In House of Cards Falling (Part 1), we examined the network of alleged sexual and other abuses within the International House of Prayer, particularly in regard to IHOP founder and frontman, Mike Bickle. In this follow-up article, we take a look at recent developments in the prophetic movement that has been integral to IHOP, noting particularly the legacy of the Kansas City Prophets.

Hamburger helper

We noted in Part 1 the series of stinging allegations made against Mike Bickle. Further revelations have come to light in recent weeks that bear a significant witness on events. In January, it was exposed that Bob Hartley, a ‘prophet’ with close ties to Mike Bickle, had been banned from IHOP due to recent allegations of sexual misconduct. One alleged victim said Hartley had “extremely forceful” sex with her after she “resisted him for weeks.”

In January, it was exposed that Bob Hartley, a ‘prophet’ with close ties to Mike Bickle, had been banned from IHOP due to recent allegations of sexual misconduct.

Another alleged victim claimed Hartley used promises of prophetic words to initiate private meetings with her. Hartley enjoyed close ties to IHOP, and to Bickle, dating right back to the 1980s, when he was part of Bickle’s Kansas City Fellowship church. Then, when IHOP was launched in 1999, Hartley continued that connection by donating some land and office trailers to the ministry.

Hartley has had a presence at IHOP ever since; indeed, as recently as December 2023, Mike Bickle & Hartley (FaceB)when he prayed on stage at IHOP’s prayer room. Hartley’s alleged sexual misconduct was apparently reported to Bickle in 2016 and 2022, but Bickle took no action. Hartley’s ex-wife is one of Bickle’s alleged sexual victims.

Revealingly, members of Hartley’s own family have been much more forthcoming about their father’s ‘dubious’ lifestyle. Taylor Lynn, Bob Hartley’s daughter, has shockingly revealed that her dad got her working for his ‘ministry’ as a young kid. “My first job at 7 was calling people for donations”, she stated. “At 12 I would spend ten hours a week researching people and writing prophetic words for him.”

Hartley’s son, Jedidiah, provides an even more damning expose of his father, stating last month (March); “My dad, Bob Hartley, who has been an influential prophetic figure in both IHOPKC and Bethel Church, is a complete fraud. His prophetic ministry has always been a con. For decades his process has been the same. He gets specific information about people, either through online searches, church directories, or most commonly, through conversations with pastors of local churches, and then he pretends as if he is (divining) this info.”

Once his dad had the names, he would mine Google, Facebook and even the church directory to find details about their lives, such as phone numbers, addresses and random facts.

“We would travel to churches, home groups, youth groups etc. and before each meeting my dad would speak with leaders of the group and ask for names of the congregants so he could ‘pray over them’ before we would minister to the group.” Once his dad had the names, he would mine Google, Facebook and even the church directory to find details about their lives, such as phone numbers, addresses and random facts.

But this was only half the story. “Before his sermon, he would ask leaders about their church members’ lives. Their relationships, faith, family, jobs etc.” When the time came for his dad to “minister”, he would place several three-ring binders “full of his manic notes” and put them on the pulpit. After delivering a sermon, he said, Hartley would give prophetic words to people “straight from all the information he had written in his notebooks.”

Jedidiah said his father openly admitted to him that he ‘got help’ from natural sources. “According to him, all the prophets did this. It was just their ‘hamburger helper,’ a phrase he had gotten from his prophetic mentor and major prophetic figure Bob Jones. A little something extra to spice up their meals.” Hartley’s son also noted that one former leader of an IHOP affiliate, “knew about the grift yet kept encouraging my father’s prophetic ministry, and told me to let it go when I objected.”

Jedidiah says he has paid a high price for sharing revelations about his father – Hartley snr made it clear that his son wouldn't get "one cent" of his “several millions’” inheritance if he talked publicly about him or about Bickle.

Hartley snr made it clear that his son wouldn't get "one cent" of his “several millions’” inheritance if he talked publicly about him or about Bickle.

Yet this same ‘prophet’ has been rubbing shoulders with Mike Bickle for decades.

Morningstar ‘prophet’

Then we need to consider another close ‘prophetic’ associate of Bickle’s – Chris Reed, who took over from Rick Joyner as Senior Leader of Morningstar Ministries in 2021. For several years, Reed has been a popular speaker at IHOP, where he is much loved for sharing incredibly accurate ‘prophetic words’ for audience members.

Reed’s prophetic ministry runs on very similar lines to his goodChris Reed (Youtube) friend Shawn Bolz. He begins by giving bits of precise information about an individual – which he appears to read from an internet device on the podium – then asks if these details are true of anyone present. Once his ‘target’ is identified, Reed proceeds to supply him or her with some generic ‘prophetic word’ – God sees you, He knows what you’re going through; He’s coming to bless you big time……

By all accounts, Shawn Bolz is a bigger player than Reed in the prophetic movement - his ministry being of world renown. Yet in an exclusive 3-part series published in 2023, Prophecy Today thoroughly exposed Shawn Bolz’s deceptive methods at hoodwinking Christian audiences – providing, perhaps for the very first time, conclusive evidence that Bolz regularly uses the internet, and social media accounts in particular, to source his spectacularly accurate words of knowledge. It seems very apparent that Chris Reed makes use of similar means in his own ‘prophetic’ performances. Yet even with such damning evidence, the movers and shakers within the New Apostolic Reformation, and in particular, all the well-known 'prophets' in the prophetic movement, in which circles Reed and especially Bolz move freely, prefer to turn a blind eye. Are they part of the scam?

The Morningstar ‘prophet’ fares no better when he comes to issuing ‘words’ of national or international concern. Near the start of 2022, he shared a very vivid dream he had, in which he saw a series of newspaper headlines. Reed stated his belief that America was going to see these things unfold in 2022 and ’23 (check out his prophecy here). It takes little knowledge of current events to know that nothing like the series of events he outlined has actually begun to occur.

It takes little knowledge of current events to know that nothing like the series of events he outlined has actually begun to occur.

Perhaps that’s why Reed offered a more toned-down list of prophetic scenarios that he ‘saw’ coming in 2023 (Read here). Almost any secular commentator could have guessed many of these rather obvious outcomes – which hardly sound like genuinely prophetic words from a man with uncommon links to the voice of God.

One question that arises in regard to Mike Bickle in all this is, if his level of spiritual discernment has been so poor over many years as to accept ‘false’ prophets like Bob Hartley and Chris Reed as genuine, and have them as close friends and allow them to speak in front of his IHOP congregation, then what basis do we have for thinking that his discernment was any better in those days when Bickle was central to the coming together of those most infamous of all prophetic voices – the Kansas City Prophets?

Kansas City Prophets

Considerable additional information has come to light about the Kansas City Prophets – the most notable of whom Paul Cain, Bob Jones & John Paul Jackson (The Galilee Project)were Bob Jones, Paul Cain and John-Paul Jackson – since they first came to prominence under Bickle’s leadership in the late 1980s. This is especially true with regard to Paul Cain.

We know of the charges made by the Rev Ernest Gruen of the Full Faith Church in Kansas City, that Bob Jones was mentally unstable and involved in occultism. We know, too, that Jones’ public ministry at Bickle’s Kansas City Fellowship involved much talk of bizarre dreams, mystical interpretations of Scripture and out-of-body experiences. We know that Jones had been removed from all ministry functions after confessing to sexual misconduct with two women (not sexual intercourse); rebellion against pastoral authority, and the manipulation of church members through personally tailored prophecies.

We know, too, that Jones’ public ministry at Bickle’s Kansas City Fellowship involved much talk of bizarre dreams, mystical interpretations of Scripture and out-of-body experiences.

It was many years later before it was publicly revealed that Paul Cain had his own problems – having had a longstanding struggle with alcoholism and homosexual activity. When this became apparent, three prominent church leaders—Mike Bickle, Rick Joyner and Jack Deere, who all knew Cain but had apparently been hitherto completely ignorant of his sinful lifestyle —urged him to submit to a specific process of restoration and healing. Cain refused their recommendations.

New breed of man?

Dr Jack Deere, theologian, writer and a longstanding confidant of Paul Cain, provides a truly devastating critique of Cain’s ministry and life in an article that he subtitles ‘The True Legacy of IHOPKC's Most Influential ‘Prophet’.

What Jack DeereDeere reveals in regard to Cain is a story of consistent abuse, dishonesty, and drunkenness. He said that Paul taped every phone conversation he had so he could later use the tapes for blackmail if anyone ever tried to accuse him of sin. He said Cain had a genealogical program on his computer. One of the things he was famous for was getting the address of a person and the names of their relatives. He mixed this information in with genuine supernatural revelation about healing, and later admitted this deceit to Deere.

While Cain had made out that he left the ‘Healing revival’ movement of the 1940s and ‘50s because the leaders were sexually impure, it transpired that the leaders he spoke of had made him leave the stage because of his own sexual impurity. No church would allow him to speak.

Deere even claims, shockingly, “There is significant evidence against him knowing Jesus … he drew people to himself and not to God. I never heard him freely confess a sin … He told the grossest lies about anyone who refused to proclaim his innocence. …

... it transpired that the leaders he spoke of had made him leave the stage because of his own sexual impurity. No church would allow him to speak.

“The most damning charge” against Cain, Deere claimed, was the fact that “he could never state the gospel”, though he always insisted on giving the evangelistic message at conferences he spoke at. Even though Deere wrote out a basic gospel message on a sheet of paper for him to read, “Paul would manage to misread and garble this simple statement.” Church leaders from other countries hearing Cain attempt to preach the gospel would say, “The gospel is simply not native to the soil of his heart.” Deere could not disagree with them. For these reasons, Deere said he remains “agnostic about where Paul is spending eternity.”

Deere ends his article with the conflicting tension: “He had the greatest prophetic gift I’ve ever seen …. (Yet) He was the most abusive person I’ve ever known.”

Biblical warnings

It has not been the point of this article to gloat over the sexual indiscretions of Mike Bickle or any other person mentioned. Rather, my focus has been more concerned with related themes.

Shocking though it is that false prophets can continue to deliver remarkably accurate words even though they live personal lives far removed from closeness to Christ, this truth is evident from Paul’s teaching that “the spiritual gifts are irrevocable” (Rom 11:29).

The Old Testament describes a false prophet as one who “presumes to speak in My name anything I have not commanded, or a prophet who speaks in the name of other gods” (Deut 18:20). In Jeremiah 14:14, God says these people prophesy lies, offering “false visions, divinations, idolatries, and the delusions of their own minds.”

Surely one of the factors in discerning whether someone is acting in a God-given prophetic ministry has to relate to how they live out their Christian faith.

Jesus, too, sounded a clear warning that “many false prophets will appear and deceive many people” (Matt 24:11). He urged believers to, “Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves.” (Matt 7:5-17).

Of course, the early Church faced similar problems, recognising that both false teachers and false prophets would arise (1 Tim; 1Jn 4:1), whilst at the same time emphasising the importance of prophecy and teaching.

Surely one of the factors in discerning whether someone is acting in a God-given prophetic ministry has to relate to how they live out their Christian faith. For, as we see in 1 Corinthians 13, prophecy clearly came below love in Paul’s ranking of the attributes that we should have – love for each other and love for God). For, “If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.”

In the third and final part in the series, we will ask what warning signs were missed – or ignored – in this sad saga of prophetic confusion; and we will outline the desperate need for true spiritual discernment within the body of Christ. Look out for ‘House of Cards Falling (Part 3)’ soon.