Volume 3, Issue 2

Please try our new “iTunes U” site to download FYI audio and video! You’ll find directions on the site for downloading files, and if you don’t have iTunes, there’s a link to download iTunes software for FREE.

When you go to the Fuller “iTunes U” site, note the FYI logo under “resources” on the welcome page that opens in your iTunes store browser. To access Chap’s talk, click the “get song” or “get movie” buttons beside the title: “Do not hinder them: The imperative we can no longer ignore.” We hope this new format will make our files more accessible. For those who prefer to directly download the files without using iTunes, we will still post them at www.fulleryouthinstitute.org/audio. 

As we move into spring break and summer short-term mission trip planning mode, most of us assume that we “get” short-term missions and its impact on our students.  After all, we’ve led plenty of trips on which students experience transformation, right?  Perhaps; or perhaps not.  FYI recently co-hosted a Think Tank of short-term mission exemplars—youth workers and organizational leaders—to assess the current landscape of short-term missions effectiveness and to survey its future.  This article looks at a few of the findings from that gathering.

When you look at the students around you, what do you tend to see—their potential or their hindrances?  Their advances or their setbacks?  This second report from our Urban Youth Workers in America (UYWA) study takes a closer look at the “full-ness” and “empty-ness” of both urban kids and non-urban kids.

“Conversion” and “evangelism” are words we often throw around in ministry without really stopping to consider what we mean and what we are attempting when we use them. Looking at two different approaches to conversion research might help us think more carefully about how we—and the students we serve—see the roles of both story and process in evangelism.

Few of us actually think suburban kids live risk-free lives, but most of what we hear about “at-risk” relates to kids who live in urban areas, in deep poverty, or in obviously harsh family environments. This article looks deeper into the oppressive forces impacting the lives of suburban kids—no less real or oppressive, but perhaps less obvious.