Mighty Shepherd Ministries was launched officially in 1987 as the Lord inspired Jim and Leslie Thompson to register this ministry as a 501 (C) 3 religious organization. The IRS approved the ministry as a non-profit charitable organization and has continued to accept its operation for keeping the charitable organization requirements of the laws of the USA.

The name Mighty Shepherd Ministries was chosen because of its similarity to the first Christian album Jim Thompson recorded in 1984 called “Come to the Shepherd”, At the same time, Jim produced one of the first Christian music videos using a song from the “Come to the Shepherd” album entitled “It's Gonna Happen.” After a time of seeking God with serious prayer the Lord began to have Jim and Leslie focus more on mission outreaches to other countries than the music business, and by the time Mighty Shepherd Ministries was started, the entire commitment to ministry was mainly centered around missions.

God began to open doors for missions for Mighty Shepherd Ministries after He had instructed Jim to pray for 40 countries on a regular basis. Mission ministry opportunities eventually opened up for MSM in the United Kingdom, Japan, South Korea, Italy, Greece, Vatican City, Bulgaria, Germany, Israel, Holland, Albania, Romania, China, Australia, Kenya, Ghana, Burkina Faso, India, and in the last 18 months, Colombia, Ecuador, Bolivia, and Peru. The ministry took the form of either leading Bible studies, holding evangelistic meetings, praying prayers of warfare and declaration, helping to plant churches, planting and overseeing the operation of an orphanage in India as well as supplying equipment for an orphanage in Albania, leading church services, and leading pastor’s conferences in many places. Most of the outreaches to other countries lasted one or two trips to help believers and church leaders be strengthened in the Lord as well as preach the Gospel for the non-believers so they might come into the kingdom of God by faith.

Some of the countries had special assignments for MSM and were visited many times to help continue in their development in the faith, In Albania, multiple MSM visits were aimed at sharing the Gospel in the villages and helping the development of leaders who were taking the responsibility of guiding a new church plant, After a few years, the Lord said our part was finished and the church and its leaders would continue in God’s plan for their ministries as they had become trained for God’s future purposes for them.

India was the longest commitment MSM had experienced as we continued for 25 years ministering in evangelistic meetings, church planting, taking care of children in an orphanage, and training leaders in conferences during that time. We saw a great move of the Holy Spirit as many Hindu people became born again, were healed, were trained to express the gifts of God in them, and leaders were trained in the Word as they participated in numerous conferences over the years. Because of the strength of the anti-Christian parts of the Hindu Party, the government became more and more prejudiced against ministries lifting up Jesus. They started by restricting finances coming in from Christians outside India, then they began to close orphanages that were sponsored by Christian organizations.

They were furious at people holding conferences for development of Indian Christian leaders and finally, in 2019, the government canceled the visa for Jim Thompson and would not allow him to enter the country for at least 10 years. After 25 years of sharing the Gospel (which is allowed in the constitution of the nation of India), the government said we cannot visit the country anymore. They did not like it because hundreds of thousands of people were born again, healed, and came under the influence of the Gospel of Jesus. They want to make sure that they remove the influence of Jesus from their nation. It is sad to think the Christians are persecuted like this, but Jesus told us that since He was persecuted, that we should not be surprised that we are persecuted for His sake.

He gave us an example of what to do about it on the cross when He said, “Father forgive them for they do not know what they are doing.” We encourage prayer for the Hindu government of India.

After the removal of the visa to India, Jim began to pray about what the Lord would have him do and the Lord said “look to the south,” ( I believe He meant South America). I asked a couple of pastors to pray with me and within a couple of weeks, I was on my way to Colombia. This past year and a half, we have taken many mission trips to Colombia, Ecuador, Bolivia and Peru. The message we share is that the Holy Spirit is coming to do something special in these areas. We believe it will be like the outpourings that occurred in Brownsville (Pensacola) in the USA and Toronto in Canada. We have been sponsoring pastor and leader conferences, sharing in churches, and we are beginning to sponsor evangeslistic meetings for the unbelievers to come into the kingdom of God. We would appreciate people praying for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit in South America and MSM fulfilling its part in God’s plan there.