As for those who persist in sin, rebuke them in the presence of all, so that the rest may stand in fear. - 1Timothy 5:20 (ESV)
Bethel Statement on Shawn Bolz to Alumni
For background, let me briefly discuss Bethel Church in Redding California. Bethel is a cesspool of false doctrine. Most apostate churches specialize. Hillsong is known for prosperity doctrine. Joel Osteen is a word faith heretic. Elevation specializes in Narcigesis, or reading oneself into scripture. This is not to say they do not promote and support other heresies such as elements of prosperity, word faith, false signs and lying wonders, and certainly NAR dominionism. Again, it is specialization. Bethel is like spiritual Jell-O in that you can't just nail them down. They subscribe to nearly every false teaching under the sun. They are word faith, prosperity and false signs and lying wonders. Heck, they are the ones that originated the "glory cloud" nonsense. They also embrace the more extreme beliefs such as grave sucking and employing a dead raising team. The are one of the chief sellers of divine healing, which usurps the sovereignty of God to claim He must always heal us. You name it, they will say yes to it and then figure out how to monetize it. That is because at the end of the day they are grifters. Bethel is run by the lead demoniac, Bill Johnson. His number one guy is Kris "Poverty Mindset" Vallotton. Kris never met a sheep he didn't want to fleece. The number two guy throughout the years has been their resident prophet-dude, Shawn Bolz. Even though Bethel now claims he was never an employee, he sure acted like one over the past ten years. Either way, Johnson, Vallotton and Bethel routinely platformed him, promoted him, and supported him. Now of course, they are treating him like plutonium, and I do not mean the nice kind from Back to the Future.
Shawn Bolz has always been absurdly fake. He had a schtick where he would pretend God was giving him words of knowledge about people at his events that he would literally be reading from his smart phone. This lazy arrogance was spotted by anyone with a sliver of discernment, and it was reported by many, including this ministry, that he was obviously data mining social media in order to fake these words of knowledge. These fake words bolstered his prophetic profile within Charismania, which grew his ministry and thus his profits. Remember, at the end of the day it is about the grift. Even though this was reported for many years, Bethel, Johnson and Vallotton largely ignored it. Until last year when a brave young woman named Jubilee Dawn came forward to tell a horrific story of the result of believing these words of knowledge. The summarized version is that a man was attending a Bolz event and Bolz shared a word of knowledge with him that the Lord was "showing him, the number 50 and we know 50 is the year of Jubilee and does that mean anything to you." Bolz already knew it did because the man's Facebook page showed his girlfriend's name was Jubilee. The man was amazed, and Shawn assured him that God said he was "giving her to him." When Jubilee saw the footage, she too was amazed and felt that God Himself had spoken into their lives and that they were meant to be married and despite dating very briefly, they proceeded to follow the "word of knowledge" and marry. And then the man proceeded to nearly kill the young girl on multiple occasions. Spitting on her and choking her twice to near death. He cut her off from her family and because she believed that Shawn Bolz had heard from God, leaving the marriage felt like it would be disobedient to God. Jubilee felt that this abuse, was somehow what God had willed for her life. After one more incident where he almost choked her to death, Jubilee did manage to leave. Now, she has a better understanding that all of this was orchestrated by Bolz, who lied about hearing from God. There are always victims of false teaching and prophecy - always. Some do not survive. Most never come forward. As this story has been making the rounds for the past few months, Bethel has been suspiciously silent. Perhaps they were waiting to see if the story would blow over, but it has persisted and finally this week they put out a statement, linked above. Let us reason together beloved as we review what is sure to be damage control, spin, and moonwalking away from their resident prophet-dude as fast as humanly possible.
"Dear
Alumni, We know this feels very late for some of you. Sorry this has taken so
long. We are aware that a conversation is happening regarding Shawn Bolz, and
our confrontations with him that took place more than five years ago. We have
delayed in an effort to reflect our recollection accurately, as the issues are
important and complex. Shawn Bolz had ministered with us many times for
many years, and had a great impact on our house. We deeply valued and trusted
him and appreciated his prophetic gift. Many of us have received important,
accurate prophecies, and words of knowledge from him (prior to social media
being so pervasive) that we had great confidence in." - Bethel Church
So
their opening position is to maintain that he had and apparently still has, a
prophetic gift. That is all you need to know about the sincerity if Bill
Johnson, Kris Vallotton and Bethel Church. This man has been exposed as the
huckster the bible warns us about. He is a charlatan. A fraud. Why would anyone
who genuinely hears directly from God use social media to mine information and
then lie that he heard it from God? Does Bethel think that Elijah would ever
lie and manipulate the people into thinking he had heard from God when he had
not? Isaiah? It is ok to say we trusted him, believed him and were deceived.
But the brand always protects the brand. We are supposed to believe that they
delayed in responding to "reflect our recollections accurately?" You mean to
get your stories straight, right Bill? Now that we all know Bolz was faking his
primary gift, why would you still think you received anything "accurate" from
him? By the way, we see what you are doing there in pretending that somehow
this is all the fault of social media. That Shawn was gifted prophet until the
corruption of social media? Are you serious?
"In 2019, some significant concerns came to us from respected international leaders regarding irregularities in Shawn's word of knowledge gift that caused them to wonder if he may have been using social media to generate them. We believe that these concerns and the evidence to support them were gathered and shared in good faith and out of concern for the global Church. Their presentation of over a dozen words amongst the hundreds he's given was a small sample size, but regardless, was validly concerning and needed to be addressed. For some of our team, the evidence felt conclusive but for others it was not. We did not have a consensus, but we were very concerned and sought clarity from him. Two of our leaders met with Shawn on two separate occasions about this. Kris flew down for his meeting with Shawn at Bill Johnson's request. Our leaders also met with Shawn's board and shared the evidence and our concerns. Each time, Shawn absolutely denied using any social media in his words of knowledge or prophecies. Shawn still maintains he never used social media in any words. And truthfully, unless something changes, only he and the Lord really know what took place." - Bethel Church
No
Bill, we all know. Can you look Jubilee dawn in the eye with this lie? Who
cares what "Shawn maintains?" Do you know of any people caught red handed who
admit what they have done? Why would he when he knows you will keep running
cover for him? We have the facts laid before us and you had more proof
submitted to you from international leaders. Someone needs to ask Bethel
leadership if they believe there is any chance that God spoke a word of
knowledge to Shawn Bolz regarding Jubilee Dawn being given to the man who would
nearly kill her. What Bethel is trying to do here is make things that are
crystal clear as murky as possible. Oh, some of us were convinced but others
were not? What idiots were not convinced and are they still on your staff? If
so, why? What is the point of muddying the waters with this garbage about it
only being a dozen or so words of knowledge among hundreds he had given? Who
cares what the denominator was? If the numerator is one, isn't that too many?
How many falsified words of knowledge, where Shawn scrubbed victim's social
media accounts to fake a word from God Almighty, would be acceptable to Bethel
Church? By the way, did Bill Johnson need a consensus to take action? Is he not
the leader of that church? So, with no respect because none is deserved, we
knew what was taking place back when it was taking place. This is shaping up to
be a statement desperately trying to find as many excuses as possible to hide
their willful complicity.
