The Initiative is an apt name for the independent film company birthed from YWAM Brisbane’s School of Digital Filmmaking in Australia. After winning a parade of awards for one of their many short films, the young film company has decided to step out into something bigger: the challenge of a feature film. Their first full-length project, The Umbrella, aims to promote a message of reconciliation, redemption, and restoration.

The Umbrella was originally the brainchild of director, producer, and founder of The Initiative, Jason Solari. After years of development, writer and producer, Josh Potthoff, was brought alongside the project to breathe life into the writing and give flesh to the story. Both are passionate about their production, aiming to engage hearts and minds. “Film is the most influential medium of our day,” says Jason. “And it’s our goal to tell good stories.”

Youth With A Mission teams scattered around the globe have found several unique ways to celebrate Christmas in the communities where they live. For these teams, this season of giving is a particular opportunity to express God's love; the way He stepped into our reality to bring hope and the promise of redemption.

Christmas is a special time of year when we bring to mind that the long-awaited Messiah, Jesus, came to be one of us; that the Son of God came to be, to dwell, to remain with us.

Lights dim and the strumming of indigenous music fades in, familiar to the ear of the audience.

On a cool October night in Northern Thailand around 200 people gathered to hear and see a dramatic movie filmed right in their community. Throughout the film showing, the audience laughed at the appropriate humor, got serious, and then pondered the message of the Creator God and His words of hope.

The film entitled "When the Storms Come" is very appropriate to the current situation in Thailand now, facing what has been called “The Flood of the Century.”

One evening, the YWAM leaders gathered for the 2011 Global Leadership Forum watched pictures of Al Akimoff, leader of YWAM Slavic Ministries, on a trip into Kamchatka, Russia. They watched Al in a thick Russian hat crusted with snow after a snowmobile ride to unreached peoples. They saw pictures of smiling men and women dressed in bright red, white and blue outfits from their tribal background. They heard that now some of the first individuals from these tribes have come to faith. In one area, pastors and church leaders trained in YWAM Discipleship Training Schools have started a church of 1,000. One of the tools to reach out to these tribes is a boat that navigates the rivers when they are not covered in ice. This boat is so new to YWAM it doesn’t even have a name yet. It sleeps seven. The crew pays their way partly by fishing as they travel.

In the middle of the second day of YWAM’s 2011 Global Leadership Forum, Kobus Van Neikerk, the coordinator of YWAM’s Africa leadership team, told a story about his wife, Rika. Kobus and Rika have been laboring for decades to serve YWAM’s staff all over the African continent. They have driven over rough roads to visit teams in remote parts of Angola, have gone into conflict areas in spite of warnings, and have comforted families in Nigeria in the aftermath of a tragic accident. Now Rika had developed vascular issues with her heart, and had not recovered her normal energy after surgery. As she was recuperating, Kobus said Rika had received a call in their Pretoria, South Africa home. A YWAMer in an African country wanted help with a difficult situation. As she tried to respond to this request, Rika’s strength gave way, and she fainted.

The first full day of YWAM’s 2011 Global Leadership Forum gathering began with the sound of power saws and hammers. Regional leaders and international coordinators were carrying sheets of plywood and dipping brushes into containers of paint. The 47 attendees, who had come from countries as far away as Zambia, South Korea and India, had dedicated their first day to building three homes for the poor in Tijuana, Mexico.

As a young student in school I learned about "the rivers in Siberia": Ob, Yenisey and Lena - three of the largest rivers on the planet. All three of them cut across the Siberian taiga and tundra and flood out into the Gulfs of the Arctic Ocean. Most of the year they are frozen and serve as ice-roads for motorized vehicles and snow mobiles. In Spring time they become alive again and boats and ships of all sorts and sizes go up and down the river.

Who are living by the shores of those mighty rivers? The "left-behinds". When globalization and urbanization had caught their "movers and shakers", and sent them to the cities, often those with less resources and initiative were left behind. The factory moved to the city as well. Thousands of villages without any future, without hope. No maintenance. Left by themselves to die.....

What would you think if a group of local police came knocking on the door of your training and ministry centre, asking to meet with your latest group of young students? When this happened recently at the YWAM centre in Bangkok, the leaders of the Discipleship Training School prepared themselves for the possibility of bad news. Instead, they were surprised to find that the police had come to ask for their help.

Today for the first time, a generation of Mozambicans living in the Zambezi delta have the opportunity to learn to read and write. In this area where poverty and illiteracy are rife, education offers the possibility of radical transformation.

This exciting YWAM project began with a Mozambican woman who had no formal training, just five years of primary school. Martin Luther King once said, “One does not need a degree to serve.” Marta Alige proved that to be true.

“2012 is a crucial year for the UK,” says Yan Nicholls, team leader of ‘Forever” - the Olympic outreach coordination team for Youth With A Mission.

“We have such a God-given opportunity to see people’s lives changed – both the lives of people from the nations visiting these shores for the Olympics, and also the lives of UK residents. One of the aims of the Olympic outreach has always been to bless communities in the UK, to see positive change. That blessing will come as we do what God asks us to do with regards to outreach. But it starts by us seeking God for His plan for this nation during this time.”

To enable this change, the Forever team has launched “Brick by Brick” - an online prayer calendar that enables you to pray for the United Kingdom throughout 2012.