(Sept. 29, 2016 - by Harold Goerzen)  Students came from near and far, eager for the opportunity to learn how to prepare a simple radio program. For two of the participants—a village teacher and a motorcycle delivery driver—this meant a 12-hour speedboat ride through choppy ocean waters followed by eight hours in a crowded minibus across remote, winding, bumpy roads.

Reach Beyond, together with its principal Indonesian media partner, recently conducted a workshop for new radio announcers in the country’s easternmost Papua province. Twelve students came from four stations in the region to participate in six days of intensive training Sept. 11-16.

“They took in theory and practiced basic skills in a variety of areas: studio equipment and software operation, announcing, writing content, communication and running a simulated on-air shift,” explained radio trainer Lisa Balzer, based in Reach Beyond’s Asia Pacific Region. “Most of the students had never operated such equipment or spoken on the radio before.”

She observed that the eclectic group was a “picture of the body of Christ, bringing different strengths to the table. Some showed that they were gifted in administration, carrying out tasks such as organizing the music library and scheduling programs, while others had a personable, relatable character for drawing listeners in and reaching their hearts.”

“Several students were technically minded and could understand and provide help with the software and equipment,” Balzer continued. “The participants helped out each other in their areas of weakness.”

She added that some of the class members had “rich, full voices that are a pleasure to listen to on the air while others had the ability to relate the truths of Jesus in ways that are easy to grasp, but all brought their unique perspectives and life experiences to draw from.”

The participants’ progress was evident as the training went on. “They went from dubiously speaking into the microphone at the start of the week to confidently announcing—with a smile—while running the equipment and software by the end of it,” Balzer said.

As a final project, each student independently presented a half-hour radio program. “For them, this is the only ‘practice’ time they would get,” she noted. Their next step was to prepare programs for actual broadcast or go on-air with live programming.

Balzer encouraged Christ-followers everywhere to pray for the young announcers as they return to their home communities, applying the principles they learned in the training.

“Pray that they wouldn’t change their minds or lose heart and decide not to do this,” she related. “Pray for courage for all of our students, for tenacity to stay the course and practice building their broadcast skills, and most of all for the light of Christ to be very evident in their lives as they represent Him in their communities through radio.”

Since 2003, Reach Beyond has worked with various partner ministries to put more than 53 community FM stations on the air in Indonesia, including over 45 with the main partner, all working in partnership with indigenous Indonesian mission groups and local churches.

According to Operation World, Indonesia has more Muslims than any other country in the world (over 186 million—80 percent of the population) while 16 percent of the population claims to follow Christianity (5.6 percent evangelical). The annual growth rate for evangelicals is 2.8 percent compared to 1.6 percent for Christianity in general and 1.2 percent for Islam.

Sources: Reach Beyond, Operation World