A controversy surrounds his alleged encounter with an angel he called 'Emma' at an AOG church in 2001. Bentley stated that the female angel gave him a vision of gold dust, and afterwards he received a breakthrough in terms of financial stability. Among Assembly of God congregants, especially, there was debate about whether such a professed encounter was in line with AOG doctrine as set out in the 16 Fundamental Truths The most persistent challenge was twofold; whether the experience of a specifically female angel who prophesied financial well-being was a Biblically recognized phenomenon, and whether preaching about such an encounter was theologically responsible - would it bring converts to worship such an angel rather than the God who sent her? Bentley has argued that it was God's choice, and not his own, that an angel appeared to him in that manner.