BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (BP) — Just a few days after getting out of an airplane seat on a long-haul flight back from Egypt, a Baptist pastor found himself sitting in a different cozy seat across the table from radio host Greg Davis.
Some might call it the hot seat, that little leather chair in the radio studio of WXJC in Birmingham, Ala. But the way Davis sees it, it’s just a good place for a friendly discussion. On the day Davis talked with pastor Paul Brasher, the two spoke about the persecuted church in Egypt. Brasher shared about his opportunity to visit with a growing church that met in a garbage dump.
“The church over there, it’s vibrant, it’s growing,” said Brasher, pastor of New Hope Baptist Church, Pell City.
That’s encouraging, Davis said. And that’s exactly the kind of thing the radio host wants listeners of his talk show, Priority Talk, to get to hear about.
Davis, who also leads a student ministry called First Priority of Alabama, sits at that table five days a week and talks with pastors, authors, actors, musicians and many others. And he invites anyone who is interested to listen in.
Desirable landing spot
“We try to bring the biblical or Christian worldview to whatever we talk about, no matter what kind of issue or topic it is,” he said.
That plus the fact that it’s a strong, 50,000-watt signal on FM radio makes his talk show a desirable landing spot for guests — some of whom are household names in many Christian homes — to be on the air, Davis said.
From Kirk Cameron to Squire Parsons, Mac Powell to James Dobson and pretty much every Southern Baptist Convention president from the past several years, Davis said he enjoys the variety of people he gets to talk to.
He also loves to feature Alabama pastors like Brasher.
“We’ve got a national reach and nationally known names in here pretty often, but we are also definitely local. That sets us apart,” Davis said. “If you’re looking to hear about what’s going on in the world from a different perspective than anywhere else, you’d enjoy listening to our program.”
Davis, a member of Beechwood Baptist Church, Mount Olive, first had the idea for the program more than five years ago when he was a regular guest on several of Crawford Broadcasting’s stations.
“I went on there a lot at the time to promote First Priority, and I got to thinking that I was sad that there wasn’t a place for authors, pastors and others to talk about ministry,” Davis said.
He mentioned that to them a few times.
Then one day, they decided he had a good point.
“The general manager was in town and they set me up to meet with her,” he said. “She said, ‘Hey, we’re going to do that show, and we want you to host it.'”
Davis wasn’t too sure about that at first. But he agreed to get together with some of his buddies and do it for a little while and see how it went.
“I thought it would be fun to do for a few months,” he said. “I could’ve never fathomed that more than five years later, we’d still be doing it.”
It’s been an amazing experience, he said.
“I get to sit down and have conversations with people and ask any question I want to ask,” he said. “It’s been really valuable for me personally, not just a fun job. We don’t think there’s any reason to waste our time talking about it unless it’s got something to help with building the Kingdom.”
And Priority Talk is a live radio show that takes phone calls, so Davis never knows exactly where a conversation will go, he said.
“But where most talk radio is driven by controversy, ours isn’t that way,” Davis said.
“We talk about hard issues,” he noted, “but we also have fun while we do it.”
Daily shows
Priority Talk airs weekdays from 2-4 p.m. and Saturdays from 5-7 p.m. on 92.5 FM or 850 AM in the Birmingham area (or you can listen live online from anywhere) and Sundays from 9-11 a.m. on WYDE (101.1 FM).
It also is available in podcast form on iTunes or on the show’s website.
