CHASING MY "ON-AIR" DREAM
(Continued)
During my early years at Radio Rhema in Christchurch, the station staff were blessed by Holy Spirit -inspired letters and cards of encouragement sent to specific staff members as she felt led, by a young Christian teacher, named Tessa Dowers. These always contained Bible verses, which the recipient always was amazed that they spoke to their heart cry to the Lord at that time.
Tessa had been faithfully attending a Church of Christ church for some time, but one Sunday, she sensed the Lord leading her to attend a local Pentecostal church, where I was in fellowship, and involved in the worship team as a drummer and worship leader.
The Sunday evening service she attended for the first time saw me playing drums for the worship songs. Tessa came up to me on the drums and introduced herself. The Holy Spirit had led her to come to this church at this time, because He knew that we were both being called to become not just close friends, but after some months to become man and wife. We were married in June,1986.
Without going into detail, let me say that the door to ministry as an announcer at Radio Rhema in New Zealand was closing for me, and we prayed and sensed that the Lord was leading us to move back to Australia.
I applied for announcer positions to three Christian radio stations in Australia, two in Tasmania, and the third in Perth, Western Australia. Both Tasmanian stations replied with offers of fulltime positions, and the station in Perth replied saying that they did not believe I could offer anything they could not find locally - which was fair enough.
In May, 1988, Tessa and I, together with our baby daughter, moved to Launceston in northern Tasmania where I was on air for three years at Launceston's 7WAY FM, the local Christian radio station.
We found this time to be quite a difficult time, financially, as we were living by faith, but God was faithful to provide for our needs. We were blessed on several occasions when the station manager, Kevin Hooper knocked on our front door, to give to us an amount of $1,000 anonymously given to several staff members.
In 1991, we both felt in God that the time for me to leave WAY FM had come. I was personally feeling frustrated, and believed the Lord was leading us on from there.
Apart from the ten years spent in Christian radio in New Zealand and Tasmania, I have had the opportunity of being on air regularly on community stations in Lismore and Sydney, New South Wales, and since 2000, when we moved to Hobart, Tasmania - on Huon and Kingston FM, based in Geeveston in the Huon Valley, south of Hobart and in more recent years, also at TASMAN FM, in Nubeena, in the Tasman Peninsular, down Port Arthur way. Both these community stations are happy to have Christian programming, for which we are very grateful, as many community radio stations across the nation have zero Christian programming.
Community radio certainly provides opportunity for programs and presenters who would not be considered worthy of broadcast on most commercial and government-run stations. I read recently that in any given month, approximately seven million Australians listen to community radio.
Thanks to modern media communication technology, most radio stations stream their programs online on the internet, as well as through traditional AM and FM radio broadcasting, which, of course means that the programming can potentially be heard around the world. I am greatly encouraged to have some regular listeners to my programs in other parts of Australia, and sometimes in New Zealand ( that I know of).
Under the direction of Richard Berry who pioneered Christian radio in New Zealand, and his protege, Hal Short, Radio Rhema expanded from one AM station in Christchurch in 1978, to three radio networks across the nation today, as well as a television network.
United Christian Broadcasters (UCB), which grew out of Radio Rhema, has now spread across the globe with radio stations in Australia - notably Vision Christian Media, which includes Vision Christian Radio broadcasting to around 800 big cities, towns, and small villages in every state and territory 24/7, with a youth station Vision 180 online - with UCB stations also in Asia, Britain, South Africa, the USA and Canada
Greg Newman, who was Best Man at our wedding in Christchurch in 1986, after spending several decades in commercial radio on the Gold Coast and in Brisbane, is now fulltime announcing with the Vision Radio Network based in Brisbane and broadcasting the hope of the Gospel of Jesus Christ across the nation of Australia.
To listen to Vision Christian Radio online, go to: www.vision.org.au
HAPPY LISTENING! God Bless.
