Ask the Editor: A story meant to be

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: Today is Friday, February 7th. Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Myrna Brown.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: And I’m Lindsay Mast. Up next, Ask the Editor for the month of February. Today, WORLD Radio executive producer Paul Butler ponders our news coverage decisions and divine listening appointments.

PAUL BUTLER: On Monday, January 6th I got a text from WORLD Correspondent Caleb Welde.

SOUND: [TEXT ALERT]

I had assigned him the January 27th History Book segment.

The text was his pitch to cover "The Cambridge Seven." College students who left for China 140 years ago. I thought it was the perfect topic. A story WORLD listeners would enjoy learning more about. Caleb got to work. I didn’t hear much from him for weeks.

Then on January 21st, less than a week before air, I get another text from Caleb.

SOUND: [TEXT ALERT]

“Hey Paul quick update on the Cambridge Seven story… came down with the flu—the hazmat kind…” he tells me that the first draft of the script will probably be late. No problem. It’s just another day at the office.

Then the next day.

SOUND: [TEXT ALERT]

Another text. This time, a voice note:

CALEB WELDE: Hey Paul, Caleb here. Wanted to touch base on the Cambridge Seven story running it into a number of problems. Probably the main one is I've not been able to find an expert…

We’re only a few days from our hard deadline…we need something. So Caleb suggests “a hard left-hand turn.”

WELDE: My best alternate suggestion is on the Columbia disaster.

But there’s a catch…we’d already covered that story in 2023…Caleb has a plan…

WELDE: I would like to focus on the Christianity of one or two of the crew members…potentially just do the story on a guy named Rick Husband.

He had found an interview posted to YouTube that Rick had recorded before his flight.

WELDE: It looks like a strong Christian family man. Left recorded devotionals for his family every day...

He also found a video of the commander’s wife telling her side of events.

We had a story. We had audio. It was go time.

AUDIO: [CLIP HISTORY BOOK]

It may not have been our first option, but it was a great “Plan B.”

Turns out…it wasn’t “Plan B” at all…

EVELYN HUSBAND THOMPSON: My name is Evelyn Husband Thompson. Do you want more? I live in Houston, Texas.

Eveyln is Rick Husband’s widow. When we wrote and produced the History Book segment on the Columbia disaster we used available interviews online…we didn’t reach out to her because of the tight deadline.

Turns out Evelyn has a friend who listens to the program faithfully:

THOMPSON: And she contacted me and said she was getting ready for the day and all of a sudden could hear Rick talking to her…it's a surprise to hear someone's voice after all those many years, but she recognized it instantly.

Evelyn has since remarried. A widower from her church.

THOMPSON: It's amazing to get to hear his voice... I laughed because I thought, he had such a Texas accent. … Very surreal to be holding my husband Bill's hand to listen to Rick. It's a little bit of a shock, but it's also bittersweet...

Eveyln says that she’s lost count of how many times over the years she’s told her family’s story of sudden loss…but her faith is strong. And she always talks of the hope of the gospel, Rick’s love of Christ, and how their faith is the most important thing to them.

She says however, that part of their story often ends up on the cutting room floor.

THOMPSON: And so I'm just very grateful for WORLD that they conveyed that message because that was what Rick treasured in his heart and what I treasure in mine.

Evelyn admits that she often mourns the loss for her kids…growing up without knowing their dad. But she tearfully told me her daughter was blessed to get to know her dad a bit more through last Monday’s History Book.

THOMPSON: Laura listened to it first and was very moved and touched by it. And I think she maybe even heard different comments from her dad that maybe she hadn't heard before. It was very inspiring. Very endearing for her to hear, hear what he shared, even his vulnerability of, of sinning, I mean, of lying on the application and just the process that the Lord took him through.

Unexpected and encouraging words…but it gets better. They weren’t just for a widow, and her kids…Evelyn’s daughter is currently dating a young man…a young man who will never meet his girlfriend’s father. But he got to listen to him in our story.

THOMPSON: And it just really ministered to him, which was just phenomenal to me because they will never actually have a physical conversation with each other. And yet he was able to almost sit in and have a conversation or at least listen to Rick's testimony firsthand. It just really moved him and it really moved me that it moved him. I was just overwhelmed by that, just the rippling effect of someone's testimony.

In the weeks ahead, I hope to share more of Eveyln’s story with you. But one more thought as we end today.

In this business, we often wish for those viral moments…when a story is read or shared by millions of people. But this week I’ve been encouraged in my own faith that while we may make plans, it’s God who directs our steps. We may have thousands of people listen to a story…yet sometimes God has ordained it special for only a few. And the rest of us just have the privilege of listening in.

THOMPSON: It's phenomenal to me how it cuts through time and space and not trying to, to, be cute with that comment, because it's very thought provoking to me that the Word of God, completely overshadows time.

For Rick to be sharing his testimony and talking about the impact the Lord has had in his life and the convictions that he has had and what matters most to him is timeless.

And so it's very exciting to me to still have that word shared from him and for me to be able to do that as well.

For WORLD, I’m Paul Butler.

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