Pastoral Recommendation Team Leaves Room for IHOPKC’s Mike Bickle To Resume ‘Informal Ministry’

Mike Bickle
Screengrab via YouTube / @International House of Prayer

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The team prefaced those by labeling him as “a long-term and chronic sexual predator who used his leadership position to obtain power and control to groom, manipulate, and intimidate his victims into being spiritually, emotionally, and sexually abused for his personal gratification.” Bickle, it noted, “has confessed to some of these actions.”

As for recommendations, the PRT stated:

According to 1 Corinthians 5:1-5, Mike Bickle should be removed from ministry of any kind until a process of repentance, counseling, healing, and restoration has taken place. He also should be barred for his lifetime from ever holding a paid, professional, public ministry again.

The team added that Bickle should publicly take responsibility and apologize for his behaviors, submit to discipline, and submit to professional counseling and evaluation. It also noted:

Should [Bickle] desire to return to informal ministry, there must be a full release in writing from the ICP with the approval of any therapists with whom he has received counsel. These recommendations should be implemented and overseen by the ICP and reported in writing to the IHOPKC Board of Directors and made available to the IHOPKC congregation and the public.

Recommendations for IHOPKC and Other Offenders

Next, the PRT noted that Bickle “created and/or allowed inappropriate leadership patterns by other staff members at IHOPKC.” For example, instead of reporting Bickle’s suspected behaviors to authorities, leaders “used biblical language and imagery to provide coverup for the victimizers versus helping and intervening on behalf of the victims.”

As a result, the PRT recommends the removal from ministry of “any offending staff member named in the Firefly report who directly participated in sexual sin or who knowingly and willingly covered up these violations.” This is true, they added, “until a process of repentance, counseling, healing, and restoration has taken place.”

The team wrote:

Because of their failure to use their higher role in leadership to appropriately confront Mike Bickle and protect the innocent, we recommend the following individuals should step away from all public ministry for a minimum of two (2) years, be permanently disqualified from holding office at IHOPKC, be required to repent publicly, and receive accountability from outside counsel/auditing with the assistance of the ICP: Stuart Greaves, Lenny LaGuardia, Marci Sorge, Daniel Lim, Davie Sliker, [Isaac] Bennett, and Joseph Taylor. We also recommend that IHOPKC not rehire them in the future, both for the well-being of the individuals and for the credibility of IHOPKC.

RELATED: Unpacking the Controversy Surrounding the International House of Prayer (IHOP)

As with Bickle, the PRT recommends that those staff members publicly take responsibility, publicly apologize, and submit to counseling and psychological evaluation. Again, the team left the door open for their return to ministry, and the recommendations are “completely subject to each leader’s willingness to submit to them.”

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Stephanie Martin
Stephanie Martin, a freelance writer and editor in Denver, has spent her entire 30-year journalism career in Christian publishing. She loves the Word and words, is a binge reader and grammar nut, and is fanatic (as her family can attest) about Jeopardy! and pro football.

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