500 to 50: It seems like Mike Bickle was stalking me...

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In 1988 Amy and I lived in Nashville. Our home church was The Belmont Church on Music Row. Belmont had a brand new building and there was a lot of excitement, as well as a lot of guest speakers.

We were all kind of relieved (or disappointed) that the Rapture hadn’t happened in spite of those theological masterpieces, “88 reasons Why the Rapture Will Be in 1988” and it’s follow-up, “89 Reasons Why the Rapture Will Be in 1989” by Edgar C. Whisenant.

…but back to all the guest speakers.

One dude who came to Belmont was a little Vineyard guy named Mike Bickle. He was very, very excited. He raised his voice a lot when he talked, not in a shouty way or even as a preaching technique. He just got very enthusiastic and his voice got louder and louder. He had with him an old dude, Paul Cain.

Apparently Paul Cain was a “Prophet.” From an early age and he would “read-people’s-mail” at church, especially church leadership. Then he was out of circulation for 40 years or something like that and now he was back in the “prophesy” business again (that was a horribly inadequate and inaccurate recounting, I’m just kind of lazy right now.)

Bickle and Cain were at Belmont for a few meetings and Amy and I went. The only thing I remembered was that I thought Paul Cain was a terrible preacher. His jokes were sophomoric and corny. He meandered as he talked. I don’t remember any points from any of his “lessons.” But then he would pray and prophesy of people and that seemed to have an effect.

Bickle kept talking about prayer and worship and his vision and prayer and worship…(and prayer and worship.) He was weird, but I liked him.

Fast forward to 1998…

Amy, the family and were entrenched at New Life in Columbia and we were in the midst of full-blown charismatic revival. We heard about Brownsville and Toronto, Smithton, and Kansas City, specifically “the Kansas City Prophets” with (who else) Mike Bickle, Paul Cain, and a host of others.

Fast forward again to 2001…

Amy, the family and I were in Newton and I was fighting to keep my head above water at IFI. Prison Fellowship scheduled a conference for all of the IFI staff. The entire staffs from Texas, Kansas, and Iowa were going to meet for a weekend in Kansas City. Our Aftercare Manager, Greg Allen, was very excited to be in Kansas City to go to this new 24-hour prayer and worship ministry called IHOP, The International House of Prayer started by (you guessed it) Mike Bickle. So after the super-boring IFI meetings, a bunch of us would pile in our rented 15-passenger van and head to IHOP. It was a bit tricky to find, but we found it.

The first think I noticed was that the Prayer Room was really just 4 double-wide trailers lashed together, just like M-Building at the prison. The next thing I noticed was that the floor of the trailers was really spongy (I later found out that Mike Bickle thought it would be a great idea to put judo mats under the carpet so it would be soft for those on their knees. It was not a great idea.)

We got to the prayer room at around 10:30 PM. There were people scattered throughout the room that could maybe seat a couple hundred. There was a map of the world on one wall, a place to take communion at another wall and some people at the front of the room with guitars singing. I plopped down in a chair and closed my eyes. I could tell they were improvising their lyrics around a 4-chord progression. Each singer would sing a bit in-turn and they would “go-around-the-horn” as it were. I had my Bible in my hand but I never opened it. I just listened. Soon, one person from the worship team left, then another, then another, finally a new guitar player sat down and he began to sing. Someone tapped me on the shoulder and said, “We probably should go, we have a very early morning.” I was about to question leaving within a ½ of our arrival until I looked at my watch, it was after midnight. We had been there nearly 2-hours and it seemed like 30 minutes. I knew I’d be coming back the next night.

The next night, Friday night, we arrived at the same time. There were more people in the prayer room than the previous night. I sat in the very front row just a few feet from the worship team. There was a thin young woman on the piano and three other young women singing. To the side was a percussion player who also sang. They again sang a simple repeated lyric over a 4-chord progression. This went on for some time, They sang:

Eternity is written in my heart

Try as I might to find another lover I find there is there in no other

Over and over they sang these phrases. In the pauses one of the singers would say short prayers/phrases, “There is none like you…no one can take your place…you love us.”

After some time the intensity changed and the young piano player began to sing:

If I never, walk on water

If I never see the miracle

If I never hear your voice so loud

It’s enough to know you love me

It’s enough to be here at your side

I couldn’t leave if I tried

And around the horn they would go…

The young woman then shouted out, “Lord You love us…you bend down and kiss our hearts!” Tears sprung from my eyes as I sang along. I didn’t want to leave that room, but more importantly, I didn’t want to leave who I could feel and perceive in that room.

On our way back to the hotel that night I whispered something very small in my heart. I said, “Lord, I never want to leave IFI. It is perfect for me, but if I have to leave, I would want to come here.”

Little did I know what that prayer would do…

chris

For More Info

mikebickle.org/

www.mistyedwards.com/

www.paulcain.org/

The "88 Reasons" Guy

www.ihopkc.org/