Story number 4 for 14 Feb 2000

Next, mission leaders are hoping a teen missions conference will encourage more young people to join the mission field. Urbana 2,000 begins December 27th. Operation Mobilization’s George Verwer, one of the speakers, says more young people than ever before need to commit to missions. “There are parts of the world that never have been emphasized. And so workers are needed just as much as ever before. And, we’re discovering that many missionaries today, even those who are career (missionaries) usually it’s not more than 10 years.” According to Verwer, that means more people are needed to fill those ministry gaps. He says Urbana is strategic in finding them. “Students, especially those who have been away from their local church for a couple of years, urgently need something like Urbana to bring the vision and to bring them the possibility of some kind of more radical decision firstly to the Lord Himself and then to the harvest that the Lord has talked about.”