Strang is again using his Charisma platform for disgusting evil...

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"They did not hire a neutral 3rd party to investigate. They hired a team of defense lawyers. They literally retained one of the most prestigious, aggressive, and expensive defense law firms in Kansas City, and nationwide. There is nothing objective about it. Everything will remain confidential. These victims are going to be completely railroaded and they sold it to their congregation as accountability." - Kansas City Attorney and IHOP Congregant Jesi Stanley

I wanted to lead this devotional off with a word from someone directly on the front lines of IHOP. I am obviously removed from it as is the man I will be responding to today, Steven Strang of Charisma News. The best we can do is speak to what facts are known, apply the bible hopefully, and make logical conclusions. Mrs. Stanley on the other hand attends IHOP and is a lawyer. She knows the lawyers that IHOP has retained for the sham investigation they are pretending to conduct regarding the many allegations of spiritual and sexual abuse from the founder of IHOP, Mike Bickle. They have spent what I can only assume are monies given for the business of Christ and paid one of the most aggressive defense attorneys in Kansas City, with a nationwide reputation. They had promised to hire an independent third party, sold their sheep a bunch of lies regarding accountability and then lawyered up so the cover-up could begin. It is sad and transparent but not nearly as disgusting as the link above from Strang. Now, I guess Strang can do this as he owns Charisma News but to do it with the veneer of just being a folksy journalist interested in the truth is shameful. As we walk through this sewage, realize the sole purpose of this is to protect his good friend by disparaging the former IHOP leaders as being driven by grievance against Bickle and the accusations as being a demonic attack, which naturally leave the victims as liars. He offers up revisionist history and absurd examples to try and prove his point. Is it any wonder why no victim wants to trust this leadership? Is it any wonder why women do not come forward when abused? Let us reason once more together beloved as this should make every true believer's blood boil. The damage to the cause of Christ is immense. Never lose sight of the fact that IHOP is a cesspool of false theology to begin with and God is bringing things to light now to deal with it.

"Today we will be looking at the report regarding the very serious accusations against Mike Bickle. It appears as if he has been exonerated. Now, its not quite that simple. There's all kinds of nuances and we are going to talk about that today. Full disclosure, I have been a friend of Mike Bickle for many years since around 1990. I have personally supported his ministry since IHOP KC started in 1999. Before that he was a local pastor in KC. It is important that there be a thorough investigation and the first part of it is now complete. We try to get to the truth, and we need to take these allegations seriously. But there are such a thing as wrong allegations. It's no secret that there have been church fights. No secret that certain ministries, that certain people have tried to take them over or even destroy them and as we go through this, I think you will see sort of a pattern." - Steven Strang

Exonerated??? Wow, beloved this should tell you all you need to know about the absolute shell of a human being that Steven Strang is. Even this bogus report does not conclude that Bickle is exonerated! The report is issued by the same compromised leadership and hired gun lawyers previously discussed. Its only purposes were to cast shade at the victims, discourage anyone from future accusations, protect Bickle, and be leveraged to excuse not getting an independent outside agency to properly investigate. Their absurd premise is they can't waste the IHOP money until they themselves verify credibility of the charges. That is what the outside agency is for! They had money to spend to secure this prestigious law firm but not to pay someone who is objective, right. And Strang just shills for them to protect his admitted good buddy Bickle. This is not nuanced Steve. You are making it that by introducing ridiculous speculation about what "might" have occurred to convince people it had. Up until these allegations, the three former IHOP leaders were nothing but respected members of the community but now they are "church fighting?" Now they are harboring wrong allegations? The inference Strang wants to make is clear. These three people, one of which was the former pastor at IHOP Forerunner Church, had secretly wanted to take over or destroy IHOPKC. Strang has not one shred of proof and offers none. He clearly does not care about the truth, Jesus Christ, or these women. He is abusing his platform to reach a national audience to sell this garbage to. Do not buy it.

"Earlier this year, Bickle got over 5 million people around the world to sign up to pray for Israel. It also shows his level of influence. I believe what happened is related to that. It's a spiritual attack. It's spiritual warfare. I could tell very early that something was not right. First of all Mike did not really defend himself. Second of all, other victims did not come out of the woodwork. In fact , exactly the opposite. Usually when there is a scandal, other people come out of the woodwork. Also, he did not confess. Usually when people get caught they go ahead and just confess and get into a defensive mode. None of that happened." - Steven Strang

Ahhh, so it must have been Colonel Mustard in the Conservatory with the wrench. Strang is playing spiritual clue here. It is lazy at best but insidious at worst to actually blame the actions of Mike Bickle on the devil but realize that is not what he is doing here. He is blaming the victims for being demonically used by the devil to falsely bring these accusations. So, follow this reasoning. Mike Bickle somehow singlehandedly got five million people to pray for Israel and the devil in response, managed to convince three former IHOP leaders in good standing to gather false accusations from at least eight women, to what? Tarnish Mike Bickle? Mike Bickle and IHOP are already in league with the devil! The 24-hour prayer has resulted in spiritual mysticism practices. Those that escape IHOP tell of horrific cult abuse suffered. You have the Bethany Deaton murder, the pastor who sexually abused a teenager being defended, the bridal paradigm, and Jesus as my lover worship music, just to name a few examples off the top of my head. Not only did Mike not defend himself, as you know, innocent people do. He has not even denied the accusations publicly! Yet this is presented by Strang as a positive? He then pontificates that because other victims were not clamoring to be further abused by IHOP leadership that it must mean there is something wrong with those that were brave enough to? Just sickening.

'I consider Mike Bickle a very effective leader and he has raised up a lot of staff. But apparently some who have left have some kind of offense. I say this based on what they've done and what other people are saying about them. In fact, I have a friend who is kind of an IHOPKC insider and in fact he is the one who sent me the statement earlier today. Then he sent me what he posted in Twitter. "It's not just about being right that matters, it's how we are right that matters. To reflect the character of Christ in all matters, in our thoughts and actions." I thought that was well said but in a personal text to me he said, "there are weapons of mass emotion used to control a narrative and implant beliefs, whether true of false. Memories can be manipulated, woundedness not dealt with desires another person to feel pain."' - Steven Strang

Ok, what these three former leaders have done, is try and counsel and represent several women that have claimed very serious sexual and spiritual abuse suffered at the hands of Mike Bickle. They tried to bring these to Bickle, my misapplying Matthew, and were rebuffed. They have vetted these allegations so far and determined them to be credible. They also concluded that Bickle targeted the victims and engaged in spiritual manipulation. So, despite this, Strang views it all negatively, smears the three by claiming they are operating with ill will in the spirit of offense against Bickle, as well as because some other people say bad things about them. How "journalistic." How in the world does Steven Strang sleep at night let alone think he is reflecting the character of Christ by defaming three former church leaders and dismissing the victims of sexual abuse as liars? Ahh but this anonymous Twitter friend takes it further to insinuate that the very memories these victims have, must have been manipulated. How utterly evil and vile.

"I am just concerned that it appears that some wounded leaders apparently had it in for Mike for some reason and they came representing this group. The statement says that after three weeks of examination, IHOPKC has identified five of the eight alleged victims. Three of the five have publicly called the allegations a lie. A fourth has not wanted to communicate with IHOPKC's attorneys and a fifth allegations relate to incidents that preceded IHOPKC's founding. Then at the end it says that IHOPKC has heard the demands to bring a third party in to investigate the organization in general, but this step is premature until IHOPKC can establish the credibility of these allegations and genuine intent of the complaint group. IHOPKC remains open to inviting a third party or several third parties to examine these findings. It is our sincere desire that the anonymous Jane Does come forward as soon as possible either directly to IHOPKC attorneys or via the complaint group." - Steven Strang

Once again, the "wounded leaders" lie. This entire video is designed to offer people seeking confirmation bias about Bickle and the charges exactly the reasoning they need. Never mind Strang, or me, have no idea who these victims are. Let's play out this rationale. Let's say that it really wasn't eight. Perhaps some have recanted under pressure or perhaps they were never victims. Is three enough? Two? What about one? How many women is it ok, for Mike Bickle, teacher of holiness, to have once sexually abused, while married to someone else? The bible says one is too many, but Strang is offering up the possibility that the original number might be smaller, as "exoneration" for Bickle regardless of how many victims there might actually be. IHOPKC is not open to any outside investigation. If they were, they would have stuck to their original promise to hire one and stop making excuses.

"I have already commented on the fact that a couple of the victims have said no and the others there was not a shred of evidence, there were not text messages, there were not emails. Apparently in one case I read a statement by one of the leaders I do know personally who has apparently been counseling this victim and her husband but so far there has not been any evidence brought forward. So it's just kinda hearsay and its just interesting that there's nothing specific and the statement says the complaint group did bring a pre-prepared list of demands to prevent escalating levels of disclosure, I'm not sure what that means and the demands and threats that included dictating the use of IHOPKC's funds and it generated an atmosphere of concern regarding the true objectives of the complaint group. Now, IHOPKC has been given a lot of donations over the years, even though the staff raise their own support, people give to the ministry. Some very generous donors have given them some land. It's just very interesting when there's a lot of assets and then sometimes when you have leaders who think that maybe they would be the successors, you know there's just so many questions. The fact is I don't know what's going on. I'm just trying to connect the dots in order to understand and report and let you understand what's really going on." - Steven Strang

Strang needs to keep to his day job, fleecing the flock while performing as a shill for the Republican Party. Hearsay is a legal term whose core feature is the person being quoted is not present. So, if an alleged victim said her friend had also said Bickle assaulted her, but you could not locate the friend to corroborate, THAT would be hearsay. When the actual victim is stating what actually happened to them, that is call TESTIMONY, not hearsay. Realize Strang is again just trying to cheapen the victims in the eyes of his readers to protect his buddy. The other red herring offered here is this notion of evidence. Firsthand accounts of what happened? Yeah, that's what we call evidence Steve. As Strang has already pointed out some of the accusations, including the most damning, stem from actions in the 1990's, you know, before people were really using email and before texting was a thing. I might add here, most people do not text and email while having an affair or have been sexually abused. Most real people do not hold onto the blue dress.

What is absolutely disgusting here though, is Strang talking out of the corner of his mouth about the fact that he does not know a damn thing, while smearing the motives of the former leaders who are helping the victims. So, Steven Strang has now born false witness against these three former IHOP board members, one of which was a former IHOP pastor, by inferring they are doing this because they viewed themselves as successors to the vast IHOP empire. Sprawling land and property and donations, none of which would actually be theirs if they were to succeed Bickle anyway but why let the truth muck up a perfectly good smear job? In order for his friend to be innocent there must have been a grand conspiracy involving these three formerly respected leaders and women spanning four decades to take down the dove-like innocent Mike Bickle, right.

"So here we have this group of leaders and one of whom, and this is all hearsay, but I was told one of these people told someone at IHOPKC and this is absolute hearsay, that they wanted to see the ministry burned down. So you have to wonder about their motives. Now if there has been wrongdoing, if there has been manipulation, or inappropriate touching or whatever it is we want that dealt with but let's think about the "me too" movement. The me-too movement in secular culture, some of the men accused were absolutely guilty. They absolutely used their power to manipulate women sexually. Then there were a couple of times when somebody wanted to destroy a man that they brought these charges and two were very prominent because they were in the news. One was Brett Kavanaugh. There were people who wanted to keep him off the SC and they found a lady named Christine Blase' Ford who alleged that in college, at a party, he groped her and did some other things. It was presented in the Senate and there were people who were so concerned about her feelings and this happened years and years ago and isn't it interesting that this came just when he was coming before the Senate to be confirmed for the SC and would tip the court in favor of the conservatives. Now there was l this evidence and the Senate voted to confirm him. Christine went back to California. There is reason to believe she made it all up. In fact BK was a real journal keeper and if I remember correctly, he was able to present journals from that era which didn't even hint any of that kinda stuff was even going on. But regardless there were these allegations and there were people who were so concerned about Christine and here we have allegations and people are so concerned about these unnamed women and a powerful ministry, and this is more than just Mike Bickle but there are people who are apparently offended at him, trying to pull him down. Now I don't know this for sure but I've seen this happen. I've seen several mega churches come down because a younger generation of leaders almost did a palace coup against the senior pastor. Most of the time these aren't really in the news. The secular new media doesn't really consider it news other than the fact that its titillating." - Steven Strang

So, you incorrectly call the victim's testimony hearsay and then commit hearsay yourself? That some random anonymous person claims to want to burn IHOP to the ground? Well, it should be burned to the ground for the rampant heresy but that aside, are you kidding me Strang? Then, not content with trampling over the victims of IHOP, Strang now revictimizes Christine Blase' Ford? Look, I understand that Strang is nothing more than a Republican Party operative, but his distortion of reality needs to be pushed back on. He offers as proof that Blase'-Ford was somehow lying, the fact that Beer-Bong Kavanaugh was eventually approved by the Senate but omits that it was strictly on a party line. So, because the GOP was in charge of the Senate is the only reason Kavanaugh was approved. Blase'-Ford was quite credible and Kavanaugh was not, despite his silly journals referenced by Strang. He mocks the notion that people were rightly concerned about the well being of Ford and correlates that to openly mock people being concerned about the IHOP victims. This is not a palace coup. This is not about offended people trying to take down Mike Bickle. He tries to constantly couch his clear attempt to discredit the victims and former leaders with things like, "I don't know this for sure." If you do not know it for sure, then shut the hell up Steve and stop slandering and bearing false witness.

"Alleged victim number one - they said that Mike Bickle emotionally pursued and prophetically manipulated her more than 25 years ago. Well, I am not sure exactly what that means. To prophetically manipulate someone. I would ask the question if this was true, why wasn't this dealt with at the time? The second and only detailed allegation is from 26 years ago. It included physical contact with Mike Bickle and an adult woman. It was also insinuated that he may have committed a crime but IHOKC has not been able to determine whether this criminal allegation has any credibility. Nevertheless in light of the detail provided to IHOPKC, the leadership team asked Mike Bickle to step away from his duties at the church while the allegations were investigated. Meanwhile the ministry attorney has reached out to the victim by phone, as recently as November 9^th, without any success. That apparently is the only one that comes close to having any credibility." - Steven Strang

C'mon Steven. You know damn well what it means. It means that your buddy used his schtick as a pretend prophet to lure, exploit and sexually abuse a woman that was supposed to be one of his sheep entrusted to him by the Lord. In case you missed it, one of the former leaders responded to the nonsense about the "partial" credibility of this victim by saying:

"This case includes a relationship between a 42-year-old internationally renowned minister and a 19-year-old, a relationship that began with prophetic manipulation and became a 4-year sexualized relationship that lasted into the early years of IHOPKC," - Dwayne Roberts

Let me go slow for the truth impaired Mr. Strang. When Mike Bickle was a 42-year-old, internationally renowned minister, he falsely prophesied over a 19-year-old girl to lure her into a four-year sexual relationship that continued even as IHOP was founded. It is not "coming close" to credibility - it has been founded already to be credible! How is this even vaguely defendable or acceptable for an adult, let alone a minister! Strang seriously assaults the victims again by asking the inanely stupid question why it was not dealt with at the time? Most victims do not come forward until much later for a myriad of reasons. Shame, guilt, doubt, immaturity. Perhaps because they knew they would be treated as Mr. Strang is now treating them? Mercifully, this hit job now ends:

"We have to realize that if the enemy is going to bring down a ministry, he has got to get rid of the head. He's got to make people question that ministry. I want to say that I think Mike has handled this right be staying quiet. The leadership team at IHOPKC has been responsible. If they have erred they needed to err on the side of being overly cautious. But like I said very early, once that woman sent out that Facebook post we had to have questions. What the IHOP people are saying is that unless something comes to light, there is not even a reason to spend the money to hire lawyers to come in and do a thorough investigation. It kind of reminds me of the Mueller Report. You know there were these charges that were made up against Donald Trump and they spent two years trying to find something and at the end of the day they found absolutely nothing.

My personal opinion, and I have a right to my personal opinion, is this is an attack of the enemy. I think that the investigation needs to continue." - Steven Strang

Keeping in mind the enormous insult Strang inflicts on the victims and the former IHOP leaders throughout this piece solely to prop up his friend, let's look at the closing stupidity he wants you to swallow. Bickle has handled this right by not even denying the allegations? By refusing to work with the victim's group? By trying to attack their credibility and manipulate them? The IHOPKC leadership team is being responsible by lying to their congregation in saying they would hire an independent agency to investigate, changing course by now insisting they have to investigate first? Or maybe they are being responsible by wasting the IHOP tithes and offerings to hire the most aggressive defense layers in KC? They haven't erred by pretending they are being accountable by lawyering up and allowing rags like Charisma to defame the victims? Everything changed early on for you when some random woman, who has yet to be actually identified as one of the eight victims, posted a random rant on Facebook? Seriously? You think it is ok to hire one of the most expensive defense lawyers in the country, but it is a waste to spend money truly investigating the truth? You think the Mueller Report found nothing? Are you kidding me? There were 37 indictments! Seven guilty pleas! There were 14 ancillary matters referred to the DOJ for prosecution! They found that Trump associates repeatedly lied to investigators about their contacts with Russia! Over 1000 former federal prosecutors signed a statement that if it were any other person than the president, they would have been indicted on multiple charges of obstruction of justice! They identified numerous links between the Trump campaign and the Russian government! Mueller himself refused to exonerate Trump, saying if he could, he would in the report!

You are always entitled to your own opinion Mr. Strang but not your own facts. The devil would have no need to attack someone already serving him like Mike Bickle. Your premise is farcical. This smear job has born false witness against three former IHOP leaders, one former IHOP pastor and everyone victimized by Mike Bickle. You should be ashamed and embarrassed, but you seem incapable of those feelings. I can only pray that people see right through your assault on these people and the truth and pray that the compromised leadership of IHOP does the right thing while there is still time.

Reverend Anthony Wade - November 21, 2023

Authors Bio:
Credentialed Minister of the Gospel for the Assemblies of God. Owner and founder of 828 ministries. Vice President for Goodwill Industries. Always remember that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose.