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One day, I heard Brant Hansen do
a break. He was going into Need to Breathe’s “Keep Your Eyes Open”
and he said something like this to his producer:
“You know, whenever I hear the
chorus of this song, I think of you”
They then talked about how she
moved away from home to pursue her career, and how her mom was
visiting that week, and how tough it is to leave what is comfortable
to go after a higher purpose. It made me remember the times I had
moved to follow my career. By the time they were done, I couldn’t
wait to hear the song! What’s more. Every time I’ve heard that
song since, I remember that conversation. It’s weird that I would
remember what a jock said! Oh yeah, I listen more intently whenever
that song plays, and I just went and downloaded it.
Brant Hansen cost me $1.29. Not
only that, he caused me to hang around longer on his station.
JP Spees is a new guy in
Christian radio, doing evenings on KSBJ. He’s a great caring
individual who shouldn’t have lost his old secular radio job because
of consolidation. One night I heard him talk about forgiveness
around Tenth Avenue North’s song “Losing.” He’s had to live a lot
of that lately. He related forgiveness to trying to do a math
problem, and how he’d always have to use his eraser. He said that
God has an eraser, too. One that doesn’t leave any smudge marks. I
could see that in my mind, and identify with how lousy I am at
math. It was the same thing with Brant - I wanted to hang around
and hear the song! The next day we got this e-mail from a listener:
Last night on my way home around 8:45 or so, the
DJ came on air and he gave a summary of what a song was about & how
it’s applicable to us.
That inspired me to send this email because I
think there are a lot of people out there, like me, that are
listening to KSBJ but sometimes we don't always get the message of
the song. Maybe because we're just listening to the music and we may
know some of the words, but the message of the song doesn't always
get across. I do think there are other listeners out there like me
and think this would be a really great help to further our
relationships with God.
Would y’all please pray about this and if you
feel God leading KSBJ to do this, find a way to work these song
summaries in more often throughout the day.
I’ve heard that there are
stations out there that don’t talk about the music. I understand
why. A lot of jocks I’ve heard default to staying on the surface.
Giving $1.29 bits when our listeners crave $1,000,000 content.
Talking about what a “great singer Francesca is, or what Third Day
is doing in the studio, or quickly pulling out Jeremiah 29:11 or
Proverbs 3:5-6” If that’s the extent of your music talk repertoire
then yeah, don’t bother.
But, if God is transforming
you, and you can relate the song’s concept to one of your real life
experiences, then you will get in someone’s heart. Do that. If we
all start doing it together then who cares about the competition,
because we’ll all be winning hearts.
I may stink at math, but I
know that that equals good.
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Sterling Tarrant is the Production Director
at KSBJ, and the creator of
www.takingitdeeper.com, a place that teaches you how to
spiritually engage your listeners through creative content.
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