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Johnny Johnston

johnston_johny.jpgJohnny Johnston attended his first college fellowship meeting on September 12, 2001, the day after the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center in New York City. He had just started his freshman year at Westminster College, and while he was looking to get connected to a church nearby, he found more Christian fellowship than he could have expected.

“I learned a lot in the classroom during my college years, but when I think about experiences outside the classroom, I know for a fact I wouldn’t be who I am today without them,” Johnny says. “The CCO’s ministry provided space for me to ask questions and process what I was learning. I felt safe doing that with CCO people.”

Johnny was mentored by CCO staff members Seth McCormick and Tim Bogertman, who were both CCO Resident Directors at Westminster. They encouraged him to participate in the CCO-sponsored Ocean City Beach Project the summer after his junior year, which Johnny counts as one of the most formative experiences of his life—and not just because he met his wife that summer.

“Jenna was a student at the University of Pittsburgh, and she came to visit a friend of hers who was also doing the Beach Project,” Johnny remembers. But that wasn’t the only significant thing to happen for him that summer. It was at OCBP that Johnny really came to understand the redemptive biblical story and to gain a fuller understanding of the Gospel message.

Johnny and Jenna now live in California, where Johnny serves as the youth director at Sierra Madre Congregational Church. The way he does ministry today is a direct result of what he learned through the CCO—on campus, at the Beach Project, and at Jubilee conferences.

“I felt like I learned more during one summer at the Beach Project than in four years of classes,” Johnny says. “And I remember at Jubilee, one of the speakers talked about scholarship as worship—that they aren’t just two ‘ships’ passing in the night. That has always stuck with me.” Johnny also points to one of the most influential teachers he met during college—CCO associate staff member and bookstore owner, Byron Borger. “I really clicked with Byron, and I still order all of my books from him,” Johnny says.

“I try to do what I call ‘redemptive youth ministry,’ calling kids to live out their faith in an everyday way, and that all goes back to what I learned from the CCO. Jenna and I live in the community where we worship and work, and we make an effort to get kids involved in community service. We have recently connected with the local environmental action group, which is not faith-based. Because of the commitment we’ve made, because we believe that caring for the earth is part of our call as Christians, Jenna and I have been invited to be board members.

“The CCO taught me the meaning of the word redemption, specifically the redemption that Christ brings to everything. This means that I get to participate in that redemption in every area of my life—in everything from making dinner and showing love to my wife to picking up trash with teenagers in our community. It’s been ingrained in me and it’s hard to think about what my life would be without that. I distinctly remember the light bulb going on for me at the Beach Project and getting to process it with CCO staff and students. Because of that moment back then, today I ask myself why I do things. Am I helping to build the Kingdom, or is what I’m doing just noise?”