned last month, following allegations they had mishandled past allegations of misconduct.
TRR reached out to IHOPKC’s press office, asking for clarity about who mishandled the prior reports of misconduct. IHOPKC’s Executive Leadership Team (ELT) replied that the “reference to past leaders was not in relation to Stuart Greaves or David Sliker,” but did not provide any other details.
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Last October, an advocacy group presunto that IHOPKC Founder Mike Bickle sexually abused multiple women, spanning decades, while also leading the 24/7 international prayer movement. Since then, Bickle’s main alleged victim has told her story of alleged abuse exclusively to El Informe Roys (TRR).
Alleged victims of abuse by other IHOPKC employees have also come forward, claiming that IHOPKC leaders mishandled their reports of abuse.
IHOPKC executive leader Lenny LaGuardia called one of those allegations “baseless” and asked TRR to retract its story and “cease and desist” from reporting the allegations further.
TRR has not retracted its story, finding that a witness provided by IHOPKC had multiple conflicts of interest. TRR also learned that the alleged rapist in this case had been fired by IHOPKC for sexual harassment and rehired shortly before the alleged assault.
Also on Sunday, Volz defended IHOPKC’s third-party investigation, which has been criticized by alleged victims and advocates as lacking independence.
Volz stated for the first time that the investigator, the Lathrop Group, would release its findings to the public without IHOPKC seeing or editing the report ahead of time.
“It will be independently and directly released from the investigator,” Volz said. “IHOPKC pledges to implement any and all policy changes, procedures and cultural changes to ensure that IHOPKC does not travel down this difficult road again.”
Volz also urged alleged victims and their advocates to participate in the investigation, so the truth would be discovered and reported.
“We’re going to get to the truth no matter what it is,” Volz said. “But the reality is, in order for this to work, there are really two requirements that we need to see met. The first, the investigation must have the ability to be truly independent and we have that. But number two, the investigation must legitimately appear to . . . be truly independent to the parties involved.”
Newly appointed IHOPKC Executive Director General Kurt Fuller has met several times with the advocacy group to establish trust, and Volz’s David House Agency has met with the victims’ consultant to try to come to a “mutually agreement-upon investigation,” Volz said.
“We cannot verify the allegations against Mike Bickle without their cooperation and this community cannot find rest until it has the truth about those allegations,” Volz said.
Victims’ attorney Boz Tchividjian, confirmed a “preliminary” conversation to make their requests, one of which is that IHOPKC’s response to abuse allegations be reviewed.
“We have had a very preliminary conversation with them about what we have been requesting all along . . . a genuine independent investigation into abuse allegations involving Mike Bickle and others associated with IHOPKC,” Tchividjian wrote in a statement to TRR. “We have also communicated to them the importance that any such investigation include how IHOPKC leadership has responded to abuse allegations made known to them. Time will tell whether the current leadership will earnestly agree to embrace such a pivotal process. We remain hopeful.”
IHOPKC will also need the community to cooperate in order to proceed, Volz said.
“We need community buy-in,” Volz said. “Moving forward, no report will be ignored and no form of abuse will be tolerated.”
Also speaking to the congregation Sunday was Kurt Fuller, IHOP-KC’s temporary executive director. Fuller commissioned the ongoing historic review and said he has spent the past three weeks listening to peoples’ concerns.
“There are some issues here that need to be addressed, some of them urgently,” Fuller said. “I meet daily with all the division heads, with the CFO and the COO and we’re mapping out some significant adjustments to the organizational structure . . . The first (commitment) is to get to the bottom of all these allegations, not just those about Mike Bickle, but also those that are now directed to the organization as a whole.”
Mike Bickle’s sister urges congregation to ‘manage ourselves in godliness’
After the announcement Sunday, Bickle’s sister, Tracey Bickle, who runs an IHOPKC-related ministry, predicó un sermón, urging people to “manage ourselves in godliness.” They shouldn’t let social media evaluate people, or misbehave, but rather be grateful for how God will use the situation, she said.
“Hungry, angry, lonely, tired cold—that’s not OK, those are not reasons to misbehave,” she said. “We get to manage ourselves in godliness. . . . He’s telling us to be thankful for what those situations will produce if we walk it out reasonably well.”
Some former IHOPKC staff ha dicho Tracey Bickle’s ministry caused harm for victims of sexual abuse. And her comments on Sunday sparked backlash on social media.
todd guillermo escribió on X: “’Dear brothers and sisters, not many of you should become teachers in the church, for we who teach will be judged more strictly.’ James 3:1 NLT Case in point is Tracey Bickle, sister of Mike Bickle. This clip was taken from Tracey’s ‘teaching’ at IHOPKC’s Forerunner church on Jan 14, 2024. Nepotism is widespread in many independent churches and generally it’s not healthy.”
Alyssa DeGraff also wrote on X: “The closest thing IHOPKC had to a ‘reporting system’ was sending both victims & perps to Mike’s sister Tracey Bickle for inner healing ministry. Perhaps she should be thoroughly interviewed regarding reports of abuse.”
Bickle said Sunday that she trusts Volz, Fuller, and Forerunner Church’s Pastor Isaac Bennett. But she also said this situation has been painful for her and she’s struggled with disappointment. At times, she hasn’t wanted to engage with her friends, family, leaders, and the situation. And some days, she, in her frustration, wants to hurt people.
“I have found myself many times in these last number of months not wanting to get out of bed,” she said. “I’ve thought, ‘Oh I don’t want to do this.’” Bickle confessed that she’s “wanted to hurt a few people a couple of times—okay, multiple times, for real. Those are the days I just stay home.”
She added that people’s nervous systems may be on high alert during this time. She urged people to work through their sadness and pain by talking to counselors, having conversations, and bringing their thoughts to God.
Correction: a quote was corrected due to an earlier editing issue.
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17 Respuestas
Is the 20,000 number for staff accurate? If so, that’s an incredible amount of turnover….
It’s not turnover, it’s the amount of people who staffed their 24/7 prayer and worship for the past 25 years.
“IHOPKC Spokesman Eric Volz told the Forerunner congregation that IHOPKC’s initial “historic review of reported misconduct” revealed that “a few” reported incidents likely “were not handled properly.”
“But Volz said that “most of those incidents happened under the watch of leaders who are no longer here.” He also claimed that the “number of known incidents” is “low,” given the size of IHOPKC, its 25 years in operation, and more than 20,000 staff who have served at IHOPKC.”
What a shock that they’re apparently not leading with specifics, but pointing to people not being there as maybe some sort of a positive as far as moving on rather than addressing the issues and saying who did what? And they’re supposed to get the benefit of the doubt or “buy-in“ based on what, exactly? Based on another iteration of Oopsie, mistakes were made (under the watch of many who are gone now)… we good?
Citing the number of “known” incidents doesn’t seem to be the way to go as far as a metric of trustworthiness or something, especially when cultures where abuse has occurred may take quite a lot of time to be uncovered.
Unless Boz’s team is given carte blanche to investigate, research, interview, and document the abuse, the extent of it, the cover-ups, etc AND give a pubically available report with conclusions and recommendations (including referrals to LEOs for any criminal violations, consider me skeptical.
Boz is the only one who can do a fair investigation????? Seriously???? Boz represents one of the accusers
That sounds impartial.
The sooner people learn that this is not a true church and does not have proper Biblical government the better it will be. Too many people in the IHOP cult have drunk the kool-aide.
We wonder how things like this happen? One way is when some supposed “prophetic vision” trumps the clear teaching of Jesus and affectively annuls it completely. Jesus said, “And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.”
This is so very straightforward and easy to do. Then Bickle comes along and claims that Jesus wants a 24 hour/7 day a week prayer room with a live Internet feed so that anyone in the world can watch it. He puts words in Jesus’ mouth that contradict what Jesus already said. The result is something that is arguably far worse than Pharisees blowing trumpets to let the people know that they are praying. Prophecy that annuls the Words in Red is always a bad thing. It produces bad fruit. It creates hypocrites and we all know what kind of acts they do…
Amen to this comment. The same scripture verse has been playing in my mind for several weeks. What IHOP has been promoting is going against scripture. Good catch!
Thank you for summarizing Tracey Bickle’s “sermon”. I could only stomach about a minute of it, and your summary proved the point to me. A lot of poor me regarding what she’s going through. Can’t these brothers and sisters in Christ stop thinking and talking about themselves even for a minute? I had some hope, but all of them still seem to be living in a bubble wherein what they say, do and the way they process information only seems to make sense to IHOP’ers.
Remember Tracey Bickle and others are trying save the family business and empire. They are hoping to ride out the storm now they have thrown some people under the bus to lighten the load. The sooner this so-called church ends up completely demolished and on the ash heap of history, the better.
“Brothers and sisters”…. having been raised required to call every adult by these titles, I now realize how insular the system of having to see people – who may even be dangerous to you – as closer than actual family. Now I see it as a clear sign of cult behavior. Bickle says he heard directly from God, even talked with the Archangel Michael, and this did not raise red flags for the faithful? Nope. Whatever he says, just believe. By the time he got to sheer nonsense the barriers to clear thinking had been broken down. A bubble indeed. Time for people to turn their brains on and start thinking.
As long as ihopkc continues to be more interested in protecting the “brand” via crisis managers/spin doctors than earnestly seeking justice for victims God’s hand of judgment (aka exposure) will continue at ihopkc. Guaranteed.
It’s a Psalm 45 thing.
Comes the day you ask yourself, “are we actually doing anything here other than stroking egos?” IHOP-KC is, like most celebrity ‘guy who heard from God and has work for you to do (and needs your money)’ organizations, pure nonsense. It is hard for people to admit they have been duped by a mystical charlatan. People have given their youth, their life potential, their money, their allegiance to something that is simply a way for some guy (and the sister) to keep a grift going. When we finally say it out loud we are able to be honest with ourselves. A grift is a grift. And religion does it so well.
As you know, the sunk cost fallacy applies in so many ways to these marks aka those being born every minute according to PT Barnum.
There are a great many people who come in and out of the prayer room every day and every night, who love God, and serve Christ faithfully in the same Spirit and hold to the same truths as He reveals about Himself to one and to all.
It bears mention, how horrible and shocking it is, for many who have been serving in this community for years, to suddenly learn of these things, and then be confronted with working through the significant world wide social media processing that is necessarily involved in our present level of instance.
We remain aghast, with all the world, and grief stricken in our hearts and homes, while maintaining experiences of brief and normal interactions that people working, living and moving, in close proximity to one another have with each other, on a daily basis, which are completely removed and devoid of these harmful and painful realities and reflections.
We continue to put our trust in Him who alone is sufficient for these things. The prayer room is good and the gathering place a necessity, may God purge and cleanse it and us who come and go night by night and day by day.
There is nothing that is done in secret that shall not at some point and time be widely known, this is a truth that we should all be more keenly aware of to inform the way we live.
Hebrews 4:13 Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of Him to whom we [every one of us in every place] must give an account.
The thing is most of the abusers, grifters, con artists, frauds, etc. are hoping that it won’t be uncovered in their lifetimes. As for afterwards, most of those probably either don’t really believe that is case or they figure once they are dead, it won’t matter. Ravi Zacharias being exhibit A. I am sure Ravi (wherever he is – presumably someplace very hot) at this point doesn’t care that his reputation and legacy are in tatters.
If you have been sexually abused your fist call should be to law enforcement. Your second is to a lawyer.