MUSINGS ON MINISTRY

Christian Ministry: Discovering the spiritual and other needs of people and taking action to meet those needs.

I was called into Christin Ministry when I was seventeen years old.

Ever since that call, I have served somewhere in the field of ministry.

I have served in churches and in para-church ministries.

There are a lot of things I do not know.

Ministry is something I do know.

Every fibre of my being has been steeped in ministry in one or more of the following areas, sometimes at the same time: Minister of Education; Christian School Administrator; Minister of Music; Minister of Youth and now Minister in Christian radio.

I have also run a successful business.

They are not the same.

Business is business; ministry is ministry and never the twain shall meet.

In fact, if you are a minister of any entity and try to run it like a business, you will ultimately fall flat on your face.

While you can run a business according to God's Word, if you try to run it purely as a ministry, you will fall flat on your face.

Ministry is God driven, and serves people.

Business serves people but is income driven.

Money follows ministry.

Money leads business.

Take Christian radio, for instance.

To succeed, Christian radio must follow ministry precepts.

Every word spoken, every song played, every announcement made must point people toward the Lord, Jesus, Christ, build them up in the body of Christ, give them encouragement in Christ and lead them closer to Him.

The key to finding support for Christian radio lies not in the skillful "selling" of radio time.

In fact, only about one-third of a station's income should come from programmers and underwriters.

Two-thirds should come from the contributions of listeners.

If those two get out of balance, gloom and doom looms.

The secret of support for Christian radio comes from increasing listenership, as only 5% to 7% of listeners will ever give a dime to the station no matter what you do.

To increase listeners, Christian radio MUST:

1. Be involved in the Christian community.

2. Be at every Christian event possible: walk-a-thons; bike-rides; community-wide church events; Christian concerts; Christian Chamber meetings; church worship services and any other place you can find to be.

3. Realize that most of those events will not return a single dollar to the station...they may even cost money, but the exposure will pay off in the long run.

4. Disperse information about the Christian community, as well as community public affairs.

5. Never waste a single moment on activities that do not promote the station to the largest possible segment of the Christian community, it results only in the spinning of the wheels and is a despicable misuse of the resources God has given the ministry. After all radio is not narrow-casting, it is BROADcasting.

6. Get an audience before congregations, where you can tell people about the station, take a brief survey and objectively discover their needs.

You may react, "But I am not interested in those things! They have never made the station a dime! I don't get why they are important to the exclusion of promotions like a good business would do, and like "selling" air time.

Then you have not been called into Christian radio.

It is a different animal, this ministry thing.

It is totally other oriented.

It is NEVER about self and self-preferences.

It is ALWAYS about the needs of the listeners...not the needs one THINKS the listener has, the needs one KNOWS the listeners has.

Ever wonder why God blesses some para-church ministries and not others?

Now you know.

What ever your ministry: Christian radio; food and groceries; soup kitchen; shelter; ministry to foster children and orphans; whatever it is, it must follow the proper precepts or it cannot succeed.

When it does follow the proper precepts...stand back! Get out of the way! God is going to bless your pea-pickin' socks off!