As more people started to come together to grab ahold of the vision of unity and total obedience, we saw that there was a very real need for shelter in our part of Kansas City. We received a donation of $130,000 from a sister in Australia. We knew that we could never get permission to start a shelter in Liberty, so we just rented a townhouse and invited our friends over. Then we rented another and another until we were housing 50-60 people at a time in 6 townhomes. Some were serious Jesus lovers that moved here to help and be a part - and some were folks that just needed a roof. In the beginning it was like 50 hard cases and three Christians. We have LOTS of stories about that. One got drunk and stabbed his roommate five times. (Nobody went to jail and he was healed within a week!) One set himself on fire in the parking lot. Lots more drama.
In the Spring of 2007 the first YouTube videos started going up. Around 2010 it started to become more of a Christian community as more people came from all over to be a part. Some had their own houses, some lived with us. God always provided somehow. At the we were housing 50+, feeding hundreds, on a budget of about $100,000 per year. No paid staff, no salaries, no steeple - just people. We had giant food giveaways in the park, distributing 18-20 thousand pounds of food at a time. In 2010 we rented a small school building and enlarged our food pantry to feed 500-800 families per month, plus dinners together and a gym for the kids to play in. In 2013 we were featured on Lisa Ling's "Our America" and the Dr. Phil Show - both of which turned into hit pieces over a custody battle within a family at the ministry. (The videos responding to Dr. Phil are here.) It still replays somewhere in the English-speaking world every six months or so and we get four nasty emails and one nice email from a Spirit-filled brother or sister that sees through it and is encouraging. (By the way, if you look us up online, hear all kinds of noise - and believe it without hearing our side - then just keep on walking. You're not ready for what's coming and we don't need you. No hard feelings. You go do you. We'll do what we're called to do. The ones we want are the ones that ask God and hear Him well enough to know what's up.) Jesus said to rejoice when you're slandered and lied about - great is your reward in heaven. (Matthew 5) We have REALLY thick skin now. All press is good press. God's got our back and you might now want to go running your mouth. (All the churches where God sent me and wanted to move in a big way, but they spit on me instead, are gone now.)
We eventually had a Free Store, then a super cheap Thrift Store - because nobody understood the Free Store. Our food pantry grew and other sources of food came online. We rented space in an warehouse to process a semi-trailer a day of scrap metal to provide some jobs for our guys. At one point we have 40 thrift store giving us their metal for us to strip and recycle (appliances, toasters, TVs, bunkbed parts, knives, tools, coat hangers, etc.). We paid them the steel price and we got paid from the copper, aluminum, brass that we could extract. But we were about at the end of the townhouse period and God said it was time for the farm He had promised many years before. He said, "Liberty must go forth." By 2015 we'd given away over 5,000,000 pounds of food, housed hundreds and given away mountains of clothes and household goods. We saw lots of people saved and many walking free and clean. People all over the world were growing because of our videos and sending money to help out. We had motivated many to start food pantries and homeless shelters - or just make some sandwiches and go find someone to eat them. Lots of people were hearing God better.
Click to go to the next page - The Church of Liberty gets a Farm with a Cave
