One of my radio station friends in Mississippi is getting a ton of grief from some Christians in his backyard for doing what I did 20 years ago -- dropping live church services from his small market radio station.
The problem with live church services is two fold: The audience for them is small, and the broadcast itself drives listeners away. What the church does ultimately is a waste of their money and a waste of the stations time.
There are better alternatives.
For churches trying to serve the "shut in" audience, record the service. Burn some CDs, then visit the shut-ins and drop off a CD so they can hear what they missed. The small amount spent on the CDs and recording is a better use of limited resources, and actually visiting the shut ins is more of a Christian act than telling them to turn on the radio.
If you want to use the services as an "outreach", consider using live streaming or YouTube. It's a lot less expensive and gets out farther than any radio station could.
Here's one of my favorites, used by a lot of churches.
Have your pastor weekly create two-minute "sermonettes" including a "Prayer line" number and the day and time of your services. For a lot less than your church is paying now, radio stations would air those a lot of different times of the week. Prime time for these would be -- believe it or not -- 6pm to 3am. Why?
Because evenings and late nights are when most people find themselves in crisis. That would be the time to give them the good news of hope and love. God's word is just as important weekday evenings as it is on Sunday mornings. Maybe even more so.
Think about it.
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