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Trump Prophet Jeremiah Johnson Ends Ministry, Saying, ‘We Need to Humble Ourselves’

By Emily Miller
Jeremiah Johnson
Jeremiah Johnson speaks in a video series titled “I Was Wrong,” released in February 2021. (Source; Video screengrab)

Jeremiah Johnson, the self-described prophet who faced backlash from fellow evangelical Christians after publicly apologizing for prophesying former President Donald Trump would be reelected president, is ending Jeremiah Johnson Ministries.

The announcement comes “after much prayer and the clear direction of the Lord,” Johnson said Monday on his Facebook page.

It also comes after his abrupt two-week hiatus in the middle of a YouTube series he titled “I Was Wrong.”

Johnson said during the series, which he described as a money loser, that apologizing wasn’t enough.

“I believe that it is a tremendous mistake to take the next four years to argue and debate and cause division and grow more prideful talking about how we think the election was taken from Donald Trump. I actually believe we need to take the next four years and humble ourselves,” he said.

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“We need to recognize that God is up to something far greater in the prophetic, charismatic movement that I believe is beyond what many even recognize. We need to stop, we need to take a breather and we need to come back to a place where we can begin to dialogue about these issues rather than be so triggered.”

A recent report by The New York Times noted that Johnson had built an audience on social media as one of the first evangelicals to take Trump’s candidacy seriously in 2015.

In one YouTube video, he said he had heard from thousands of people after the first episode of “I Was Wrong” and that 90% of that feedback was negative. 

He admitted Monday on Facebook that he expects ending Jeremiah Johnson Ministries will mean “tremendous financial loss and the removal of influence that has been well established over the last decade.

“We fully understand what a shock this will be to many on numerous levels. However, we are choosing to radically obey Jesus over any other voices in this season,” he said.

Johnson said on Facebook he plans to delete all social media accounts associated with Jeremiah Johnson Ministries over the next week.

But it’s not the last people can expect to hear from Johnson.

His new website outlines plans for a ministry called The Altar Global.

Instead of offering what Johnson called “prophetic commentary” on current events, The Altar Global will “help prepare the Bride of Christ for the return of our glorious Bridegroom King Jesus,” according to the website.

That includes a one-year intensive program called The Altar School of Ministry, based in Concord, North Carolina, where Johnson and others will train students “on the lifestyle of an end-time messenger and the return of the Lord.” It also includes local and national conferences, monthly Zoom calls with supporters and books and other resources.

“This is not a name or brand change but rather a complete shift of our ministry’s identity and focus,” Johnson wrote on Facebook.

He added: “I am not discouraged nor am I drawing back from my calling. Quite the opposite. I feel God is launching me, my family, and our ministry team further into His purpose for us. In response to God’s gracious correction, refinement, and empowerment, I am choosing to refocus my gaze upon Jesus and the eternal realities of His Kingdom like never before.”

Emily McFarland MillerEmily McFarlan Miller is a national reporter for Religion News Service.

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35 Responses

  1. I wish Mr. Johnson success in the reality-based community. Unfortunately, he might have to change his name to go out and get a regular job. On the other hand, everyone was already thinking of Robert Redford in that mountain-man movie.

  2. Maybe he can be a carnival barker or one of those “As Seen on TV” product pitchmen. Both jobs would be more a more honest living that the so-called “prophecy ministry” scam he has been doing for years. Even the youths that sello the three-card monty games in NYC to tourists is more honest work IMHO.

  3. Where do these people come from??? Is there a little “Nut Warehouse’ somewhere cranking these Nut cases out?

  4. 50/50 chance he’d get the election results correct, yet he still is “wrong”. Why would anyone want to listen to him as a “reliable” source in the future for any Biblical instruction?

  5. “…which he described as a money loser…”

    Ah, a true Trump-era ministry. Profit from Trump supporters by telling them what they want to hear until you have a pang of conscience and issue a mea culpa which upsets your fans who instantly abandon your channel, causing your revenue stream dries up.

    And like any true Trump acolyte, your decision is to (essentially) declare bankruptcy, wind up the business, and start another more lucrative ministry where you can sell packages consisting of convention tickets and personal Zoom-based classes for hundreds of dollars a person.

    Gotta admit, the grift is strong with this one, though he is refreshingly honest about it, I guess.

  6. Comments on here are amazing. The man says he was wrong, and wants to lay everything down for Jesus… but hey… lets kick him while he’s down.

      1. The point?

        Jaimondi is saying is that Christians (likely) making comments that are straight up rude about another Christian because they seem to think Jeremiah Johnson or what he did is stupid.

        Last I checked, Love is not rude.
        What does that say about us Christians?

  7. Way back in the day you could be executed for this sort of thing. Now you just take a mulligan. Some folks need to sober up with this speaking for God pretentiously stuff.

  8. Well, at first I thought it was good he was turning away from what seems to have been a false prophecy gig, and I do feel sorry for him on some level as it seems in doing so he has sparked the outrage of the evangelicals who are still trapped in the conspiracy thinking bubble. But since he’s starting a new end-times -focused ministry, I think he’s still a little nuts. There are dozens of better ministries he could do to show the love of Christ: feed, clothe and house the poor; sponsor mental health and other services for the homeless; work to end racism; sponsor low-income housing; help bring clean water to any of countless villages in Asia or Africa, or Flint, Michigan; and on and on.

  9. Jeremiah Johnson hears very strongly from the Lord, some of the time: but is quite badly off base, some of the rest of the time. He is correct to give up the political prophecy ministry, and to stop calling his ministry after himself, rather than Lord Jesus: but I do not regard him as having heard from the Lord about The Altar Global – no matter what he thinks.

    Withdrawing from the public gaze and a undergoing a season of rigorous study at a Bible College or university (Greek, Hebrew, OT, NT, exegesis, hermeneutics, etc. etc.) would under-gird a harvest of righteousness for him in the future. This would be by far the best course of action for him. It is vital to be anchored in the Word, with deep faith but also with good critical thinking and analytical skills. Ministry leaders need to be well-grounded in reality, and in the day-to-day labour of advancing the Kingdom – in addition to receiving visions and dreams from the Lord.

    The deeper the penetration of the Word, the better the discernment of dreams, Jeremiah…

    1. Reread how you described JJ’s ministry: sometimes he hears from God, sometimes he doesn’t. What are the criteria you use to determine whether he has heard from God or not? That his predictions are correct? I could list predictions and claim to have heard them from the pine tree in my front yard and sometimes I’d be correct and sometimes not. It wouldn’t mean the pine tree is talking to me.

      Many times people’s criteria for judging whether or not a person speaks for God is simply that the person claims to speak for God.

      1. I don’t need to re-read my own post, thank you. If I hadn’t meant what I said, I would not have written it in the first place.

        I am quite aware of the claims that some people make, regarding hearing from God – including those that Jeremiah makes.

        I have an extremely long track record in hearing from the Lord – which is under-girded by my study of the Scriptures over decades – in French, at a truly excellent Conservative Evangelical Bible Institute in Belgium. I am a continuationist – they are cessationists – but that doesn’t mean that I can’t study alongside them, with real intellectual rigour.

        If you are a cessationist – as I suspect – I don’t intend to debate with you, because such debates are tedious and almost always fruitless, and it is too late at night in my country. According to one’s faith is it done unto one – or not, as is the case for too many Christians.

        Jeremiah Johnson thought that the ball-game/AmyConeyBarrett/Trump dream was from the Lord – but it wasn’t, for a number of reasons. I discerned that – but he didn’t – and that is the dream that has caused his JJM ministry to come crashing down.

        However, Jeremiah does possess a genuine prophetic anointing – even if you don’t believe in it – but he is depending too much upon it, and it is becoming wayward. I am concerned about him. That is why I say that the best thing he could do would be to settle down to some serious study and privacy, for a season, to ground himself in normal Christian functioning. That is what I advise.

        The criteria for being able to hear from God are manifold and complex – an intersection of serious and continual Bible study; experience in fasting prayer; practice in using the spiritual gifts; dedication to spiritual disciplines such as simplicity and voluntary poverty; growing in righteousness; habitual obedience to the Holy Spirit; the ability to discern spirits; the development of wisdom through dwelling upon the wisdom literature. Constant dynamic reading of the Scriptures, led by the Holy Spirit. Daily prophetic gifting: for example, I think of something related to politics or other national issues in the morning – and it turns up in the evening newspaper that same day – day after day, year after year. A commitment to personal holiness. The counsel of the saints. Exercising faith – and appropriating the mind of Christ by faith. Receiving constant powerful and clear answers to prayer. Repeatedly seeing one’s own prophetic dreams come true in real life, within time frames ranging from a matter of hours to three or four years. Receiving dreams of Biblical scenes – such as Ezra reading the Law – or seeing my own church surrounded by skyscrapers in an early morning dream, going to church a few hours later, and then having a conversation with the buildings manager, who volunteers the information that building work will soon be starting all around the church. My church is now encompassed, on several sides, by skyscrapers. All of this comes together, over a long period of time, to form spiritual discernment, and a knowledge and understanding of the Lord’s mind in a range of contemporary situations.

        At the end of the day, in order to hear from the Lord, one must please Him greatly. That takes serious and unrelenting discipleship.

        It is all of this experience – plus the careful study that I have made of Jeremiah Johnson over the last six weeks, via his YT videos, FB page and website – which has caused me to make that assessment of him, above. The Holy Spirit often asks me to assess different Church leaders, according to His will.

        1. Althea, I used to believe all that stuff, too. It was very difficult to lay it all aside, and it caused a lot of soul searching. In the end, I concluded that even though there are no prophets or gift of prophecy today, Christ and the gospel are still real and bearing fruit. We may disagree on the continuation of the charismatic gifts, but we can agree on the gospel.

          When we meet in heaven, we can sort it all out! God bless.

        2. Who is he to say everyone else needs to humble themselves while he waltzes off to a new scheme.
          And it is appalling how few people bothered to watch the hearings on election fraud held in the major battleground states. For at least forty hours, Americans stood under penalty of perjury and testified to the irregularities and downright criminal dishonesty that took place.

        3. Althea—thank you for your graciousness in your response to Paul. And for Paul’s gracious response to you.

          I am one too who believes in the prophetic, and that believes God is pouring out His Spirit on all flesh, with dreams and visions and the prophetic…we can’t despise it.

          As for understanding and discerning the Lord’s heart, you are right it comes out of obedience to God, a study and understanding of Scripture…knowing him at His Word to see if any word contradicts the Bible. God does not lie. Sometimes we presume we know what a prophecy means when God has much more in mind. For example, God has lifted the veil and you can see the heart intent of people in government and even the Church. That which was hidden.

          In 2018 I heard a prophecy that God was going to be shaking the Church to reveal what was not of Him. Even if one doesn’t agree about the prophetic any Julie Roys reader can see God is doing a cleansing work in the Church. I feel sad but not surprised when I hear of Christian leaders falling.

          I live around the Kenosha WI area, which was shaken by race riots in August when a black man was shot by an officer. Immediately after those events I sought to pray and discern God’s heart there. Others did too. In fact many different Church leaders, black and white, from different churches united in prayer and we all got similar words about “unity” and “forgiveness” and “reconciliation” and the city being hit by holy fire. When praying I heard the word “Rwanda” and had seen and image of Jesus walking through the city and wherever He went, His Glory fell and worshipped followed. I take “Rwanda” to mean God wants that level of radical Forgiveness that happened in the Rwanda massacre in the 1990s to happen in Kenosha. A place of huge racial reconciliation and forgiveness, led by God’s Church. But God needed the unity of His Body first.

          These words have yet to fully manifest but we’re praying they come to be.

          Same here.

          Instead of forgetting our manners and acting nasty to other believers, we NEED Unity in the Body of Believers. Unity in praying to save our lands, and the evil actions government and the enemy, to spur on a new awakening. What testimony is it if we bicker? But if people see how we can Still Love despite being so different from one another, they will want to know more.

          People are hungry to know God. We have a big opportunity now.

          1. It is very difficult to be unified when so many Christians are so deeply vested in the prophetic movement as an integral component of their Christian identity.

            I believe in libertarian free will; it’s a part of my human identity. But I’m totally willing to believe I could be mistaken and the Calvinists are correct. I’ve been open-minded enough to look at the issue from a number of sides. Whatever the truth is, I know Jesus and the gospel are still real (and that I have free will ;) )

            What I fear is that for too many Christians, Charismatic theology and practice is so deeply rooted in their Christian identity it IS their Christian identity. In other words, to question it is to question whether or not they are a Christian. That’s very difficult for someone to do.

            Add to that the propensity for people to “boast” in their leaders and suddenly we’ve got a large chunk of Christian believers defending false prophets and the prophetic movement. In essence, they are defending their essential identities.

            It was very difficult for me to question the prophets and apostles I had previously believed in as well as my own “prophetic history”, but I’m so glad I did. I have left those things behind and haven’t regretted it for one second! It’s so wonderful to not even know who JJ is or care about his “prophecies”. Or try to search my own imagination and try to believe it’s God. It’s a wonderful freedom to not be confused by this theology any more.

          2. I think I see what you’re saying Paul, even if we would disagree on the aspect of prophecy. You are right that any time Christians starts making their denomination, a belief in a certain teaching, or following certain leader a fundamental part of their Christian identity, versus, “I am My Father’s Child, a Sheep who hears His Voice, Rooted in the Vine and an heir and a part of His Royal Priesthood…” All the things Christ says about who we are in Him in His Word…we run the risk of having a distorted identity.

            “I am who You say I am.”

            As for unity, I have faith in the power of prayer and the Holy Spirit to overcome our difficulties there. And it takes humility on our part too.

    1. Scratches head at word “enjoy”.
      Thinks, I enjoy the insightful comments…buuut….

      “What is up with all these people being nasty and rude to each other in the comment section?
      Christians to other Christians?

      It stinketh, like a body left four days in the tomb…

      1. It takes reading the Bible as a whole to understand the character of God and the way He works in the world. During the time of Moses, God used signs and wonders to confirm the giving of the Law. After the Israelites entered into the promised land all manna ceased and Joshua had to mainly rely on the written Law to figure out what to do, as the Lord didn’t communicate with him face to face as he did with Moses. At times there was direct communication, but it was far less than what happened with Moses. Throughout Israel’s history, God continued to send prophets (Nathan, Elijah, Elisha) to be spokespeople for God mainly during the times of deep apostasy, but mostly the people of God had to rely on the written word to hear from the Lord (as well as the Urim and Thummim).

        During the time of Jesus (and his apostles), there were also signs and wonders, and again these things were done to confirm Jesus’ message. As we read Acts, the further we get away from the Pentecost, the fewer of the signs and wonders there are, and mainly bc it follows a similar pattern of the OT, the gifts cease bc the message has been given and the people now rely on the written word. I am not saying it isn’t possible for God to give gifts to his people, or for God to perform miracles. He does both, but as a pattern through scripture, if there is a gift then it’s pretty clear that God has spoken. None of that “did He? Didn’t He?” Remember the story of the man of God who prophesied against Jeraboam’s altar and was told by God not to stop anywhere, but go straight home, and another “prophet” told him that the Lord told him that he needed to stop at his home? And the man of God listened to the “prophet” and then a lion killed him for disobedience? (1 Kings 13). The point is, if even once you said God told me and it didn’t come to pass, you are a false prophet. And according to the OT you should be stoned. Sooooo….I would be very careful with “God spoke to me”…

        My concern with any of these “God told me” people is that it can be very manipulative to the people who haven’t studied the word of God thoroughly. But it goes even deeper than that, bc there is a right way and a wrong way to study scripture. Have you ever wondered why is it the Pharisees, who knew scripture forward and backward, somehow missed Jesus? And how Satan when tempting Jesus, used scripture? So there is a right way and a wrong way to understand what scripture actually says. And there is a lot of confusion and manipulation going on in Christian circles with people who misuse scripture to their own ends.

        All that to say that we all better be careful with “God told me this, or God told me that”. If we have to study like the Bereans the written word, based on the examples I have above (Pharisees and Satan), then how much more so do we have to be even more diligent when someone has a “prophetic word”. Blessings to you all.

  10. Oh, weird. A ministry to prepare for the end of times? They give people antipsychotics for that. How about focusing on teaching and preaching the Gospel for the here and now, which ultimately prepares all of us for Christ’s return. I feel sorry for his family who are dragged into this. Hmm, maybe he’s setting them up for a TLC reality show.

  11. This man first came on my radar a few years ago when he talked about “Horoscope Prophecy” because he was the only man I have seen in the Prophetic Movement who dared to talk at all about the great deal of fake things that are promoted from the stage and people in the movement. I learned about these in 2008-9 as I saw them in person. Some months ago I read his book about Cleansing this movement and I thought that he went 75% of the way towards saying everything that needs to be said. When I was reading this article I thought that he may have just gone the rest of the way until he announced that he was changing streams instead of actually keeping full fruit of repentance.

    For those here who are still in that movement let me say something very firmly and clearly that most people outside of the movement already know: almost everything coming from the leaders on stages and media platforms is simply fake. This does not negate what is supernatural that is real, but rather reaffirms it because the real is powerful. Those who are Cessastionists are following a doctrine taught by devils. The Holy Spirit owns all of its gifts. They do not belong to men so that we can choose which ones we like and which ones we do not. To claim that is a pure insult to the Holy Spirit whom we are not to grieve ever. We are not Father God so that we can tell the Holy Spirit what to do with these gifts. Yet even these men believing what is by itself a false prophecy can see the great falsehood of what our celebrities are promoting claiming to be prophecy and other supernatural events which are neither. Those in the movement have thrown away all discernment and tend to swallow a whole lot of fake until they recognize what it is. Then, like me in the Vineyard in the 80’s, they bounce over in disgustful reaction and want to get far away from all of the nonsense.

    The real problem we have here is that the movement has ignored one of the 10 original laws: You shall not use the name of the Lord in vain. This was a command not to do false prophecy, not to put words in the mouth of God that He did not say. This law, like adultery and some others had a quick death penalty with it. If Johnson and his mentor Loren Sandford had just admitted to adultery none of us would want them to instantly jump back into some new ministry. Yet false prophecy is just as much hated by God and requires, as John said, “to keep fruit in keeping with repentance.” These men are simply disqualified from leadership according to what is written in Titus and Timothy. Do we really believe that the Apostles who wrote our Bible would agree that False Prophets should stay in ministry even while abandoning their claims to be Prophets?

    What we need to all do is to follow the actual teaching of Jesus to call no man Rabbi or Teacher. The Holy Spirit is our teacher. Instead we are following men who tell us what we want to hear. This grieves the Holy Spirit while leaving us vulnerable to being sucked into that which is fake and a lie. The gifts are real and they are designed to be used by humble people. They are not a stage show which is where things started to go horribly wrong years ago in the Vineyard movement. Time to stop following men and get down to taking our own faith seriously and letting the Holy Spirit trump our Godmen we put up on pedestals.

    1. Cessationism is a doctrine taught by devils? C’mon, man! That’s a little too dramatic.

      I do think you’re right about following the Holy Spirit rather than human teachers. I think we discern the Spirit’s will by study of the scriptures in the context of historical interpretation and an extant interpretative community. I don’t think we discern his will through “impressions” or our imagination. When I read Moses’ criteria for discerning between true and false prophets in Deut. 18 , I believe I was discerning the Spirit’s will: don’t be afraid of people who claim to speak for God but their predictions don’t come true. This interpretation has been a consistent one through church history and even today.

      And here’s the rub: there isn’t a single “prophet” today who hasn’t gotten it wrong on something. From Pat Robertson to Bill Johnson. I’m not “afraid” of these people. They don’t speak for God. It feels so good to not pay any attention to them.

    2. I feel like a lot of us don’t want to throw the baby out with the bathwater, and at the same time wonder if there’s still a baby in there, because there’s an awful lot of bathwater. At the same time, if cessationism is true, the bible doesn’t do a very good job in communicating that in my opinion.

      1. L, I don’t think a cessationist argument can be made explicitly from scripture. And I’m a cessationist (about 99.5% – I could be wrong).

        I think what one has to do is explore the Bible’s teaching on how God delegates his authority to those who speak on his behalf. Once someone has a good handle on that, they can use it to contrast this teaching with the claims made by those who claim to speak for God today. When I do that, I simply do not find anyone who fits the criteria.

        So, why not? Why aren’t there prophets today? I think that has a lot to do with God’s purposes in redeeming mankind through Christ. Christ has died and risen, the apostles recorded their authoritative teaching on this subject, and the church has been founded. I’m not sure there’s a need for anything else. One could spend his or her days digging deep into scripture and never find the end of God’s goodness and mercy in Christ.

        But there are plenty of people who will tell you there IS a need and they have the solution! I usually find these people rarely have Christ and the gospel as their explicit focus in their prophecies.

        Books like, “Are Miraculous Gifts for Today?” published by Zondervan will at least get someone thinking more deeply about the subject.

        1. You write:

          So, why not? Why aren’t there prophets today? I think that has a lot to do with God’s purposes in redeeming mankind through Christ. Christ has died and risen, the apostles recorded their authoritative teaching on this subject, and the church has been founded. I’m not sure there’s a need for anything else. One could spend his or her days digging deep into scripture and never find the end of God’s goodness and mercy in Christ.
          Why are your “thoughts” Biblical? Yet you say, “I usually find these people rarely have Christ and the gospel as their explicit focus in their prophecies.”

  12. We probably don’t differ too greatly. I guess you could say I am functionally a cessationist in the environment I live in here in the US. And the stuff I see showboated here I would characterize as, at best, very immature. I too have seen people constantly wondering “was that God” with whatever pops into their head. Also it leaves people wide open to manipulation. If someone claims they’re speaking for God, who wants to question God? Spiritual abuse runs rampant in these circles.

    On the flip side, I am more open to the gifts in a mission setting, particularly where people have never heard the gospel.

    1. I am more open to people being able to make up stories in far away countries where there’s no one to expose those stories as fraudulent.

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