Joshua Fund board member Wayne Pedersen inducted into National Religious Broadcasters Hall of Fame

Wayne Pedersen, a member of The Joshua Fund's board of directors, was entered into the Hall of Fame at the National Religious Broadcasters (NRB) Association. The prestigious award was presented to Pedersen at the annual NRB Convention last week in Nashville, Tennessee.

“It stands as a witness for current communicators, a showcase of warriors for Christ who have lived exemplary lives of valor and compassion, blazing trails and leaving paths for succeeding generations to follow,” reads the NRB’s website.

Pedersen grew up on a dairy farm in northern Minnesota. He discovered Jesus as his Savior when he was young and by age 16, he dedicated his life to serving God full-time. That decision led Pedersen to serve his entire career in the world of Christian media.

“I'd always wanted to be in radio, since I was a little kid. But God put a call in my life,” Pedersen told ALL ISRAEL NEWS Editor-in-Chief and Joshua Fund co-founder, Joel Rosenberg, on his weekly program THE ROSENBERG REPORT on TBN.

“He called me to serve full-time, helping religious people find a personal relationship with Christ. There are a lot of people with religion but without Jesus. And so that was how specific my calling was. I thought it meant to be a preacher. But God took my passion and interest in broadcasting and my love for radio and microphones and all of that, allowing me to use that DNA he placed in me to fulfill that mission he gave me to help people find a personal relationship with Jesus,” Pedersen shared.

Pedersen and his wife, Willi, have been to Israel on several occasions, where they learned to love the people of the land through God's word.

“We grew to love Israel, love the people of Israel, and responded to God's call to reach the Jew first and also the Greek. And so that's why we love what The Joshua Fund does. It is for Israel, but it's also for the neighbors. That's a distinctive of The Joshua Fund. It's not just a Muslim ministry or a Jewish ministry,” he told Rosenberg.

Since the outbreak of the Oct. 7 war between Israel and the Hamas terrorist organization in Gaza, Pedersen and Rosenberg have been involved in humanitarian relief efforts across the country through the Joshua Fund. The fund has invested more than $100 million in local charity initiatives and the strengthening of churches across Israel and throughout the Middle East.

“I have seen messianic pastors and their wives with Palestinian pastors and their wives coming together for a week of study teaching, prayer, worship,” Pedersen explained.

“Those that are followers of Jesus and in the land can come together as Palestinians and Jewish believers to worship and learn and praise God together. I see the beginnings of breakthroughs.”

“We are seeing the culmination of events that point to the final days and the things that are coming together internationally against Israel, but also what's happening within Israel, as well, as more Jewish believers are coming to accept Jesus as Messiah,” he continued.

When asked by Rosenberg what his main prayer for 2024 is, Pedersen replied: “We pray that the church in the land would grow, that the congregations would be strengthened, and that believers in Jesus would come together in unity and begin to pray for the peace of Jerusalem – and pray for the peace of Israel, and pray for believers of every ethnic stripe to come together and stand against the evils that are assailed against not just Israel, but against all of us, the enemies of the gospel and the enemies of Christ.”

THE ROSENBERG REPORT airs Thursday nights at 9 p.m. EST and Saturday nights at 9:30 p.m. EST on the Trinity Broadcasting Network (TBN), the most-watched Christian television network in the United States.