Science News » NIMH Grantee Wins One of Science’s Most Coveted Prizes

NIMH grantee Karl Deisseroth, M.D., Ph.D., of Stanford University, has been awarded one of science’s most generous prizes. A German foundation presented the inventor of technologies that are transforming neuroscience with its 4 million euros Fresenius Prize.

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Science News » Pediatrics-based Brief Therapy Outdoes Referral for Youths with Anxiety and Depression

A streamlined behavioral therapy delivered in a pediatrics practice offered much greater benefit to youth with anxiety and depression than a more standard referral to mental health care with follow-up in a clinical trial comparing the two approaches.

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Pray for China’s Missions Movement

The Back to Jerusalem movement began in the 1920s when the Chinese church received a vision from God to take the Gospel to all the unreached people groups between China and Jerusalem. Chinese Christians understood that the spread of Christianity had generally taken a westward path and had reached as far as China. Their mindset was that a Back To Jerusalem effort from China westward would complete the circle around the entire globe, ending where it all began, in Jerusalem.

Through decades of persecution, where the primary work being conducted was often underground, this movement has continued. The contemporary Back To Jerusalem movement started in 1983 when Simon Zhao was released from prison. Simon had been one of the leaders of this movement in the 1940s and 50s. During his time in prison he prayed daily “God, the vision that you’ve given us has perished, but I pray you’ll raise up a new generation of Chinese believers to fulfill this vision.”

The current movement has a goal to have 100,000 Chinese missionaries sent out across the globe, primarily in the nations between China and Jerusalem. Many of these nations are within the 10/40 Window and are primarily Muslim, Buddhist or Hindu. There are approximately 5,100 unreached people groups and tribes in these nations. The Back to Jerusalem movement helps the Chinese church train and send Chinese missionaries into unreached areas of the globe.

Please join with YWAM’s global prayer day, called The Invitation, during the month of June to pray for the Back to Jerusalem movement. You are particularly invited to pray during our prayer day, June 8.

If you have only a few minutes to pray, pray this short prayer: Ask God to raise up 100,000 Chinese missionaries to go into the nations between China and Jerusalem, and pray that these missionaries would be well trained and supported. For the full prayer information, see below.

Pray for Back to Jerusalem

Prepare to Pray:

• Watch this short video about the Back to Jerusalem movement.
• Ask God to reveal a key prayer request to you that He wants you to pray over and over. Pray this prayer as a breath prayer holding this topic before God throughout the day. Write out a short phrase to repeat in pace with your in and out breath, to pray whenever it comes to mind throughout the day. For example, as you breathe in, you pray: “Merciful and gracious God,” and as you breathe out, you pray: “Have your way in China and westward toward Jerusalem” (or whatever key prayer request the Lord gives to you).

Pray for the Back to Jerusalem movement:

• Pray for continued growth and strength of the Chinese church networks so they can train and send 100,000 missionaries to the 10/40 Window and across the globe.
• Praise God for the growth of the Chinese church. Praise Him also for the Chinese Christians that willingly go, knowing that they may give their life so that the lost can hear the good news.
• Pray that the Back to Jerusalem movement will be protected from people who would want to organize and control it.
• Pray for the Chinese government, who have good historical reasons for being suspicious of Christianity because it was often intertwined with foreign governments and their political and military ambitions. Pray for the Chinese government to recognize that Biblical Christians are trustworthy citizens. Many Christians go out to other nations or to minority tribes within China in the course of their work or as a result of government initiatives.
• Pray for these workers to understand how to be an ambassador for Jesus. Also pray for the many who are wanting to start businesses or engage with other economic activities as part of their missions calling.
• Pray for excellent training to help Chinese missionaries with cross-cultural sensitivities, language learning, etc.
• Pray for financial and prayer supporters to partner with the Back to Jerusalem movement. Pray for the provision of Bibles and of supplies so that Back To Jerusalem can provide for people where disaster strikes and where people have the greatest needs.
• Pray for social change in the 10/40 Window through the impact of the gospel.

Take Action

After you pray, take action to learn about and support the Chinese mission movement.

Consult the Back to Jerusalem website for more stories, information and prayer concerns. Learn about the interesting history of the Back to Jerusalem movement in “A Captivating Vision,” in Christianity Today, April 1, 2004.

Pray about the Back To Jerusalem movement in a deeper and ongoing manner:

• Fast regularly
• Send intercession and spiritual mapping teams to China and 10/40 Window nations and pray on site.

Read books:

• The Heavenly Man, by Brother Yun.
• I Stand With Christ, by Eugene Bach and Zhang Rongliang.
• Back to Jerusalem: Called to Complete the Great Commission, by Paul Hattaway.

Conduct research on:

• The 10/40 Window to learn more about these nations. (Start here.)
• Chinese church history.

Support the Back to Jerusalem movement:

• Become a Back to Jerusalem Gatekeeper.
• Provide Bibles.
• Purchase tea.
• If you sense God calling you to partner with the Back to Jerusalem movement in some way, allow Him to lead you to discern where and when.

Share on the June 8 post on YWAM’s Facebook page, post a picture and add a comment about how you prayed.

Go to Twitter, search for #praywithywam and tweet about your prayer time or post a picture.

Send us an email letting us know how you prayed and what God revealed to you.

Don’t Miss the Invitation

During May The Invitation focused on spending silent time with God.

• YWAM Champagne, France reported that they were very grateful for the proposal for a time of silence.

In April participants prayed about persecution:

• Multiple locations reported praying for the YWAM worker kidnapped last year.
• YWAM Central African Republic reported that receiving The Invitation stimulates them to pray for matters beyond their area.
• A YWAMer from Muizenberg, Cape Town, South Africa was inspired by 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 and asked herself “Am I willing to give it all and give up myself?”
• YWAM Cape Verde prayed and reported that they are grateful to receive The Invitation in Portuguese.
• Several YWAM locations shared that they utilize The Invitation to share information about YWAM with the students and staff at their location.

Future topics for The Invitation:

• July 13, 2017: Two-Thirds-World Workers, Financial Support
• August 10, 2017: Family, Singles, Marriages

Here’s how to participate:

• Sign up for prayer updates. On ywam.org, find the “Stay Connected” box on the home page, put in your email address and click “Sign Up.”
• You can now listen to The Invitation as a podcast. To sign up or listen to past episodes, go to: http://ift.tt/2mXjIgI.
• Download prayer updates in a specific language. Go to http://ift.tt/1UO8eZP. (Currently available in Spanish, Portuguese, French, Indonesian, Korean or request other languages.)
• If you sense God giving you a word or a direction for YWAM’s prayer, please contact us.

 

 

 

 

 

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Science News » NIMH to Host Multimodal Brain Stimulation Speaker Series

Beginning May 31, 2017, the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) will launch a speaker series intended to bring together leaders in the field conducting research using non-invasive brain stimulation and functional imaging including EEG, fMRI, and transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS).

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Generic (Scientific) » Novel Approaches to Understanding the Mechanisms of the Neuropsychiatric Symptoms in Alzheimer’s and Advancing Therapy Development

On May 8-9, 2017, NIMH and the National Institute on Aging brought together clinical, behavioral science, and neuroscience researchers to discuss neuropsychiatric symptoms and treatment approaches for Alzheimer’s disease.

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Rescue in South Sudan

In 2016, due to fighting in South Sudan, YWAM’s workers in the country faced an urgent need to evacuate. Many of those workers are natives of South Sudan and couldn’t afford the cost of airfare. Thanks to contributions from churches and from YWAM’s emergency fund, called the Storehouse Fund, they were all able to leave safely.

YWAMers from South Sudan and Uganda leave for the South Sudan refugee camp

Now, as violence continues to make South Sudan unsafe for their return, the YWAMers from South Sudan are continuing to care for vulnerable people who live near their new home in Arua, Northern Uganda. They have begun to reach out to other refugees from South Sudan in villages nearby, helping these people find shelter, nutritious food, and healthcare.

Also, a team of eight from the YWAM Arua Discipleship Training School recently had the opportunity to fly back to a refugee camp inside South Sudan. Although many of them had recently escaped the violence, they sensed God leading them back into South Sudan to care for others.

For a month, they ran a seminar on knowing God and making God known. The 118 participants included 20 Muslims who were seeking God. Many of these people were the first believers from their tribes. Many come from the Nuba mountain area in Sudan. By the end of the program, some of the Muslim students had chosen to follow Jesus.

As the seminar ended, a Muslim leader talked to the YWAMers. He said in his tribe there are now 55 Christians. There were never any Christians before. But in the camp these believers had no place to worship. They were joining with Christian groups from other tribes that spoke other languages. He asked the YWAMers if they could build the believers from his tribe a church.

Building the church in the refugee camp

So that day the seminar participants went over to this tribe’s area of the camp and, together with the Muslim elders there, in one day they built a church.

That evening, many of those Muslim leaders joined the Christians for a service in the new church. The YWAM team showed the Jesus Film and many people gave their lives to Christ.

Team leader Vikki Wright, who together with her husband John leads YWAM Arua, is now contemplating how God will lead them next. Fifty of the tribes in the Nuba mountains have no known believers. Most of those tribes have people who have taken shelter in the refugee camp. The YWAMers have many invitations to come back.

Said Vikki, “God is looking for people to fulfill the Great Commission who will go no matter how much money is in the bank, who will have courage to face the fire, who will follow Him step by step, and possess their promised land as they extend the Kingdom of God. We don’t need to be superstar Christians, just people who will trust and obey.”

The South Sudan refugee camp: many unreached tribes

To find out more about YWAM in South Sudan, go to the YWAM South Sudan Facebook page. To learn more about YWAM Arua, visit ywamarua.org.

If you would like to help YWAM care for people in times of crisis like the YWAMers in South Sudan are going through, please make a contribution to the YWAM Storehouse Fund. After helping with several needs over the last year, the fund is depleted and needs more donations. To give, go to the ywam.org donate page and pick “emergency fund” from the list.

 

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Science News » Brain “Relay” Also Key to Holding Thoughts in Mind

Long overlooked as a mere “relay,” an egg-like structure in the middle of the brain also turns out to play a pivotal role in tuning-up thinking circuity. A trio of studies in mice are revealing that the thalamus sustains the ability to distinguish categories and hold thoughts in mind. It might even become a target for interventions for psychiatric disorders marked by working memory problems, such as schizophrenia.

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Creating Space for God

Since the beginning of 2017, The Invitation, YWAM’s monthly prayer day, has focused on growth. Last month we prayed about the possible parallel increase in persecution. As we experience both of these realities–an increase in numbers and an increase in trials–it is crucial that we put our roots ever deeper into God.

Silence can be a gift to us in this regard. Silence offers us an opportunity to become more aware of God and more aware of the truth of our own hearts. When things are going well, as when our numbers increase, we are tempted to rely on our own strength. Silence can safeguard us from the pitfall of self-sufficiency by keeping us in touch with our great need for God. And when things are difficult, as when we face trials and persecution, we are tempted to panic and try to save ourselves in our own way. In silence we are reminded of the greatness and nearness of God.

In any case, as YWAMers we are often a people of action and it is easy to find both fulfillment and distraction in our activity. When we practice silence, we make space for God to meet us beyond all possible distractions. God invites us to know Him and, in knowing Him, to know ourselves and to become the God-empowered people He made us to be.

To remain in silence for more than a few minutes can be uncomfortable for us. We are used to noise and chatter and in the quiet we often find our minds buzzing with all sorts of thoughts. In order to make space for God, we encourage you to join us in this month’s practice of silence–whether as a community, or individually–trusting that this deep listening will lead to a fresh springing up among us of God’s abundant life.

Please join us during May, and especially on our prayer day of May 11, to seek God through silence. If you will be entering into this prayer as part of a YWAM group or a church group, please see below for instructions on how to facilitate a group. If you will be praying on your own, please skip down to the “Spend Time in Silence” section, and pick one of the three activities.

For Prayer Facilitators: Prepare to Spend Time in Silence

This month’s prayer time will focus on making space to hear God’s voice, listening, and being attentive in silence. Here are some practical tips to help those facilitating the prayer time.

• Decide ahead of time if you want the group to stay together, doing the same activity, or if you will let individuals choose for themselves which activity in which to engage. This is important in order to save time. If you want to let people choose which activity to do you may want to have the three options written out, either as a PowerPoint slide displayed on a screen or wall or on a handout. If the instructions are only verbal you may have to clarify and explain a few times, which would take away from the amount of time you could spend in silence.
• As a facilitator please help set the tone of the time by explaining the expectations to the group as you begin. You may want to emphasize the expectation of silence in the room (if you are staying in the same room) or of not talking to each other if the group is going outside. This may be challenging for some.
• Please be sure to give all the instructions at the beginning of the time of silence in order to avoid interrupting the group with further instructions. Include in the instructions a specific time to gather back together again.
• Consider ahead of time how you are going to process and receive feedback from the group. We have included some possible processing questions. Decide who will facilitate the processing time and how you will record the feedback.

Spend Time in Silence

As part of your time of silence, you are invited to consider one of the following three activities as a way to practice “making space for God.” If you are participating with a group, we recommend you all do the same activity so that afterwards you can share together about your experience of God through that activity.

Option A: Take a walk outside, in silence.

Begin by simply noticing how you are feeling physically and being present to the world around you. Practice curiosity and a deep listening to your intuition. Let this time be a journey of the heart, noticing where you are being invited to walk and where to stay for a while. Try to let go of any goals you have for this time (such as to reach a certain destination). Even if you walk only a few steps and simply notice what you see, that is enough.

After spending time slowing down and being present to what is around you, become aware of any questions or reflections that come to your mind. Each season has its own particular questions to ask: for example, spring might cause you to reflect on the fullness of life and time for play. What draws your attention and what questions does your time outside invite you to ask at this particular time of your life?

Finally, once you have enjoyed this time of reflection, ask yourself how are you moving in this journey of life with God. You might choose to mirror your response in the actual movement of your legs and feet as you walk (if you feel hurt, you might walk with a limp; if you are excited, you might bounce; if you are uncertain, you might mirror that in the way you walk). Then ask, how do you want to be moving through life in this season? You could move in that way for a short while. How might God be speaking to you through what this brings to your mind?

Option B. Get comfortable and keep silence wherever you are.

Be sure you have your journal and some pens or pencils. You may want to light a candle as a symbol of God’s presence. Get comfortable in your chair, or on the floor. Take a few moments to settle into this time and notice how you are feeling. Pay attention to the part of you that finds silence difficult, and to the part of you that looks forward to being with God in this way.

After spending time slowing down and becoming present to yourself and to God, begin paying attention to what comes to your mind. Are you aware of questions you want to ask the Lord? Is there something going on in your life that the silence offers you an opportunity to think about? You might reflect on how you have been turning towards God in recent times, and how you have been turning away from Him. Speak with Him about this.

In the quiet, you may well find that many random thoughts jump around in your mind, distracting you. If it helps, write down things you need to remember so you can stay focused during this time. Then simply return to an attitude of openness and listening to God. How might He be speaking to you through the things that come to mind? You could journal about this.

Option C. Reflection on a painting.

Finally, you may choose to spend your time in silence considering a painting such as this one, based on the story of Jesus and his disciples in the boat during a storm (Mark 4:35-41).

Consider projecting this image so everyone in your group can see it, then settling into a silent time of reflection.

As you first look at the painting, ask yourself these questions:

• What grabs my attention right away?
• How does the scene change for me, as I look at the painting?
• What is surprising to me about the painting? What questions does it raise for me?
• Which of the characters do I most identify with, and why?
• What would it be like to be in the boat in such a storm?

You could also consider reflecting on the following questions:

• What are the storms in my life right now?
• In what ways have I overlooked – or been aware of – Jesus’ presence with me?
• What is His invitation to me in those stormy places? And what is my response?

Conclude Your Silence Activity

In conclusion: Whichever activity you choose, at the end of your time simply express gratitude to God for your awareness of His presence, for what He has revealed to you, and for the grace to move toward Him.

Once your time of silence has concluded, here are some questions to help you or your group process:

• How was the time of silence and listening different from having a specific topic to pray for?
• What challenges did you experience in the time of silence and listening?
• What insights did you gain from this time of silence?
• How do you think a time of corporate, worldwide silence and listening like this could impact the mission?
• What do you think God thought and felt as we took time around the world to be silent before Him?

You may like to use this as a closing prayer:

“Lord, thank you that you are not a silent God. Thank you for your desire to communicate with your children. Please give us patience to wait in silence and the ability to quiet our hearts before you. Please train our ears to hear your voice. Help us to be aware of the noises and distractions in our life that may keep us from being close to you, and give us the grace to be still and know that you are God.”

Take Action

Find out more about spiritual formation:

• Read blogs from YWAM Montana and YWAM Salem.
• Attend training on spiritual formation at YWAM Seamill, Scotland.
• Plan another spiritual formation event for your location.
• Join the conversation about how God is leading in these prayer times. Comment on the post on the second Thursday on YWAM’s Facebook page.
• Follow YWAM on Twitter; search for #praywithywam and tweet about your prayer time or post a picture.
• Send an email to prayer@ywam.org letting us know how you prayed and what God revealed to you.

 

Don’t Miss The Invitation

YWAM Europe staff worship together in Albania

During April 2017 The Invitation focused on growth and persecution:

• YWAM Melbourne prayed for our Egyptian brothers and sisters from the Coptic Church after bombs exploded in multiple churches on Palm Sunday.
• YWAM Madison and YWAM Melbourne prayed and invited others to join them through Facebook. YWAMers from Homer, Alaska also posted that they prayed.
• Others posted on Facebook that they prayed specifically for Christians in Nigeria, the Middle East and for the Hazara people group in Central Afghanistan.
• YWAMers at a YWAM Europe conference prayed for the nations.

Future topics for The Invitation:

• June 8, 2017: Back to Jerusalem
• July 13, 2017: Two-Thirds-World Workers, Financial Support
• August 10, 2017: Family, Singles, Marriages

Here’s how to participate:

• Sign up for prayer updates. On ywam.org, find the “Stay Connected” box on the home page, put in your email address and click “Sign Up.”
• You can now listen to The Invitation as a podcast. To sign up or listen to past episodes, go to: http://ift.tt/2mXjIgI.
• Download prayer updates in a specific language. Go to http://ift.tt/1UO8eZP. (Currently available in Spanish, Portuguese, French, Indonesian, Korean or request other languages.)
• If you sense God giving you a word or a direction for YWAM’s prayer, please contact us.

Photo credits: Nick Kenrick and Carol Jacobs-Carre, Flickr

 

 

 

 

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Science News » Prescribing Patterns Change Following Direct Marketing Restrictions

A significant proportion of individuals who die by suicide have made a prior suicide attempt, and often access emergency care (ED) services.

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Science News » Emergency Departments Could Play Significant Role in Reducing Suicide Attempts

Research funded by the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) shows hospital emergency departments can play a vital role in lowering the number of suicide attempts among adults by as much as 30 percent.

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