(Sept. 16, 2011 - by Marla Bender and Ralph Kurtenbach) As Wantok Radio Light (WRL) prepares to add two new stations to its growing network in Papua New Guinea this month, listener response is escalating.

The network's evening announcer whose program airs on more than a dozen stations received 3,000 text messages per month last year. This year the number has jumped to 15,000 messages a month. Many respondents requested information on finding a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.

Local residents are eager to hear the first shortwave broadcasts from Wantok Radio Light in 2005.

The partner ministry began 10 years ago in the capital city of Port Moresby through a cooperative effort. The U.S.-based HCJB Global Technology Center assisted Evangelical Bible Mission and Papua New Guinea Bible Church.

WRL developed an ambitious plan to establish 30 FM stations throughout the country. This year WRL hopes to take a giant step toward this goal by planting 10 additional repeaters, bringing the total to 23.

So far, repeater stations have been established in more than a dozen locations nationwide. Christian programming from the main station in Port Moresby is sent via satellite. All of the repeaters download that programming from the satellite and rebroadcast it.

Installing the satellite dish for the repeater in Buka, Papua New Guinea.

Later this month, Alan Good from the Technology Center in Elkhart, Ind., will return to PNG for more engineering work. His initial task will be to repair five transmitters. One will be used to get a current station back on the air, and four will be available for new installations, including two while he is there.

Good assisted with WRL's initial installation in 2002 and installed six more stations while living with his wife in PNG from 2005 to 2007.

"Something special is happening over the airwaves of PNG," said Pawa Warena who directs Wantok Radio Light, adding that he dreams of nationwide coverage.

Engineer Alan Good (center) with a pair of local radio workers in Buka.

"We are asking God to increase the number of souls being saved from three to five a day to 10 every day," Warena added, expressing a sense of urgency. "God is faithful, but we also need to increase the number of stations so that many more can be saved."

Source: HCJB Global