Konichiwa! We wanted to send an update letting you know that we have safely made it to Japan for our three-month vision tour. After spending a couple of weeks with family over the Christmas holiday we spent two weeks in Southern California with friends. Nearly every day was filled with dinners and visits with many people that we love. It was incredibly humbling and encouraging to us that people were eager to see us. The church there sent us off with prayers and wisdom, tears and laughter. Our flight was uneventful and that’s really the best possible thing that could have happened. Thank you to everyone praying for Alishia as we traveled.

The Lord has used His workers to bless us mightily. One of the missionaries drove over an hour to pick us up from the airport, then drove us to the place we’ll be spending our first month. It’s an apartment that is under one of the churches in Yokohama, it’s not a church that we’re praying about working with, they just had the space and wanted to bless a couple of perspective missionaries. It’s quite a nice place to stay, but the biggest blessing was getting to meet some of the church staff. Our first encounter with Japanese Christians and the difference between them and there non-believing countrymen is amazing. While most Japanese are reserved and even a bit cold, these sisters were warm and open.

We took a couple of days to recover from the jetlag and pray over the city of Yokohama. We also learned valuable culture lessons, getting ourselves on the correct trains and being able to buy groceries for ourselves. In Alishia’s words ‘the Japanese move fast and are extremely deliberate with all they do; we are often in the way trying to figure out what is going on in a world that whirls by.’ We are enjoying the moments of being childlike and know that we have many more of them ahead.

Now that we have caught our breath it’s time for the work to begin. We will be helping at the first of three churches for the next month. I’ll be teaching on Galatians 4:1-7 on February 5^th, so please keep that in prayer. We also have leadership arriving on Sunday January 29^th and we’ll be taking them several places in Japan to visit with missionaries. We’ll send out another letter soon. Love you all.

As we get closer to our vision trip to Japan, I wanted to write to you and share a specific way that you can be praying for our trip. Of course, our primary prayer request is for clear vision and direction from the Lord. But there are other secondary needs that we would appreciate if you would lift up as well, so I’d like to share one with you.

Alishia suffers from celiac disease. Even the smallest exposure to gluten causes her to get very sick. Her symptoms are both physical (skin rashes, headaches, pupils dilated different sizes, weaker immune system, etc.) and mental (loss of words, inability to process movement around her, something that she can only describe as ‘brain fog’, constant tiredness, etc.). So, as you can see, in order to have a successful trip we need to avoid her getting contaminated. Her sensitivity is very high if I eat gluten I can contaminate her, if we wash our dishes with a sponge that has been used on dishes that had gluten on them she will get contaminated, if the kitchen where the food is prepared is not a controlled environment, forget about it. The challenge is that gluten is often hidden in things that you wouldn’t expect, we don’t read hiragana well enough to know exactly what’s in most products, and Japan allows products that may contain some gluten to be labeled ‘gluten-free’.

Every missionary faces challenges as they work toward going to the field, and this challenge is not insurmountable. We are extremely blessed that the first missionary family we are staying with has faced this same challenge. The wife is also an American with celiac, and through some years of trial and error she has found what products she can eat and which she has to avoid. She’ll be able to take Alishia food shopping and help her get familiar with labels and products. We’ll also be taking food with us, and cooking most meals ourselves, as we can’t trust eating in restaurants. If you would like to help us with purchasing these extra items for our trip, we have created a wish list that is linked here. https://giftbuster.app/user/242958/wishlist/373328

Please ship any items from the list that you wish to purchase to this address and make sure it will arrive before January 20th, 2023.

Jeff and Alishia Root

17451 Bastanchury Rd Ste 203

Yorba Linda, CA 92886

Thank you for your prayers, and please pray for Alishia to be healed, that the Lord would protect her from accidental contamination, and that we would be able to focus on Him and what He’s saying, and not on her health.

Love You,

Jeff and Alishia Root

Praise the Lord! After two and a half years of closed borders, as of October 7, Japan is finally open to visa-free travel once again. Thank you to all of you who have been praying for us and Japan it has helped sustain us in the waiting. Was the prolonged wait a plan of the devil to keep new missionaries from going out? Maybe. Was it used by God to better prepare both the missionaries and Japan for this time when we are able to go? Absolutely!

We have been blessed the last couple of months to have an amazing summer in California with Daphne and our fellow interns, as well as getting to serve alongside our church family here in Montana since August. Alishia and I are leading up the high school ministry here at Calvary Chapel Whitefish until we leave, and it’s been a real blessing to us to use the things the Lord has grown us in over the last three years.

To update you on our upcoming schedule, so that we can schedule a time to get together with you when we’re in your area. We will continue to be in Whitefish until the end of December when we will go to visit our family in Nebraska. After two weeks there we will fly to California to visit our friends at Calvary Chapel Saving Grace. After two weeks in Orange County, we fly to Japan on January 23 and will be there until April 22. As I may have mentioned before, this initial trip will be a bit of a scouting mission. We will be visiting at least four ministries and will be praying about where the Lord will have us start. We also will have a couple weeks with a team from the states joining us, as well as a time when leadership comes over to see what we’re seeing and to pray with us.

Please keep us in your prayers as we are making accommodations and coordinating this three-month trip. There is a lot of moving parts, and it can get complicated. We would also love if you considered partnering with us financially on a monthly basis, now that Japan has reopened the only thing preventing us from moving long-term is monthly support. There is a link at the bottom of this email if you’re led to give. Thank you all for so many small things that you do to support us every day.

Happy Easter everyone!! As we celebrate our living Redeemer I wanted to give you an update on what’s going on with us.

First, thank you all for your prayers for us and Japan. The entry restrictions have started to lift since our last update, students and business people have started receiving visas again and while we don’t currently qualify for either of those visas, it means that visitor visas will follow. Please continue to pray for Japan and for it to open up completely by this fall. We have been waiting in the starting blocks for awhile now and we are excited to go, may the Lord’s timing happen soon.

In the meantime, God has provided us with some amazing opportunities while we are here stateside. In March, we were able to travel to Santa Rosa, Ca, to visit some missionary friends, and then continued on to Truckee, Ca where we filled in for our friends Isaac and Hope while they were out of town. I was given the opportunity to teach the young adults group and we were able to share at the church on Sunday morning as well. The Lord provided some awesome encounters as we were able to meet a missionary that had recently returned from Japan as well as a missionary whose family had served in the Middle East for many years. The people He puts in our paths encourage us greatly and give us an opportunity to ask questions from people who have been where we feel called to go.

The internship that we are a part of, also sent a team to an inner-city church to give the incredibly faithful workers there a break to be refreshed and poured into. The small crew of servants at Hope Central Watts Calvary Chapel do multiple jobs each weekend to be able to provide church and Sunday school for a mostly forgotten community. We sent a team of twelve to fill the roles usually filled by just three or four people. It was a joy to serve along side them and here their passion for the people of Watts (for those of you that aren’t familiar with Watts, it’s a fairly notorious part of south-central Los Angeles that has high gang activity). I was given the opportunity to give the message that morning and you can check that out at this link: https://www.facebook.com/HopeCentralWatts/videos/344774491037935/?app=fbl

Filming and editing at Missions Equip has hit full swing and we are getting new teachings recorded each week. Alishia was able to serve at the Women’s Day event put on by Voice of the Refugees where they minister to dozens of displaced women (mostly Muslim women) and show them the love of Christ. Often, these women are told that Christians hate them and that they will never be accepted in America. Events like this one breaks down walls that can get in the way of the gospel and she was very blessed to be a part of it and make connections with some of the woman that she has been following on since.

We love you all and are always thankful to hear from you.

Jeff and Alishia

As the month of February starts, we wanted to make you aware of our situation and ask for you to pray with us. Japan is still closed due to COVID, and they are not allowing non-citizens to enter the country. We called the Japanese consulate to see if there were any options at this time, and they told us that unless Alishia or I were Japanese we had no options at this time. The Japanese government is going to reassess these policies at the end of February. Would you join us in prayer each day this month that Japan would open up to international travel in March?

We are not the only people being impacted and slowed down by COVID, and we understand that the Lord may well be the One behind the slow down. Pray that we would receive direction from the Lord and discernment on what is a closed door and what is an obstacle to push through. We are not questioning our call, we still feel that we are called to Japan, but we want to be open to whatever the Lord would have us do. If our time before we can get to Japan is going to stretch out, we want to know if there is a step or two, we can make to further prepare ourselves and serve the Lord in the meantime. We trust that our next step will be made clear if we all join together in prayer, so thank you for taking the time to lift us before the Lord.

As far as what we are doing while here in California, in January we joined with some friends to do outreach in Little Tokyo (a neighborhood in LA). A Japanese believer from Northern California joined us to witness and we handed out Japanese tracts to those that gathered. Please pray for the seeds that were planted among the Japanese here in the US.

Missions Equip, the ministry I work with, is currently starting up two translation projects. They are translating the Bible into Toposa language that is spoken in South Sudan. Half a million people will be getting a bible in their language for the first time! While that’s going on in Africa, I am helping to lead a project translating our missions bible college classes into Spanish. We are working with a team from Iquique, Chile to take our videos and translate them, and dub them with the Spanish audio. We are so blessed by the number of resources we have in our language and the access we have to the Word of God, let’s not take it for granted.

Alishia is continuing to lead a bible study as well as working with the youth group at the church. I’ve been blessed to help lead a men’s group and a life group. We also have the opportunity to fill in at church in March leading their young adults group while their leaders are out of town, so please pray as I prepare for that. Thank you for your partnership. We love you.

16 Rejoice always, 17 pray without ceasing, 18 give thanks in all circumstances, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.

  1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 ESV

Happy Autumn everyone! We are settled in here, back in southern California. We had a good trip from Montana to Seattle to Yorba Linda, but are glad to not have to drive for a while. Here is what has happened since our last update. We had the opportunity to meet Pastor Rob Douglass in Seattle in early September. We interviewed a pastor and former missionary to Belize for Missions Equip. It was a great experience and we learned a lot as a ministry on how our on-location video shoots will look in the future.

We then drove down the west coast making a stop in Portland to see family and arrived in Orange County mid-September. We were praying about a place to stay and a job for Alishia before we arrived and the Lord answered our prayers perfectly. We were blessed to stay with friends until a place became available to us, and it checks all the boxes that we were looking for. Every time that we have returned to California the Lord has provided for us with housing and employment, it has built our faith and allowed us to focus more on our training and less on the cares of the world.

On September 18 we celebrated twenty-five years of ministry for Rob and Heidi Douglass as well as hosting an open house for the new Ends of the Earth office/Missions Equip studio. It was a night of worship as we thanked the Lord for all that we had seem Him do, over the last quarter century for those who have been here from the beginning and the last few years for us. Less than a year ago we would be looking at a racquetball court used for storage. Today it is a fully functioning office, recording studio and fellowship café, and it was done for less than a tenth of the expected budget. What a work of God this project has been!

We have also started our third year of training as interns at Saving Grace World Missions. We have cross cultural studies and specific outreach to the people groups we’re called to this year as well as the homiletics and church planting classes and book study groups we had last year. We’re also getting opportunities to lead midweek small groups for the church as well as three-to-four-person growth groups, which help us develop our discipleship skills. I’ll be sharing more about what we’re doing in the internship in the coming months.

Thank you all for your prayers and support. We love you and would love to connect with you if you’d like. Please reach out with any prayer requests or just to chat.

Prayer Requests:

• For wisdom in the timing of our vision trip to Japan, and that the current Japanese regulations (they don’t currently require vaccinations) would remain in place.
• For Alishia to have the Lord’s supernatural strength and energy as she balances work, the internship and a bible study that she teaches on Saturday morning.
• For continued provision for the Root family.

And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry

Ephesians 4:11-12a

Another amazing summer on the farm has come to an end. We had a great time with Daphne and were blessed to spend time with family. Alishia and I will be leaving for Montana next week. Here is a letter to let you know what we’re up to now.

This past weekend we had the opportunity to speak at a church in central Kansas. The pastor there, pastored our church when I was young, he even baptized me when I was nine years old. It was a huge blessing to be able to reconnect with him and his family as well as share with the church what we’ve learned about the purpose of the church. If you would like to watch the service you can do that at the following link: https://youtu.be/uqAAJk_Zmms

We will be in Montana for just four days before heading to Seattle on September 2. While in Seattle we will have the opportunity to meet up with Rob Douglass of Missions Equip and interview a couple of missionaries for that ministry. Rob will also be speaking at a couple of churches that weekend and we will help with support during those speaking engagements. After we finish up in Seattle, we will make our way back down to Orange County and begin serving at Missions Equip. We’ll be interviewing missionaries and pastors and creating content for the Mission Equip website, which will be a large database of missionary training and support resources. The exposure and access we will have to these missionaries and pastors will help put the finishing touches on our preparation for Japan. Just as Paul says in Ephesians 4:11-12, God has given us some to be pastors and teachers to equip us for the work of the ministry. We are thankful for all of the teachers that He has given to us, and we feel that the continued equipping will help us be more successful once we get to the field.

We still feel that Japan is the ultimate calling that God has for us and we are excited to move toward that again. Please be praying for our preparation in this time until we go. Please also pray for our financial provision as we transition to doing ministry full time. As we get closer to our departure for Japan, we are in need of monthly partners. Twenty dollars a month would be enough to help us reach our support needs, so please pray about partnering with us in the Gospel.

We would love to connect with you when we are in Montana or once we get back to California, please let us know if you’d like to get together when we’re in your area.

Just want to send out a letter to let you know that we made it to Nebraska. The journey from California to Montana to Nebraska was a long one, but we made it. We’re glad to be spending several weeks with Daphne on the farm and it feels good to get away for a bit and reflect on what the Lord has done and is doing in our lives.

We enjoyed a wonderful week in Montana with our church family and friends. It started with a stop in Boise on the way up to Whitefish to visit some friends. Then we picked up Daphne in Lewiston, Idaho on Monday morning and made it just in time for bible study on Monday night in Whitefish. We were able to reconnect with friends on both Monday and Tuesday nights and I was honored to have the opportunity to share at our church on Wednesday. It was a blessing to see everyone again and spend time with family even if it was only for a little while. If we missed you this trip, we will be back in Montana in late August/early September and would love to see you then.

While we were there, we were able to talk to our church leadership about an opportunity that God has opened up for us in California. I have been offered a role as studio producer at Missions Equip, the ministry that we have been volunteering at for the last several months. I would be in charge of capturing and directing the videos that we will be making as well as editing and voice over work on the post production end. In case I haven’t wrote about it before, the videos will be part of a missionary training and support resource website that will be available to missionaries worldwide from any church or sending agency. I will be sharing more about this in future updates. I’m very excited about this opportunity and ask that you would keep this in prayer as we follow what the Lord has for us. Please also consider partnering with us financially as we step into full time ministry and take this leap of faith.

We of course are still excited for Japan to open up so that we can take our vision tour. We still feel that Japan is the calling long term, but we are thankful for the opportunity to do ministry while we are being prepared for that season. Keep the timing of our trip and ultimate transition date in prayer as well.

Praise Report:

• We made it safely to Nebraska.
• We get to spend the summer with Daphne.
• We have an amazing opportunity at Mission’s Equip in September.

Prayer Requests:

• For Japan to open up to tourist travel so we can plan our vision trip.
• For safety as we travel again at the end of summer.
• For the Lord’s provision for our family.

It’s been a busy spring here in Southern California. Here is a rundown of some of the things we’ve been up to since our last update.

The studio at Missions Equip is nearly complete and plans are being made for the start of video recording and website construction. It’s been such a blessing to be a part of this project and we can’t wait to see what the Lord does through this ministry.

We are very thankful for our internship at Saving Grace World Missions. The ministry opportunities, the discipleship, the access to current missionaries, our fellow interns, the classes and training, and so much more have grown us and prepared us more than we ever expected when we first came down here. I truly believe that our time in this program will increase our chance of success and longevity on the mission field.

We attended a prayer walk in the Torrance/Gardena area of Los Angeles. These cities have the two largest Japanese American populations in the contiguous United States. We visited a few different locations and prayed for the churches ministering in that community, against the false worship that runs deep there, and for the population there, that they might be saved. Then Alishia and I led our own prayer walk there at the end of May with our fellow interns from SGWM. The first time we were blessed to pray with others who also have a heart for the Japanese and Japan, and the second time we were blessed that our friends that don’t feel called to Japan would come pray with us for these people.

The Calvary Chapel Japan Conference was held online on April 30^th  (May 1^st there), so we were able to participate in that. There are some amazing workers serving in Japan and it was great to connect with them. The topic of the conference was The Intimate Relationship with Jesus in Family, Work and Church, and you can watch the sessions here:  https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTSW3w5dLV7ALrJc8L6xY_Q

Here is an update on our summer plans. We will be travelling to Montana in early July, and will be in Whitefish July 5-July 11. Then we will head to Nebraska on the 11^th and will be there until late August. We will then be back in Montana by the end of August. We would love to see you while we are there, so please reach out to us so we can make a plan to meet up.  

We are hoping to be full time ministry this fall as we ramp up before we head to Japan. Please pray about partnering with us on a monthly basis. You can set up a recurring giving plan with the link at the bottom of this email or at this weblink: https://www.egsnetwork.com/gift2/?giftid=3B3D6B2778D3489

Prayer Requests:

• Pray for Alishia’s grandmother, her health and living situation is not ideal. Pray for her mental and physical health and that she would be shown mercy by the employees at her housing facility.
• Pray for Japan, that they would open the country to foreigners and that we would be able to take our vision tour this fall/winter.
• We have an opportunity to speak at a church in Kansas in August. Pray for me as I prepare a message and that we would make many connections.
• Pray for direction as we look to serve the Lord here until His timing for us to go to Japan.

Hello everyone,

I have an exciting update to share with you all. I (Jeff) have been given an amazing opportunity to go on a mission trip to Africa in April. I’m going with a team from Ends of the Earth Ministries to Uganda and South Sudan. I can’t express how excited I am to be able to participate in this trip. The main purpose of this trip in April is to host three training seminars.

The seminars will be as follows:

1^st) Faith Comes by Hearing Audio Bible listening groups and how to lead a Bible study with a proclaimer.

2^nd) Biblical Trauma Counseling helping children and adults recover from the tragedies of war, poverty and witchcraft.

3^rd) God Story / Oral Inductive Bible study.  In time this Bible study method will give birth to a Bible college that will properly disciple new believers and tribal leaders to fulfill the great commission amongst the unreached.

Each evening we will be interviewing and photographing a few new children so they can be added to the Promise Child program. These children are from the unreached tribe surrounding our medical clinic and have recently joined the children’s home led by Ends of the Earth missionaries.

Please be praying for the team as we travel and are on the ground in Africa. You can also partner with me financially by using the following link:

https://www.egsnetwork.com/gift2/?giftid=3B3D6B2778D3489

It’s been a busy month for us here in California. Alishia leads a bible study via Zoom on Saturday mornings. We’ve been able to help some people in the church this month with moving and tree removal. Alishia is in a book study of Hind’s Feet on High Places and I am doing morning devotions for the church Facebook page. We are preparing for Easter services, and Daphne will be visiting during her spring break next week, so we’re very excited for that.

We’ll be spending July and August in Nebraska and Lord willing will head to Japan for our vision trip once they open back up to tourists.

Prayer Requests:

• Pray for Alishia as she stays in California while I’m in Africa.
• Pray for the team as we minister in east Africa. For safety and health.
• Pray for Japan, that it will open up and that we’ll be able to go.

Love Jeff and Alishia

All photos courtesy of Ends of the Earth Ministries.