Life and Death

July 09, 2019 by Kevin Johnson

I love thinking about the future. It’s fun to dream. There’s a comfort in knowing that there are always possibilities. As exciting as tomorrow can be, sometimes I have a tendency to forget about what’s going on right now!

It’s easy for us to do the same thing with the Gospel of Jesus - we throw it so far into the future that we forget what it means for us today. We know that through the sacrifice and resurrection of Jesus Christ we will spend eternity with God. What an exciting truth! But this is not the totality of the good news of Jesus. The Gospel is not only about a destination, but an identity.˜

Past, Present, Future

January 19, 2019 by Kevin Johnson

Do you ever struggle with knowing how to look at your current circumstances?

The book of Colossians is a letter written by the Apostle Paul while he is in prison. Think about that situation! Paul followed God’s calling to share the Gospel, and as a result of that, he’s ended up in jail. For doing the will of God, Paul ended up in prison! There’s a passage in chapter 4 of Colossians where Paul puts his experience in perspective of the past, the present, and the future.

What I Learned from a Clumsy Deer

October 26, 2018 by Kevin Johnson

A couple of weeks ago, I went on a fishing trip with my Dad and my brothers to celebrate my dad’s sixtieth birthday. We went backcountry camping and fly-fishing in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. This was one of the more remote things we’ve ever done. We hiked miles into the wilderness with our supplies, planning to live on the fish we caught. After our first day of fishing, we felt like we might be in trouble. We didn’t catch enough fish. Dipping into our emergency rations on day one wasn’t exactly the plan. The next day, we decided to split up.

Normally, we fish in pairs, each taking one side of the river. But on this day, we were fishing alone. It was nice because no one knew how many times my fishing line got hung up in the trees. At one point, while untangling myself from a particularly angry shore-bush, I heard a loud THUD come from across the creek. I thought a tree had fallen. Thankful that it missed me, I looked across the water and saw something shocking.

When Things Go Awry

July 17, 2018 by Kevin Johnson

Has there ever been any event in your life that didn’t turn out the way you wanted it to? Sometimes we make plans thinking we know the future, but we soon find out otherwise. Things go awry. We tend to think that things go well for those who are following God. It's easy to fall into the mindset that if things are not going as planned, God is upset with us.

There is a story in Acts 16 where some of God’s faithful followers go through something they were probably not expecting.

At this point in the story of God, the Gospel was spreading, and the Apostle Paul was on a mission to take the it everywhere. But as he did this, there were a lot of people who disagreed with the spread of Christianity. What happens is pretty crazy.

Watch Out for the Dogs

May 22, 2018 by Kevin Johnson

You know that moment in a movie or a T.V. show when you hear the record scratch noise and the video stops? There’s usually a freeze-frame and the main character looks confused. You're supposed to ask the question, "What is going on?"

If the Bible had a soundtrack, there's a moment in the book of Philippians where this would have totally happened. If you read through the book of Philippians, you'll read about Paul's experience as a prisoner for the Gospel. He encourages his friends to really care for one another. And then, you get to Philippians 3.

Covered

April 17, 2018 by Kevin Johnson

What do you wish people thought about you? It can be easy to get lost in others' perception of you. Do you think people ever talk about you behind your back?

When we’re born, we’re born into a context. We have a family, a history, and a lot of times, expectation. Maybe you were always expected to amount to something. Maybe, no one thought you would amount to anything. But there was a perception around who you were and who you were supposed to be.

Ten Things Before You Go to College

April 03, 2018 by Kevin Johnson

When I was in seminary, I led a group of 4 high school guys for four years. We started meeting together when they were freshmen, and I got to see them graduate and head off to college. The last topic we talked about were 10 things before they headed to college.

Last year, I fleshed these ten things out a bit more to write Ten Things Before You Go to College. In this short book, I outline ten things that I wish I had thought about before I headed off to school. This week, I released the full-color print version!

Circumstances

March 20, 2018 by Kevin Johnson

As we read the Bible, it can be easy to forget that there were people involved. It can feel like we’re opening up a confusing, sometimes mysterious, holy book, and we forget that there were real people involved.

Philippians was a letter written by Paul. For us, Paul has become a sort of larger-than-life missionary that we attribute most of the New Testament to. We have to remember that Paul was just a man. He was a kid once. He experienced a lot of the same things we do. He wrote Philippians in the midst of some interesting circumstances.

Paul wrote this letter from prison.

Holding the Rope

March 15, 2018 by Kevin Johnson

Have you ever met someone that you wanted to be like? As you get to know them, you think, "I want to be like him?" Or, "How do I get to be more like her?" Maybe they’re funny, joyful or helpful. There are some people from the book of Acts that I've always admired. I want to be like them. Weirdly, no one knows their names.