Founded in 2014, My Father’s Arrows, located in Jay in Santa Rosa County, is a faith-based, community driven public charity born out of a longing to serve children in the local foster care system in a way that provides common permanency and brighter futures. The mission of My Father’s Arrows (MFA) is to provide needing children with safe, permanent, loving Christian homes where they will develop into lifelong servants for the Lord Jesus Christ and live as responsible, educated, law abiding citizens with great promise and hope for the future. As a part of the State of Florida Department of Children and Families foster care network, MFA accepts children of all faiths into their programs, without requiring participation in religious activities. The Pensacola area is in the midst of a foster care crisis in which there simply are not enough licensed foster homes to care for the abused, abandoned and neglected children in the community. The founders of MFA recognized that the best way to solve this problem was to partner with the local child welfare agencies and create a supportive network. This network includes community education, recruitment, mentors, caregiver support, and a children's home to provide the needed licensed foster care beds. With those goals in mind, the My Father’s Arrows Thrift Store opened in 2016. The Thrift Store’s primary focus is to provide foster parents and child welfare professionals with free clothing, shoes and equipment for children in foster care and give household goods to aged-out foster teens who are living independently. In the summer of 2017, MFA opened Mama’s House, a children’s home, staffed by licensed foster families who care for children in a family setting in separate wings of the home.