Paul and Christie Johnson

Missionaries in Rochester, MN

Christmas in the rear view mirror

by

It’s good to be home. I took some time off between Thanksgiving and Christmas to get refreshed and re-envisioned and it was a really good break. I read a lot, spent a lot of time with my favorite people (Christie and the boys) and even got some house work done.

We also had the pleasure of meeting with both our extended families over Christmas. It’s so good to celebrate Christ’s birth together.

After that we jumped into our annual Faithwalkers and not only were reconnected with our local church family whom we had missed for several weeks but also our extended GCC church family from all over the country.

Coming off Christmas and Faithwalkers I’ve been meditating on what keeps me content and joyful. What can I constantly return to no matter what my situation or  feelings are telling me. I tried to articulate it this way on facebook: The greatest relief is not a sense that you’ve done well enough to escape hell but that you’ve done poorly enough to need Christ’s payment and therefore are assured heaven!

When I’m in touch with my sin as a basic reality I can step away from expectation and effort and relax in the grace that has been given to me. Then I want to do my best for the one who loved me enough to die for me and promise me heaven!

Tom Brown said it this way during his talk at Faithwalkers (I’d encourage you to listen to it – one of the best of the conference): “Because Jesus the lamb was the hero for us I don’t have to be… We are freed from the need to perform for God or for other people”

Christmas is about Jesus coming to earth as a little baby and doing what we cannot do – living a perfect life and then dying the death we deserve so that if we put our faith in him instead of ourselves we get to have his death applied in our place – so we don’t have to face eternal punishment in hell for our offenses toward God. Then it means that we are free to live for him and do what we were created to do. Good works!

This is a little bit of an extension of the topic at hand but these works God has prepared for us and fantastic things we can do for him! That was my seminar topic at Faithwalkers. Check it out and let me know what you think.

Fall in Iowa

by

Here we are in the middle of September and I’m exhausted.

The Rock has been pumping out events, t-shirts, invitations, music, food, signs, posters, but most of all I think this year we’re pumping out the gospel more than we have in the past.

We set our sights on this last spring and I think we’re making progress toward it. The idea was to step up in sharing the gospel even if it meant stepping back in other things.

The challenge is to take advantage of the opportunities given and well, God has been giving us opportunities. Would you pray that we would take those opportunities and that God would reap a harvest through them?

I’m tired, but from the right activities. I’m not tired from lots of meetings, from an abundance of administration of from a flood of ministry minutia. Nope, I’m tired because I’ve been sharing the gospel several times a week for the past month and I’ve been leading, encouraging and equipping others to do so. I’m excited that I’m tired for those reasons.

Does that make sense? 🙂

Colossians 2

by

I am really excited to be speaking on Col 2  this Sunday at Stonebrook! The more I study it the more important this passage seems to me.

Do you ever struggle with your motivation as a Christian?

Do you ever feel like we do to much?

Do feel like a failure as a Christian if you don’t do __________?

Do you ever feel like your relationship with God has become a list of rules?

Do you feel judged by others because you don’t do ______________ or do _____________?

Do you ever feel twisted around by all the conflicting ideas out there in the world on self improvement?

We so often focus on the externals. Externals are easy to measure and sometimes the only way to measure where we are at. But focusing on them draws us away from what is the substance, the heart, the base of our faith- Christ and his work.

We desperately need Col 2 before we get to Col 3 with its commands to put off and put on. Col 2 is the motivation and heart of how Col 3 starts with “seek the things that are above”.