In 1998, long before First Fruit Ministries had a name, a building, or a board of directors, God began planting a vision in the heart of Rick Stoker.

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At the time, Rick was working full-time as an orthopedic representative with Stoker Medical Innovations. But he felt the Lord calling him beyond the comfort of his everyday life and into the lives of Wilmington’s homeless community. He began spending nights sleeping under the bridge alongside the people he felt called to serve, not simply bringing help from a distance but entering into their world.

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He started making meals and taking them to people living on the streets. Before long, those meals grew into something more. Rick began a street church, gathering every Thursday for worship, fellowship, food, and the simple reminder that the people living on Wilmington’s streets were seen and loved by God.

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Then, in 1999, Lee Anna Letino returned to Wilmington. At the time, she was working in photography and had begun spending time with people living on the streets. With a background in international development and nonprofit work, she already had a heart for people on the margins. Someone involved with Rick’s street church invited her to come to one of their gatherings to photograph.

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This led to her first conversation with Rick. What began as a conversation about photography became something that would alter the course of both of their lives. Lee Anna had a radical encounter with Jesus. She describes the Holy Spirit coming over her as she received a vision of what would one day become First Fruit Ministries. She knew, unmistakably, that God was calling her into ministry. For two weeks, she sat with what she had experienced. Then she made a decision: she would give her life completely to God.

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Lee Anna began joining Rick in street outreach, and her calling became increasingly clear. She was being sent to bring the love of God to her people, the homeless community she had already grown to know and love.

As Rick and Lee Anna served side by side, their lives became intertwined as well. Within about two months, they both knew they were going to marry each other. Together, they began following a calling that was quickly becoming much bigger than either of them had imagined.

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Their work soon developed a particular focus on women involved in commercial sex work. They could help women leave the streets and receive treatment, but they kept encountering the same heartbreaking problem: once a woman was ready to begin again, there was often nowhere safe for her to go. So they found a house.

Rick and Lee Anna Stoker began turning this grassroots ministry into a legitimate nonprofit organization. They established a board of directors, defined roles, handled taxes and paperwork, and began writing grants. In June of 2000, their first resident moved into the home.

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Rick and Lee Anna took day-labor jobs to help keep the ministry afloat. They prayed for what they needed and watched God provide, often at exactly the moment provision was necessary. For the first four or five years, they describe their lives simply as “living by miracles.” It was a season of total dependence on God.

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By the end of 2000, they felt God calling them to take another enormous step of faith: leave their employment and devote themselves to ministry full-time. They obeyed. And in the years that followed, grant funding, individual donors, volunteers, and community support began to come alongside the work God had started under a bridge. But through every season of growth, the heart of the ministry remained the same.

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It was never really about the food. The meals were important. They met a real and immediate need. But food was also an invitation to sit down, stay awhile, build trust, listen to someone's story, and remind them of their worth.

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As Lee Anna describes it:
“Food gave me the opportunity to sit with you long enough to speak into your life.”

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What began with meals carried onto the streets and worship under a bridge became First Fruit Ministries; a ministry built on the belief that transformation happens through relationship, that every person deserves to be known and loved, and that sometimes meeting a physical need opens the door to something much deeper.

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From the beginning, the mission was not simply to feed people. It was to sit with them long enough to love them.