ODESSA, Texas — The Odessa Salvation Army’s new Corps Officer, Justin Vincent, always intended to hit the ground running when he arrived to his new post.
“So my priority coming here is to help to address the homelessness problem, but not just the homelessness problem but also the resourceless people as well,” said Vincent.
The first thing on the agenda is to get the shelter up and running fully again.
Currently they do things like serve food and provide showers out of it but Vincent wants to be able to provide more for the community.
“When we got here, we saw the need for the shelter. The shelter, the Red Shield Lodge, had been open three years ago and needed to close because of renovations to revitalize a lot of the facility over there and that is our goal, is to get it open again,” Vincent said.
Vincent says that serving the community however they can be not only part of his core beliefs but also the Salvation Army’s as a whole.
“So the Salvation Army, first and foremost, is a church. If people don’t know that, we’re a church, I’m an ordained minister. First and foremost, we’re a church that likes to look at ourselves as a church that rolls up their sleeves and gets involved in the ministry. Our mission is to meet human needs in Christ’s name,” Vincent said.