Great news! Jonelle and Fred Liddell, the first household to respond to EFM’s Five-Year Goal are now halfway to their support raising goal. We celebrate God’s faithfulness and the generosity of his people. Join us all in gratitude for this significant development!

This is a major milestone because they can now join EFM’s missionary community full-time! They will pour all their energy into training for language and culture learning, partnership development, and preparing for the field. Once they finish this training and reach 100% of both their monthly financial need and prayer partner goals, they can deploy to the Balkans.

As you celebrate this benchmark, if you sense the Lord prompting you to support the Liddells through prayer and/or financial support, follow this link [their Classy page]. It would propel towards stepping into this amazing opportunity to share Christ’s love in a place of great need. It will be a great encouragement to them too!

Finally, I am honored to be a part of this expression of God’s relentless love to the world. I am grateful for people like you who faithfully help make it so.

The post Exciting News: The Liddells Reach 50% first appeared on FRIENDSMISSION.COM.

“I thought you had left!” “So, when are you leaving?” We hear variations of this multiple times a week and usually reply with a smile and something about how it’s been going slowly, but we’re getting closer and will leave as soon as we can. That we have to be fully funded before we can leave, that we see how God had been using the “slowness” of the process. All those things are true. There are pieces we don’t usually say, though. “We’re struggling with impatience.” “Yes, it gets discouraging sometimes.” “Even as we feel deeper and deeper confirmation that this is God’s will, we struggle with insecurity and frustration in this indefinite transition time.” I have been thinking this week of a song I grew up singing: “He did not bring us out this far to take us back again, He brought us out to take us into the Promised Land.” He will finish the work he began. Please pray for our hearts in this process. For patience, for hearts in tune to the Spirit’s leading, for souls restored as we follow the Shepherd.

Briefly, we had a lot of fun visiting two churches in Oregon at the beginning of February, one Friends and one Lutheran. Fred was able to attend and speak at Man Camp in Idaho this last weekend for the Friends churches over there. We thank God for the hospitality of these bodies of believers, for the encouragement of their friendship, and for the joy of connecting with old friends and family on these trips.

The Kids

Both Alex and Jael have recently started talking about things they love. Usually, they are positive statements, as this from Jael when I was putting on her footie pajamas last night: “Feet? I WUB it!” Occasionally in the negative, as this from Alex when I grabbed him to wrestle and he wanted to be still “Mommy, I don’t yuv dat dame.”  They continue to be very thankful children, and Alex has started thanking us for both of them: “Thanks for helping my sister!”  Watching them play chase, alternated with fits of giggles, is a true delight! They fill our house with growls and roars, as they are often various kinds of dinosaurs.

Prayer requests:

• For more monthly financial partners so that we can reach the nearer goal of going full-time with EFM and the slightly farther goal of getting to Croatia and starting language school.
• That God would already be drawing a people to himself in the Balkans and would strengthen the believers and workers in this region.
• For faithfulness in the little things and the big things, the study and the friendships, the prayer and the drawing near.

Fred and Jonelle Liddell

Alex and Jael

We currently have 254 prayer partners and have a goal of raising it to 500. If you know anyone who would like to pray for our ministry, please forward this form to them.We are currently raising funds for our monthly needs. We are so grateful for those of you who have already begun supporting us financially and in prayer, but we have a ways to go. We are currently at 35% and need to be at 50% funded before we can transition to full time ministry. Please partner with us, we would love to share in this ministry with you. There are four ways to financially partner with us: Online. Visit our personal support webpage aquí. You’ll be given the opportunity to indicate whether you are making a recurring or one-time gift. Credit Card. This may be given online (as stated above) or by calling the EFM office (303-421-8100) to give your information to a live person. Automatic Bank Transfer. Download the form aquí and email it to Debby McElroy (EFM Bookkeeper) at debby@friendsmission.com. Please note that ACH payments are processed on the 10th or 25th of the month. Check. Mail a check to EFM, P.O. Box 771139, Wichita, KS 67277. Make sure to mark your check “Liddell Family Support” and note if you will be giving on a recurring basis (monthly, quarterly, etc.). Pay to the order of “EFM.”

The post Liddell Family: March 2025 Newsletter first appeared on FRIENDSMISSION.COM.

“He makes me lie down in green pastures; he leads me beside quiet waters.”

This time ended with a week and a half in San Diego, visiting Fred’s family and childhood friends and sharing at the church he grew up in. We expected joy together, but God gave far beyond our hopes. Family time was sweet, fun, restful, and active. We played at the beach, visited the zoo, and went to a dinosaur museum/play place that may be Alex’s favorite place ever. We spent time with friends who we hadn’t seen in months to years and had such a good time catching up. We saw Fred’s old home church in such a healthy place, with a lot of new faces and a lot of dear friends.

That visit started our next season of travel. We have two visits to churches in Oregon as a family coming up, and Fred will end the month with a weekend at Man Camp in Idaho, with men from the Friends churches there. We are very thankful for our new partners, in prayer and in finance, and appreciate your continued prayers for us to reach full partner support.

Kids Moments

Alex has a dual obsession with letters and dinosaurs. At the dinosaur place, he was completely delighted to walk around the corner and see a T rex model. Arms in the air, “A TYRANNOSAURUS REX!!! RAAAAHHHRRR!!! DINO DANA!!!” (Dino Dana is a kids’ show). He gets excited whenever he sees letters on our clothes, signs, or in books, and often sings the alphabet song. Jael was delighted to hold her baby cousin and loves wearing her stuffed animals in a baby carrier or “wrap” (a scarf) the way I wear her. We rode a miniature train in San Diego, and Jael was snuggled next to me, just watching the things going by, until we came around a corner and saw the bear statue. The whole train could hear her yell, “BEAR!” But they couldn’t see her beaming face when she saw it! Both kids love praying: Alex tells Jesus all about his day with its highs and lows. Jael isn’t always intelligible, but she is always excited to pray.

Prayer Requests:

– For our preparation, that we will be learning what we need to, sharing what God wants, and will be faithful in this waiting stage.
– For the kids, that their hearts will draw near to God and will find peace in the changes as we prepare and as we move.
– For the Balkan people, that the Spirit will draw them to him and that they will find the true rest that comes with letting go of control and hatred and turning to the one who is love.

The post Liddell Family: January 2025 Newsletter first appeared on FRIENDSMISSION.COM.

“I made your name known to them and will continue to make it known, so that the love you have loved me with may be in them and I may be in them.”

Since our last newsletter, we visited three more churches in northwestern Oregon, attended my grandpa’s memorial service, and had a few days with some extended family around Thanksgiving. In each church we visit, we learn just a little bit about the ways that congregation is being God’s hands and feet to each other and in their community. You are such an encouragement to us! Feeding the hungry, serving your neighbors, making disciples in prisons, giving care packages to the homeless, and providing a safe place for children after school, God is working through you. May you continue to be faithful and to see the goodness of God!

When we’re home, we’ve been working on setting up prayer and planning teams for our new field, meeting some new contacts who can help us understand this region and its people better, and slowly putting our affairs in order. All of us needed this slower time, where we could have more of a routine. Fred is seeing some encouraging things at work, starting with the hiring of a new IT director who will come on full-time in January. The kids are doing “school,” playing, coloring, singing, reading.

We hope that next Christmas we’ll be in the Balkans! In the meantime, we need more monthly financial partners, more prayer partners, and wisdom as we prepare to go. Please pray, and if you feel drawn to join with us, please do so!

Prayer Requests:

– For Fred as he transitions out of his IT manager role and out of his job altogether.

– For the kids that they will love God early, will feel grounded as we are moving around and moving away, and that we will care for them well.

– For the people in The Balkans, that they will see the light of Christ, know the Prince of Peace, and make the Father’s name known in their communities and beyond.

Thank you for your support and prayers!

Fred and Jonelle Liddell

Alex and Jael

The post Liddell Family: December 2024 Newsletter first appeared on FRIENDSMISSION.COM.

Over the last several years, a dedicated group has been exploring and studying southern Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Montenegro. We have discovered a number of deep needs – war trauma, racial and cultural conflict, splintered communities and a tiny gospel representation. Christ-followers in those countries – the very few that there are – have been praying for people to come and help them. It’s a bit of a modern-day Macedonian Call. (Acts 16:9)

On the recommendation of Friends Churches in the Pacific Northwest (NWYM), and after careful consideration and prayer, the Board at EFM enthusiastically approved adopting this new field. This is a good and exciting step in our goal to open new fields, bringing our total to seven.

We are excited that we already have workers working to go to the Balkans. Fred and Jonelle Liddell are in the process of raising money to go as soon as possible. This is an amazing blessing. If you would like to speed them on their way, you can!

You can partner with them in two meaningful ways: through prayer and financial support, both of which are deeply valued and appreciated. To join their prayer team, haga clic aquí. To support them financially with a recurring monthly gift, haga clic aquí.

Most of all, will you pray. God has a beautiful future for the Balkans. We can’t wait to join God in his work there!

The post Exciting News: Another New Mission Field Approved! first appeared on FRIENDSMISSION.COM.

Then we all traveled to Newberg, Oregon for the Global Outreach Conference that I’ve been helping plan (as part of the Northwest Yearly Meeting Board of Global Outreach), the annual Missions Banquet, and Yearly Meeting (our denomination’s annual sessions). I am on the above-mentioned board and serve as our church’s representative at the business portion, so it was a busy few days! During the sessions, the representatives gave their endorsement of the Eastern Europe field for the Luke 10 Initiative and recommended changing its name to “The Balkans” to more accurately reflect the area we are looking at. In addition, we have several new prayer partners, and several churches asked us to schedule a visit with them. We are working our way through that list, getting those visits scheduled. If you would like us to share at your church, please email me at jonellel@friendsmission.com to set up a time!

Helping Grandpa with stroller during Yearly Meeting

Jael “helping” Grandma set up before church

A lot of my extended family lives in the Newberg area, so we enjoyed spending some all-too-brief time with uncles, aunts, cousins, and second cousins on both sides of my family. We also got some precious time with my grandpa, the kids’ last great-grandparent. This family time, the conversations with old and new friends at Yearly Meeting, and the increasing interest in the field of the Balkans were such encouragement and joy!

It has been a busy summer already and that will continue, but it will be shifting focus somewhat. We are fully in the partner-raising stage, looking for individuals and churches who would like to join us as prayer partners or as monthly financial partners. We hope to be on the road most weekends, driving to different churches and meeting their congregations. We would love to meet with any of you who are interested in learning more about how God is leading us.  Some of you have already partnered with us and we are very thankful for you! We’d love to meet with you, too, and learn more about how we can uphold you in prayer. If you are not our prayer partner and want to be, welcome! And if you are ready to become a financial partner, welcome to you too!

Prayer Requests:

• Fred’s position in the city is shifting, possibly just temporarily, and that brings a lot of unknowns and a lot of new responsibilities. Please pray that he will be faithful in his work while we are fundraising and that God will give him the strength and focus to fill both roles (IT interim manager and EFM candidate) well.
• Please pray for us as we are on the road a lot. Pray for safety, for health, for the kids as their routine is mostly gone right now.
• Please pray for the Balkans, that God will prepare us for this place and that he will raise more workers to go. Pray for the people, that he will soften their hearts towards the gospel and will bring deep peace and healing to troubled minds, souls, and relationships.

Thank you for your support and prayers!

Fred and Jonelle Liddell

Alex and Jael

The post Liddell Family: August 2024 Newsletter first appeared on FRIENDSMISSION.COM.