Flashback to 1986! I attended Evangel University. I was a grown-up preacher’s kid and I had found my calling because I definitely did not want to be a preacher. I wanted to be a DJ! Woo Hoo! I was working on the campus station and at that point I knew I wanted to be a Christian radio DJ! I wanted to play Petra, Whiteheart, Rez Band, and all of my favorites. I wanted to do ministry. But again, I really just wanted to be a DJ.
What a ride it has been!
Over the past 35 years, I have been blessed to be involved in Christian music (CCM) radio. I have talked about my faith on the radio. I have met people at concerts and listened to amazing stories about how the station and the music have impacted them. Sound familiar?
When I started with WayFM in 2002, I thought I had hit the jackpot. I was now working for a CCM network that was growing, and impacting lives all over the country. Later, when I became a part of the WayFM leadership team, we were so excited because we were ministering to so many!
Uh, but wait a second…
In 2016, our leadership stumbled onto something. Our prayer wall on our website was literally getting hundreds of prayer requests, and some of them were not even being prayed for!
We were deeply convicted.
We were running promos and inviting people to visit the prayer wall, but errr, uh, nothing was really going on over there. We were too busy doing our radio things. We had to ask ourselves… are we serious about ministry?
In Jan 2017, we hired our first Prayer Pastor at WayFM and it was not an easy decision. We really didn’t have the budget to do it. We had lots of other needs, like a new transmitter, repairs were needed on our station vehicles, etc. But we made an important decision to take our role as a ministry more seriously.
On his first day on the job, Pastor Dave (Our new Prayer Pastor) came into my office and showed me a prayer request that he had just received….
Dear Wally and WayFM,
I had an affair on my wife over the weekend with her best friend. Please pray for me.
I was blown away. This listener just spilled his guts to a radio station. Who would do this? And why? Because, we were his ministry. He needed more than just the radio signal, more than just a fun-loving DJ. He needed prayer. So, we prayed for him. Pastor Dave wrote to him…And we ministered to him.
And that was just the beginning. In the first year, we counted 10,000 prayer requests, the next year it was 20,000, the next year even more. We are still growing! And we are committed to praying for every single request. We are as serious about our behind-the-scenes ministry as we are about promotions, DJs, and other radio things.
We are not the church. We point people to church. But we are a ministry.
By the way, check out this article from Bethany Bravery at the CMB website, asking “Would You Be Willing To Wash Your Listener’s Feet?” She gets it!
What about you? Are there things you can do to increase your ministry in 2021?
2 Timothy 4:5 says this, But you should keep a clear mind in every situation. Don’t be afraid of suffering for the Lord. Work at telling others the Good News, and fully carry out the ministry God has given you.
I’ve recently moved into a new role as VP of Ministry at WayFM. I’d love to chat with you more about this. Let’s learn together. fdice@waynation.com
Faron Dice
VP of Ministry, WayFM
fdice@waynation.com
Faron Dice has worked for WayFM for the past 18 years and in CCM Radio for the past 35. He loves Jesus, his family, and still wonders why his band Timothy never made it big in the 80s.
The team at 94.9 KLTY has served the Dallas/Fort Worth community for over 35 years. In 2020, the need was never greater. Through their local campaigns, Christmas Wish and Speak Love, they were able to assist many families who were impacted by not only the pandemic, but by hard times in general. The Speak Lovecampaign helped first responders, teachers, servers, food service staff, and many more within the community throughout the year. In 2020 94.9 KLTY’s Christmas Wish campaign brought Christmas joy to hundreds of families in the DFW area. They provided vehicles, food, toys, and other forms of relief to families in their community. They could not have reached any of these needs if not for their listeners and their generous donations to 94.9 KLTY’s nonprofit programs. In total, Speak Love and Christmas Wish raised more than $160,000 for those in need in Dallas/Fort Worth. They also recognized those sacrificial front-line workers and first responders who keep our community safe. Each week, 94.9 KLTY honored them, raised funds throughout the summer, and then presented each first responder with a check as a token of their gratitude. With countless families in need because of the pandemic, 94.9 KLTY also helped the Tarrant Area Food Bank distribute food essentials on multiple occasions in September, October, November. It is 94.9 KLTY’s sincere honor to serve our listeners in Dallas/Fort Worth.
LIFE 96.5 seeks to empower and serve the Sioux Falls area by reaching out in faith to help make it a better place to live and work. They want to lead their listeners to Jesus and help them grow in their faith through opportunities to love and serve others. In January 2020, LIFE 96.5 listeners donated over 950 brand new baby items during the Sioux Empire’s Largest Baby Shower. The Baby Shower grows every year, demonstrating their community’s love and support of the couples who are choosing life for their unborn children. LIFE 96.5 listeners, in partnership with Dacotah Bank, provided gift cards and cash donations to the Sioux Falls School District social workers to meet the needs of 1,000 homeless students. LIFE 96.5 also invited listeners to participate in a city-wide prayer parade, where they prayed for health care and government officials while driving past hospitals, schools, and city government offices. During the months of September and October 2020, LIFE 96.5 listeners provided over 250 twin sheet sets and 100 mattresses to the Sioux Falls Sleep in Heavenly Peace organization for children who are sleeping on floors. Through LIFE 96.5, listeners also made a difference in the lives of patients spending Christmas at Avera Behavioral Health Hospital. Each patient received a Christmas stocking filled with gifts and a note of encouragement. In addition, each Saturday morning LIFE 96.5 staff host Life Connection, a program featuring community leaders and discussing the needs and concerns of the Sioux Falls Community.
89.5 KVNE exists to glorify God by encouraging people, connecting their community, and pointing people to Jesus Christ. When their community was turned upside down by COVID, they knew they had to jump into action and mobilize their listeners to make a difference for Christ. To best serve their local community, KVNE held multiple drives to support local ministry partners and those most impacted by the pandemic. They collected 1,500 gift cards (totaling more than $15,000) to benefit those in need because of shutdowns, gathered over 12,000 diapers for foster families, and collected 150 care packages for senior citizens. They also collected 1,032 fans for the Salvation Army and over 1,000 pairs of shoes for kids heading back to school. Additionally, listeners donated 1,512 care packages for the homeless in East Texas, and KVNE hosted two blood drives to help those fighting the coronavirus. People across East Texas needed connection during the pandemic, so they organized a social media outreach, called Praise Defeats, a coordinated time where listeners shot videos of themselves singing “Raise A Hallelujah.” The videos were shared thousands of times, as they deepened their community’s connection. In addition, KVNE launched a Hispanic Christian music station (Fuzión), started a worship station (Lift Worship), and began a Bible Teaching Station (The Well) – all to help people grow in their faith. God allowed them to impact His Kingdom in profound ways and serve their local community powerfully during an unprecedented time when people needed hope like never before.
Since 1986, The JOY FM has made community service a hallmark of its ministry to listeners – first in Sarasota, and then expanding to Tampa, other Florida markets, and most recently to Atlanta and Middle Georgia. Even with this growth, community outreach remains hands-on, with legacy events like T-Shirts for Turkeys, which helped feed more than 28,700 families in all markets served last year. 2020 created new challenges for serving, so The JOY FM innovated several service projects to accommodate contactless delivery and social distancing. JOY Drop and Restock, a brand-new outreach, collected 30 tons of food to restock local food banks hit hard by the pandemic. Partnering with Natalie Grant and Hope for Justice, Team Freedom approached a grand total of $1,000,000 in 2020 to fight human trafficking. As listeners faced political rhetoric and serious questions about race and justice, as well as practical challenges like hybrid classrooms, The JOY FM programming (on terrestrial signals, as well as its LF Radio and JOY Worship platforms) responded with a recommitment to our mission of “Helping You Find JOY.” Resources for listeners, such as the Off Air with Carmen podcast, was provided to help listeners wrestle with big questions like Christian citizenship. Possibly The JOY FM’s most relevant community service effort for 2020 was prayer. The JOY FM’s Prayer and Crisis Referral service interacted with 620,936 listeners in need of prayer or help. Of those calls and texts, 4,949 listeners reported praying to place their faith in Jesus Christ.
“Hope Starts Here” is more than The Light FM’s tagline. It’s their mission. In 2020, they were intentional in regularly offering community-needed resources and hope-filled encouragement. They hosted their 5th annual Make a Difference training to encourage listeners to share God’s hope and saw 14 people begin a personal relationship with Jesus. The Light FM also visited eight local Law Enforcement agencies to share words of encouragement and care baskets. They partnered with East Tennessee Children’s Hospital and artists of Winter Jam for a private concert and time of prayer with families battling pediatric cancer. The Light FM listeners from five different cities donated 258 wheelchairs, 262 crutches, 259 walkers, 71 transport chairs, and 66 canes to Wheels for the World, which brings mobility and the hope of Christ around the world. During stay-at-home orders, The Light FM began offering free monthly virtual events, including: a graduation ceremony, featuring artists and Bible teachers; a conference with Crown Financial on how to manage finances during the pandemic; Girl Talk LIVE, a women’s event with worship and Bible study; God’s Hope in Crisis training with chaplains of the Billy Graham Rapid Response Team; a pastor appreciation event for local churches, featuring Chip Ingram and Matthew West; and a Family Christmas Night with live music, games, and a devotion from The Light FM staff. Even throughout the pandemic, The Light FM also found ways to be out in the public, safely, with six drive-in events featuring movies and live music.
