The Power of Radio

2 days a week I have a 45 minute one-way commute to work. I try to mix it up a bit. Sometimes it's a good praise and worship CD and sometimes it's a sermons series....ah, who am I kidding, it's rarely those things. Too often I'm just lazy and flip on the radio. This morning, I'm glad I did.

Q100 is a decent radio station in Atlanta. I sometimes listen to their morning show...even though the topics often cause me to tune out b/c they are extremely immature, etc. Well, this morning they did something really neat (ok, maybe I was being too hard on them...they often do a lot of good in the community.). This college student called in to ask for help. She has a special needs brother who is a high school senior. Last year, she wanted to make his prom special so she coordinated his Prom plans, including renting a Hummer and talking her college friends into being dates for a few of the special needs students. Well, this year she wanted to do it for the whole Special Needs class at his school. That's 15 total students.

The Bert Show got behind the idea and asked for their faithful listeners to call in and chip in where needed. What happened over the next 20 minutes was amazing...seriously, no joke! Within 20 minutes they had:

* A lady called in who works for a charity that specializes in getting free prom dresses for needy girls. (They had over 500 free available dresses to choose from.)
* One young girl called in saying she would be a date for one of the guys. (Props to her. She won't get any "cool" points for doing that...the reward is far greater than that.)
* Somebody called in saying they would cover the $675 it was going to require to purchase each of them a prom ticket.
* A professional photographer's wife called in offering her husband's services for that special day. She said he would serve as their "Personal Paparazzi".
* They had one limousine reserved, so someone called in ready to pay for another one.
* A professional wedding planner called in saying whatever else was needed, she would call her vendors and have it covered in 24 hours.

So within 20 minutes this special needs class had their outfits, dinner, limo ride, prom tickets, pictures,....you name it...COVERED! And it started b/c a caring sister wanted her brother to have a special night at the prom...like the rest of the kids...cause she knew if she didn't do something, they'd probably get left out.

(Just to play devil's advocate: Sure, some of the people's motives who volunteered help may have just been trying to get their business name in there...I say who cares...they are still offering up the service.)

After listening to this thing go down, I had a few thoughts:

>Radio (TV) can be a powerful tool. And it's amazing how it can be used for such good...and such bad.
>I wish it was that easy to get believers at church behind something. (Something that has eternal value!)
>I like how most people really do have a caring heart for those in need...and children...and special needs kids. It often just takes a little coordination to move them to action.