The 2025 Truth & Liberty conference at Charis Bible College in Woodland Park began Thursday without its headline speaker, Charlie Kirk, who was assassinated on Wednesday.

Kirk, the CEO and founder of the young conservative foundation Turning Point USA, was supposed to speak Thursday evening. That segment was replaced with a panel of speakers, which followed a session honoring his life. 

Andrew Wommack, the founder of Charis and Andrew Wommack Ministries, told attendees during the panel discussion that “if this doesn’t light your fire, your wood is wet.”

“Thank you for giving [Kirk] strength, inspiring him to stand up against a culture that is trying to destroy everything that this nation was based on,” Wommack said in a prayer.

The college had planned to host Kirk after Wednesday’s first stop of his American Comeback Tour at Utah Valley University, where he was shot and killed while answering a question from an audience member.

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On Thursday evening, Kirk was compared several times to biblical martyr Stephen, who in one video played in the auditorium was described as “doing nothing else but speaking the truth.”

“We are rejoicing because the message is greater than the messenger,” Wommack said to the audience. “Stephen was the first martyr 2,000 years ago and it did not stop the message, it amplified it.”

Kirk’s message had gained some notoriety from around the globe, including South Korea, where one member of the panel became choked up describing his impact.

“We’ve come to consecrate the ground, but we cannot consecrate it,” Truth & Liberty Coalition Board Member Bill Federer said while appearing virtually. “Those that have died have consecrated far more than we’re able to.”

Federer said he was in South Korea with Kirk on Saturday building “sort of” a Turning Point for the country, partly because “it looks like their election was stolen” and they have a “pro-communist president.”

He was presumably referring to South Korean President Lee Jae Myung, who is part of the liberal Democratic Party of Korea. Myung was elected in June after the country’s highest court unanimously upheld the impeachment of his predecessor from the right wing People Power Party.

Federer said Kirk was going to spread the message in America of a “mega church pastor” if he was arrested for protesting “the trans agenda bill that they’re mandating.” 

“Two days after we left they arrested the pastor, and before Charlie could start talking about it he got shot,” Federer said. 

The panel included five in-person speakers and two appearing virtually who talked about what they described as the “trans agenda” throughout the discussion. None of the panelists were students of Charis Bible College and media members were restricted from talking to all attendees.

One of the panelists, Laura Smalts, described her story of transitioning to a man and then undoing so after saying she “can’t wait to meet” Kirk in heaven. 

“I was sick of lying to everybody,” Smalts said. “I could not even have a normal conversation with someone without the whole time in my head going ‘Do they know? Have they figured it out? Do they believe me?'”

Smalts described herself as becoming “neurotic” as she “destroyed” her body until she “understood the beauty of what God created.”

Smalts said she had suicidal thoughts before and after her transition, to which Wommack added that there are more suicides for people who have transitioned than those who do not. 

Trans people who take hormone replacement surgery have significant decreases in depression and suicidal thoughts and attempts, according to the Trevor Project, a non-profit group that’s mission is to end LGBTQ youth suicide.