Jim Le Shana, Ph.D. | Superintendent, Northwest Yearly Meeting of Friends | President and Chair, Evangelical Friends Church Planting | Global Director, International Friends Church Multiplication Conferences
In preparation for the upcoming Barclay College International Friends Church Multiplication Conference, to be held October 21-23, 2026, themed Multiplying Leaders to Multiply Disciples we want to share a brief overview of the background for recent church multiplication within the Friends tradition. The following three paragraphs are excerpted from the document Pathways for Tomorrow Initiative 2025 – Lilly Endowment: “Large-Scale Collaboration” Initial Considerations, Church Multiplication Collaboration (CMC), dated February 3, 2025.
Background and History for Friends – Evangelism, sharing Christ with those who do not yet know Him, and starting new gatherings of believers have been important among Friends whenever we have been at our best. Although there are many examples of church planting over the centuries, the last major multiplication movement among Friends in the United States occurred in the late 19th century. . . .
In recent years, the attention and priority of united efforts for church multiplication among Friends in the United States has been on the rise. In 2013, Friends leaders at Barclay College in Kansas offered the first National Friends Church Multiplication Conference. They hoped that 30-40 leaders might participate, but more than 100 Friends gathered from nine Yearly Meetings. Three more national conferences followed in 2014, 2016, and 2018, with each one larger than the previous. In 2020, this emphasis shifted to an International Friends Church Multiplication Conference, held online with over 500 registrations from 26 states and 26 countries, repeated again in 2022, with even more participants from more countries (30). Last November 2024, this conference exploded with 850 leaders and students in a 100% online conference, two in-person international locations (Bangladesh and Rwanda), and three in-person locations in the US (George Fox University/Portland Seminary, Barclay College, Malone University). Notably, for the first time in history, the presidents of all three universities and the executive dean of the seminary all spoke for the same conference on the same general theme.
To support the efforts of leadership development and church multiplication among Friends, the coordinating council of the six evangelical Yearly Meetings of Friends in the US (the Evangelical Friends Church North America – EFCNA), approved in 2024 the formation of Evangelical Friends Church Planting (EFCP). Among other things, this is the group that will be responsible for assisting regions in their efforts to identify, recruit, train, and send out prepared men and women to serve as pastors and church planters. Another group, Evangelical Friends Mission (EFM), is already identifying and training new missionaries while forming seven new mission fields around the globe. These groups would serve as strategic partners to aid in the growth and development of the Church Multiplication Collaboration.
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