Just about any time of day, any day of the week in Balstrop, Louisiana, you’ll find an industrious production facility with 4 ShopBot PRSalpha ATC tools running at full tilt. About 11 years ago, James Brent (Pastor Jim) was called into the ministry and felt compelled to witness to people in need; specifically people who weren’t already involved with the church. “It wasn’t really on purpose that I started all of this…” he explains, “As we started witnessing to drug addicts and wanted to help, we decided early on that a few church services weren’t enough to turn their lives around.” And thus Freedom Challenge Ministries was started.
Freedom Challenge Ministries has had hundreds of graduates of its faith-based, year-long program committed to helping men (and women in its sister program, Morehouse Women’s Challenge) overcome their struggle with life-controlling addictions. Some individuals are court-ordered into the program, but many come on their own. Freedom Challenge Ministries offers a safe, controlled environment — for an extended period of time — with little or no cost to the families, and operates completely on charitable donations.
In the early days, when looking for ways to get the word out about the ministry, as well as fund it, “some of the men decided to make crosses using jigsaws.” Floyd Arnaud, Director of the Men’s Group, explains, “we had collected scrap wood from a local cabinetmaker and about 6 guys cut out crosses one-by-one.” After selling the crosses in local Walmart parking lots for several weekends, and handing out flyers about Freedom Challenge Ministries mission, the popularity of the crosses grew to the point that they quickly exhausted the cabinetmaker’s supply of scrap and had to begin buying material to produce the crosses.
After services one Sunday in August 2009, Pastor Jim had a thought: “Let’s make a football cross, and paint it in the Saints colors!?!” To say football is big in Louisiana would be a huge understatement. The 2009-2010 season for the Saints was one to remember after years and years of disappointing seasons – the first Super Bowl win took the team and the region to new heights and hope. The Saints-painted crosses were a huge hit and essentially launched the need for a more automated and streamlined manufacturing process. Pastor Jim, through the recommendation of a colleague, contacted ShopBot Tools to learn about ShopBot and eventually lead to the purchase of their first machine. Pastor Jim recalls his first conversation with Dianne in sales at ShopBot. “Dianne asked lots of questions about what we were trying to do and gave me information about the tools. She also encouraged us to look at other CNC’s to be able to compare. The fact that ShopBot makes their own tools so they really understand them, have affordable pricing, and that they have excellent tech support made ShopBot our choice.”
These days, Freedom Challenge Ministries has nearly outgrown the 20,000 square foot shop and fabrication facility that allows the men to work onsite together to generate the products that help pay for their living expenses. Creating over 70 different cross styles and sizes is only a portion of the many wood veneer and MDF ornaments, tractors, animal, decorative shaped products they create and sell. Jake, who went through the program himself 7 years ago, has stayed on at FCM and is the main operator and shop coordinator of their CNC machines. Even taking the tools offline for some software updates and tune ups can put them behind on orders that come in daily.
Each weekend teams of men package up crates upon crates of painted, stained and decopauged crosses and other items that are taken across Louisiana and Texas to Walmart store fronts,. Once each month, truckloads of product are taken to the Canton, Texas, flea market where Build-A-Cross has a permanent storefront along with several booths selling everything from their crosses to monograms to grab bags of “filler” containing every imaginable wooden shape. They are also rapidly growing their internet business, which often makes it difficult to keep inventory stocked. Orders come in daily and are regularly produced and shipped the next day.
Outreach is continuing to expand. The demand for their crosses and other products has never been higher. Pastor Jim believes this is just the beginning of their outreach and ministry possibilities locally and beyond.
To learn more about this organization visit:
www.freedom-challenge.com
To see some of the products they make and sell visit:
www.build-a-cross.com
To learn about full-size ShopBot PRSalpha tools visit:
www.shopbottools.com/mProducts/prSalpha.htm