Below is a Facebook Message I received from a teacher at Emerson. I don’t know how God used these pair of shoes, but it’s apparent it had an impact on more than just the child:

“Hi Jeff! I have only met you a few times. First in Lori Bain’s office at Emerson while giving one of our precious boys a new pair of shoes and another time at the walk. While I don’t know you well, I see your heart. I’d like to help with raising funds for Mission Amarillo. My graduation from WT is in August and instead of a graduation party where people bring gifts, I’m asking for donations to Mission Amarillo. The pair of shoes you brought to that young man showed that we care. He has had a hard life and has lived the past five years in a Children’s home in Lubbock. He came to Amarillo to live with his mom and the situation was not good. We had to work very hard to build trust with him and our hearts and prayers were continually focused on helping him. I know it was “just a pair of shoes” but that was the last day we got to see him. CPS came not more than 30 minutes later to retrieve him and his two little brothers. Thank you for listening to Christ. Thank you for being Christ to our kids! Glenda Moore”

There are a lot of ways you can help Mission Amarillo help kids. Contact me and I’ll tell you how!

Jeff

Faithful Prayer Partners,

It has been one of the best summers we’ve ever had at Mission Amarillo. We’ve just completed the work for the month of June and it’s been outstanding. So far, we’ve had 170 students and adults serve in 14 apartment communities and do work projects in 5 locations. They have served over 400 kids and adults in the apartment communities.

We have at least three more groups that will serve here over the next three weeks. Please be in prayer for them as well as the seeds of the gospel that have been planted in the 400 served so far!

To see out photos of our summer, check out our Facebook page at this link, https://www.facebook.com/MakeAStepUp . Be sure and like us while you’re there!

Following are more prayer requests that need your intercession:

Back to School Outreach – We are in the process of distributing and collecting registration for our school supply project, Back to School Outreach. We are trying some new concepts this year. In some of our more established communities, where our property missionaries know the residents well, we are selling backpacks full of school supplies for $5-$10 a piece. This helps the residents by giving them a steep discount but prevents the creation of dependency to some extent. The proceeds from these sales will be reserved to help residents of these specific communities when needs arise. This way, the residents themselves are participating in helping one another through the purchase of the school supplies. Please pray for Astoria Park/Greenacres, North Grand Villas, and Cypress Creek Apts as we implement this new concept.

We will still have seven apartment communities that we will provide school supplies free of charge. In all, we will help more than 800 kids with school supplies, so we need your help both for school supplies for the four mentioned above and for the seven communities that will received them free. We now have storage space available to store these supplies long term, so you can either donate school supplies or adopt a property. Either way will help us more than you know. Please call, 236-3487, or email me at jeff@missionamarillo.org to find out the details.

Shoe Closet – We are thankful to First Baptist Church Amarillo for donating around 450 pairs of shoes during their VBS in June. Also, FBC Claude will be collecting shoes for us during their VBS in July. These collections are appreciated, but we still need to collect as many everyday shoes as possible over the rest of the summer. Last summer and fall, we received around 1600 shoes through area churches and organizations. We ended up giving away 1700 pairs of shoes to students in 28 schools in Amarillo, Bushland, Canyon, and River Road, and to students living in 11 affordable housing communities. Our plans are to expand to every remaining school that has needy kids before the beginning of the school year. As you can imagine, we need to collect more everyday shoes to meet the demand we will face this fall. I’d like to ask you to do two things. First, consider hosting a collection event at your church or organization. Given our current inventory, we need to collect at least 1000 more shoes before school starts August 27. Second, please pray that the Lord who owns the cattle on a thousand hills would provide us with the shoes we need to help kids in need. To see the sizes we need most, from this website, place your mouse pointer on shoe/hygiene/household closet and click on “needs”.

Apartment ministry: One of the things I’m most excited about is the day to day ministry that is going on through our property missionaries. We have three properties with refugees from seven countries and we have your typical American poverty in our other communities. We are beginning to see a rise in interests in beginning organic/home based outreaches to the people living in these communities. We have what I would call a seed planting operation occurring regularly at Glenwood Apts. and we have new churches who are getting involved in reaching out to students in Amarillo, Canyon, and Hereford. We have excellent work going on at most of our communities and are beginning to see the fruit of our workers labor. Please pray that the Lord of the Harvest would send workers into His harvest fields and that He would raise up workers from the harvest.

Last of all, please pray for some efforts we are currently planning. We are trying to raise the general awareness of Mission Amarillo so more people can participate in the work. Anytime you participate in this type of endeavor, there is always the danger of the ministry becoming more important than the mission. Our ultimate mission at Mission Amarillo is to take the gospel to the forgotten and impoverished in our area and partner with willing churches to make disciples. Please pray that efforts to access more resources don’t overwhelm our primary mission. We always want to make Christ known to those who don’t know Him. We will need your prayers to accomplish all He wants us to.

Thank you for lifting up this ministry and the support you give it.

Grace,

Jeff Parsons

First of all, I’d like to thank everyone who helped in anyway with Walk a Mile in My Shoes. From the sponsors, volunteers, and the walking teams, it was an incredible time. I’m not sure it could have gone any better. We raised over $11,000 and had 124 people participate in the walk and learn more about the context of poverty in our area. A big thank you to Chick-fil-a for providing food, bounce houses, and the Chick-fil-a cows to start the walk. It was truly a family event and I believe God was honored.

Our summer is off to a good start with our first mission group from FBC Hale Center. These students have done an outstanding job all week of working hard at Hope Welcome Center in the mornings and doing a Summer Kids Club at Spring Terrace Apts. in the afternoon. If this group’s attitude is any indication, this will be a great summer. We have another nine mission groups set to work with us. They will do work projects ranging from painting houses, working in the shoe closet, and working at Hope Welcome Center. They will do Summer Kids Clubs in apartment communities, one church, and one elementary school in an impoverished and often forgotten area of our city. Please pray that the Lord would use these groups for His glory and that people would be drawn to Jesus throughout the summer.

The Lord continues to use the Mission Amarillo shoe closet to minister to those in need. Since Aug. of 2011, we have given away 1695 pairs of shoes to kids and adults in need. Today, we gave away 26 pairs of shoes to kids in the Bushland ISD who are considered homeless. It was fun to watch the kids excitement when they received their new pair of shoes. Many of them, who had just met me, would come find me to show me the new pair of shoes they had just received. While standing in line to leave, one of them held his new pair of shoes up to his nose, took a big wiff and declared, “Dang! These don’t stink!” He then wanted everyone else to smell his new pair of shoes. Please pray that these students wouldn’t just seek a new pair of shoes, but would understand that we give the shoes because Jesus loves them.

Awhile back, I told you about a new ministry we had started, Wheels to Prosper. This ministry is part of a national program that gives away a car to people in  most in need. We have been given a 2004 Toyota 4 Runner which has a resale value of over $13, 000. Rather than give this car away and have the recipient have to pay close to $1000 in taxes and registration fees, we are considering selling it and using the proceeds to purchase more affordable vehicles and possibly to repair existing vehicles. There is a lot that has to be worked out to do this in a legal and transparent way, so please pray for us as we consider our options and seek out what the Lord would have us do. We will give away our first car on July 28, through our WtP partner, Aardvark Automotive. Please pray that the recipient will feel the love of Christ and that Christ followers present there would make that love known.

Also, please pray that our shoe closet would be adequately restocked this summer. There are some churches in our area that will collect shoes for us. However, we have several sizes currently where we have very little or nothing in stock. Please click on Shoe Closet/Needs page on this site to see the sizes we need most. If you or your church would like to collect shoes for Mission Amarillo this summer, contact me at jeff@missionamarillo.org or call me at (806)236-3487 to get more info.

Finally, please remember to pray for our faithful property missionaries. They do all the hard work and are on the front lines of this ministry. They do everything from rental assistance, helping bridge language barriers, learn and reach out to different cultures, and deal with the challenges and tragedies of everyday life with the residents in these communities. They go because Christ has called them. They would be more comfortable in a conventional church doing conventional church stuff, but they have responded to the call of God to go out to the hard places in our city. They can’t be prayed for enough. Their jobs are hard, but they love it and are blessed to be a part of what God is doing on the properties. I’m privileged to work with them and am thankful that God allows me to be associated with them. Please pray for their strength, patience, that they remain close to God, that they spend enough time with their families, and that God would use them to draw residents of these communities to Himself.

Thank you again for your prayers and support. Please pray that God uses all we do to draw people to Himself.

Grace,

Jeff Parsons

This is a post I wrote back in October of 2009, before this website existed. For some strange reason, I was drawn back to it and wanted to repost it.  I hope it will inspire you to be more intentional about being Christ’s ambassador wherever He has placed you.

My son’s encounter with a non-Christian at work got me thinking and I wanted to share those thoughts with you.

I’m a firm believer in the sovereignty of God. I don’t think we can force God to do anything and any act of kindness He shows us is not owed us. He does it out of His divine goodness and for the glory of His name. It’s the same regarding a move of His Spirit. Perry Noble, pastor of New Spring Church in South Carolina once said, “A move of God can not be planned, but it must be prepared for.” Since God is sovereign, we can’t manipulate Him, but we can live in obedience to Him, realizing He will use us for His glory. In the Great Commission, He calls us to make disciples. So how do we do that? How do we go about making disciples for a God who determines when He will move and how? I’m glad you asked…:)

The way I see it, we have four roles. Since Jesus often used farming analogies, that’s what I’ll do here.

1. Fertilize the ground through prayer. No move of God will occur without His people humbling themselves in prayer. Through this we gain God’s heart for the lost, a vision for accomplishing all He wants done, a sense of direction of how we should pray, and how we should go about sharing Him with those who don’t know Him. We won’t gain a burden for the lost without asking God to allow us to see them through His eyes. Through this, we gain a passion for Jesus and a love for those who don’t know Him. We should all have non-Christians we are praying for. If you don’t, ask God to burden your heart for someone and begin praying for them immediately. Also, start prayer walking in your neighborhood, an apartment community , a park, your workplace, anywhere people are and watch how your burden for the lost grows.

2. Plant the seed. In Matthew 13, Jesus tells the parable of the seed sower. Most read this parable and notice the result of each seed. This is something we should consider, but also notice the sower wasn’t very selective in where he scattered the seed. It went on the road, between rocks, in a batch of weeds, and only some into good soil. We need to plant the seeds of the gospel in peoples lives both through our actions and the words we speak. We should be able to talk about our relationship with Jesus as naturally as we talk about our kids, our hobbies, our jobs, or the Cowboys and Sooners losing in the same weekend.(I say that with a tear in my eye) We should scatter the seed everywhere, talking about our relationship with Jesus, in a very real and non-self righteous way, through most any conversation we have. Don’t force it. Just don’t hold back. Most of us know the opportunities we miss. If we simply take the opportunities presented to us, we will scatter a lot of seed.

3. Water it. 1 John 3:18 says, “Let us not love in word or in thought, but in actions and in truth.” Once we begin to talk about our relationship with Jesus, people will watch us. We can either validate everything Jesus says, or blow it by acting contrary to God’s word. This doesn’t mean we won’t make mistakes….it’s the way we handle those mistakes that will draw attention to Jesus. We need to be real, not real religious, and live intentional lives, focusing on communicating the love and grace of Jesus through our actions and words, realizing God has placed us in our jobs, neighborhoods, and communities for His purposes.

4. Be ready for the harvest. Each of us should be able to lead someone to Christ. Under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, if we believe God is telling us they are ready, we should be prepared to share the plan of salvation with someone. It’s not our pastors’ job, youth minister, or any other person in the vocation of ministry to lead our friends, family, neighbors, and co-workers to Christ. It’s our job. Again, don’t force it, but don’t hold back. If the opportunity is there, share…and see what God does with it.

At this point, we need to realize, our responsibilities continue. God didn’t call us to get people to pray a prayer, walk an isle, get dunked, and plug them into Sunday School (Although, that’s not a bad thing!). He called US to make disciples. If God gives you the privilege of leading someone to Christ, He expects you to play a primary role in their discipleship. Meet with them regularly, go through the bible with them, and teach them to be a reproducing disciple of Jesus. Don’t know the answer to every question? Good. God likes it when you’re dependent on Him. Also, this IS your pastor or minister’s job. He will help you with those questions and disciple you as you disciple someone else….kind of cool how that works.

I know you may be saying, “but I don’t have the gift of evangelism”…..you don’t have to. Jesus said people will know we are His disciples by doing two things: Obeying His commands and loving God and others above ourselves. If we devote ourselves to loving Jesus in front of those who don’t know Him, God will use that to the glory of His name and draw all men to His Son.

The shelving needed to stock hygiene and household items has been procured and will be installed as soon as I arrange my schedule to do it! (Hopefully, by Friday afternoon.) Now we need to collect these items so we can begin meeting needs.  Below is a list of the items we need. If you, your church, or business would like to help us collect these, please contact me. Businesses, we have an easy and cost effective way for you to help, so let me know if you’re interested.

Hygiene items : (high priority)

toothpaste

toothbrushes

bar soap

deodorant

hairbrushes/combs

shampoo

conditioner

Lotion

Household items: (high priority)

laundry detergent

dish soap

toilet paper

spray cleaners

Lower priority items: (we’ll take them if we can get them)

Kleenex

Paper Towels

Band Aids

Chap Stick

As always, we will appreciate any help you can give.

Grace,

Jeff