(CP) After months of deliberation, the board of the embattled International House of Prayer Kansas City has decided that the vaunted 24/7 Prayer Room won’t be operated under the umbrella of any church. This decision follows the shuttering of several arms of the ministry, including the Forerunner Church, within the aftermath of a sexual misconduct scandal involving founder Mike Bickle.
The board announced the choice Wednesday in an email update on the restructuring of the ministry sent to members of the IHOPKC community. A duplicate of the e-mail was shared by The Roys Report.
“Another source of confusion has been the technique of evaluating whether to maneuver the governance of the Prayer Room under a church structure, and if it must be relocated to our Grandview Plaza facility,” the board said in the e-mail.
“It is the choice of the Board of Trustees that the Prayer Room will remain independent of any external church and proceed to be the center of IHOPKC. Further, the Prayer Room will remain in its present location on the Red Bride Center.”
While the 24/7 Prayer Room won’t function under the governance of a church, the board noted that it would still require governance. The board is working on a plan to operate it independently of a church.
“We realize that the long run health and wellbeing of the prayer room requires a proper governance structure for oversight, accountability, and spiritual strength,” the e-mail said. “We are exploring the very best fit moving forward and are committed to making sure systems are in place for solid decision making and responsible leadership.”
In April, IHOPKC announced that the ministry could be restructured, including the shuttering of some facets of operations this yr, including the IHOPKC school of ministry and Forerunner Church, led by Isaac Bennett.
“In April, we announced that, after much prayer and deliberation, we might wind down lots of IHOPKC’s ministry and training expressions, including IHOPU, Forerunner Church, CEC, and internships, a process which concluded May twenty fourth. Since that point, our focus as a ministry has been the 24/7 Prayer Room and Intercession for Israel,” the board’s email reads. “During the technique of planning and carrying out these changes, incorrect statements were made about IHOPKC’s future and reasons for shutting down various ministry expressions. As we said earlier, IHOPKC just isn’t shutting down.”
The Roys Report, citing a leaked recording from leaders at an internal IHOP University staff meeting in addition to an email from IHOP University President Matt Candler, reported earlier this yr that IHOPKC was within the technique of shuttering for good attributable to the financial impact of Bickle’s sexual abuse scandal. IHOPKC permanently cut ties with Bickle last December.
In February, a 3rd woman alleged she was groomed and sexually abused by Bickle within the Eighties when she was 14.
Using her maiden name, Tammy Woods, who’s now a 57-year-old mother and grandmother, told The Kansas City Star that Bickle abused her in St. Louis where he pastored a church before moving to Kansas City and starting IHOPKC in 1999.
Woods said Bickle abused her in his automobile, at her home, within the church and his office. She said the abuse, which began when she began babysitting his two sons, involved sexual contact but not intercourse. She revealed that the IHOPKC founder also told her several times that his wife, Diane, would die young and suggested that she could possibly be the mother to his sons.
Last yr, a girl identified as Jane Doe by The Roys Report alleged that Bickle paid for her apartment and gave her a key to his office, and that she engaged in sexual acts with him from 1996 to 1999 before he founded IHOPKC. She claimed Bickle wooed her with Scripture at age 19 when he was 42.
Bickle initially agreed to step away from the ministry last October when allegations of sexual abuse involving mutliple women were delivered to light by an advocate group. Bickle confessed to engaging in “consensual sexual contact” with a girl connected to the 24/7 prayer ministry along with a previously confessed relationship with the Jane Doe, who alleged she was his kept woman for several years, in response to an independent investigation report released in February.
In December, he admitted on Facebook to engaging in “inappropriate behaviour” but not “the more intense sexual activities that some are suggesting.” The ministry perminantly cut ties with Bickle two weeks later, saying its investigation confirmed “a level of inappropriate behaviour.”
