How Church Can Help Build Strong Families

Aaron Johnson (00:00):
You know like I do that a family is only as strong as the father and the mother as a unit, but we want to encourage that team to be actively involved in their kids' lives. And to that, we do other initiatives. The last one we did was meals at home. It a three-month long program where families would intentionally eat together. We've lost the dinner hour.

Narrator (00:36):
Welcome to the Modern Church Leader, where you'll hear executive pastors share practical tactics and strategies that churches are using right now to thrive in our digital world and advance the Kingdom of God. Here's your host, Frank Barry.

Frank Barry (00:50):
Hey guys, Frank here with another episode of Modern Church Leader. Really excited about today's conversation. I'm married, been married for almost 20 years. Have three kids and excited to talk about marriage and even things beyond with pastor Aaron Johnson. How's it going, Aaron?

Aaron Johnson (01:08):
It's going great. Thanks for having me.

Frank Barry (01:10):
Yeah. I'm excited. This is a topic we haven't explored a ton yet on the show. So, it sounds like you've been at it for a long time.

Aaron Johnson (01:18):
Well, yeah.

Frank Barry (01:20):
Yeah, yeah. I'll love just to give listeners a sense of who we're talking to, and a little bit about their life, and ministry, and the church they serve at and things like that. So, why don't you take us back a little bit and give us your story?

Aaron Johnson (01:35):
Yeah. Well, if I started where I have been starting it mostly these days, I'll tell you that I began my life coaching career at the young age of three years old. That life coaching career lasted maybe six months when my dad decided to not keep taking me to the barber shop where we were getting our haircuts, because apparently as the story goes, every time somebody would walk through the door I would say, what's your name? What's your wife's name? Do you have kids? What's your kids' names? And that's what a coach does. A coach just asked all kinds of questions. And well, it irritated my dad. And the barber, who was his good friend, thought that it irritated my dad, so that if I ever stopped asking or forgot to ask the question, he'd say, "Well, Aaron, don't you want to know what that guy's name is?" And off I'd go again. Well, that didn't last a whole long time until my dad took us home and started shaving our heads until years later.

Frank Barry (02:37):
Right. Dad was like, "Nah, I can't handle this."

Aaron Johnson (02:41):
Yeah. So life coach career interrupted. But in the early 80s, I was finishing out my piano performance degree at the University of Texas in Dallas where I met my future wife, my wife to be. And she was a cute girl sitting on the front row in an education class. I sat on the back row because I was not interested in the class, but I was interested in her. Fast-forward a year, were married. She was a single mom. So, all of a sudden I'm a husband without a plan. I'm a father without a plan. And off we go into adulthood. And at that time, I really wasn't even at the beginning of my ministry career, but that came a year later in 82. And I've been in that since.

Aaron Johnson (03:31):
Well, 40 years now. We've been married 40 years since Labor Day weekend this year. And I'm in my 40th year of ministry. And last year as I was mentioning, we've all had chance to take stock of our lives as COVID gave us this downtime I guess. And one of the things I realize is I've had 40 years of being able to raise my family, four adult kids, eight grandkids, and minister to various church families along the way. Where I am now I've been at for 19 years, at Woodcreek Church. But I haven't had really much of any time to have impact and influence out in the world. And as I mentioned a little bit earlier, if I'm thinking of 20 years as a lap of life, I've begun my fourth lap. Probably my last lap all things considered. Maybe God will give me a victory lap into my 80s. I don't know.

Aaron Johnson (04:30):
Anyway, but I don't want it to be said of me in my last lap that I didn't have impact and influence out in the world. So to that end, I started down this life coach exploration trail and I have spent the entire year this year going through two programs. Entering into Toastmasters and a couple of other things along the way just to prepare myself for something that clearly God is calling me to. And the reason I say that is because all my ministry career I feel like I've backed into these positions that I've had. Because I've had some natural talent, I was in the worship ministry for 25 years. So I backed into it, but this is the first time where, honestly, I feel like I've turned around and I've headed face first into what God's calling me in a fearless way. And so, I'm taking all the things that he's done with me and through being for me and rolling it into this effort and he's taking me there.

Frank Barry (05:42):
Yeah. I love that. I mean, let's talk for a minute just about your ministry experience. So you're the marriage-

Aaron Johnson (05:51):
They call me the family life pastor.

Frank Barry (05:53):
Family life pastor. Okay. What's a family life pastor and how do you... 19 years in that role at that church or?

Aaron Johnson (06:01):
No, I'll back up a little bit again. Eight years in church media and communications on the front end. And at that eight-year mark, I realized I need to go to seminary and I need to make use of the music background that I have. And so, that led me into worship ministry for 25 years. And for the last seven, that makes 40, it's been in family life, which for us means marriage, family, and children in different iterations at all levels. Mostly, I spend my hands-on time in marriage ministry. I have a team of people who take on the children's ministry and youth ministry, and all together we form the family ministry trying to energize our families to take on that home first-line discipleship role that God wants them to have.

Frank Barry (07:03):
Right, right. And how do you work with the families and how do you... Obviously, there's the weekend experience. I'm sure that you have some oversight and help with all that. But beyond that, how are you really helping families? And what does that look like through COVID and through church from home and all those things?

Aaron Johnson (07:25):
Yeah. Well, COVID's a different story. And of course that was a different story for everybody. But we did a lot of online stuff, encouragement, Facebook live pieces, and devotional materials that we pushed out to our families. Now, we're doing more in the way of initiatives. And this is more of a marriage initiative, but save the date. All next year we're going to have a dating contest that the winner will most likely win a cruise for having a date. Three weeks out of four, 12 months in a row. And even then, that's only to get them into the drawing to [crosstalk 00:08:16] for that. But anyway-

Frank Barry (08:19):
I love that. You're gamifying dating for married couples.

Aaron Johnson (08:24):
[crosstalk 00:08:24]

Frank Barry (08:25):
Yeah. Full gamification with prizes and everything.

Aaron Johnson (08:29):
You know like I do that a family is only as strong as the father and the mother as a unit. So, we're all about strong marriages as you might imagine. But we want to encourage that team to be actively involved in their kids' lives. And to that, we do other initiatives. The last one we did was meals at home where it was a three-month long program where families would intentionally eat together. We've lost the dinner hour. So, in order to enter that and be part of that contest they had to take pictures and do funny things on Facebook, on our children's ministry, Facebook page, so that we knew that they were actually doing it. They loved it. And so, we're doing those kinds of things.

Frank Barry (09:25):
I mean, tell me more about that. Even those two examples you just gave, I actually... I'm the dad who comes up on every show. I've got three boys. A triplet nine-year old boys.

Aaron Johnson (09:37):
Oh my god.

Frank Barry (09:38):
I've been married for about-

Aaron Johnson (09:38):
Can I pray you right now?

Frank Barry (09:38):
What's that?

Aaron Johnson (09:40):
Can I pray for you right now?

Frank Barry (09:44):
Absolutely. We can. But been married for 20 years. Three kids. Having a blast. Absolutely love being a dad. I love talking about the family stuff. And I just think it's cool, those two initiatives. I forget what it's called dinner hour and save the date. Super cool. Tell me more about the dinner at home and how you guys did that.

Aaron Johnson (10:08):
It was called meals at home, and I think the website would be drivefaithhome.com. It's initiated by a fellow named Kurt Bruner. And it comes out of Lakepointe Church in Rockwall, Texas. So, I would tell everybody to go there and check it out. It's a great family support website, drivefaithhome.com. There's also another website particularly for dads as the name will tell. It's called allprodad.com. Completely faith based. Great content. And I use that content in initiative with dads only that I call dad hackery, and all it is-

Frank Barry (10:58):
I brought up the website so that I would have them for myself real quick. I love that

Aaron Johnson (11:03):
There you go.

Frank Barry (11:03):
Go ahead. Dad hackery.

Aaron Johnson (11:05):
Dad hackery. It is an initiative that I eventually want to see out in the coaching world. But I'm test driving it in the church, but it's just dad's getting together with dad's either over breakfast or lunch talking about dad stuff. And we build in a competitive component where the first time we got all together, we played a kickball game. Included the kids in that. We eat together. And in between, I send them a reflection project to work on. They fill it out, they do it. We get back on a Zoom call and we just talk about dad stuff. The next time... I actually forgot what we did, but the next time we get together here in November, we're going to go axe throwing here in the Dallas area.

Frank Barry (11:50):
Kickball and axe throwing. All the dads are in. The only other thing you could do I guess is golf. But as we talked about earlier, golf is not quite your thing.

Aaron Johnson (12:00):
Yeah. You know where that is in my world.

Frank Barry (12:03):
And when you did even the meals at home and things like that, what was the participation like? And how did you inspire, and encourage, and keep the momentum of that? Because you did it for a month or how long did it last?

Aaron Johnson (12:21):
It was a three-month program. And that's typically what all of the initiatives that come out of the Drive Faith Home program are. And they've got tons of them. Well, maybe not tons. A lot of them. For different kind of things.

Frank Barry (12:36):
They got a lot. Yeah.

Aaron Johnson (12:37):
And all different age levels too. This was an easy one, because for this we were targeting mainly families with younger kids. But because there was just certain things that you can't do as easily. We knew they eat. Everybody eats all the time. They just weren't eating together, and that's largely due to sporting things, extracurricular activities. I think we had somewhere between 70 and 75 families decide to do that. And the ones who did it, they were all in. There really wasn't a drop-off through the three months.

Frank Barry (13:19):
So you have them sign up for the three months campaign? They registered to participate.

Aaron Johnson (13:25):
Absolutely, absolutely.

Frank Barry (13:25):
And then, it sound like videos or photos, whatever, posting them on social media. And then, you would do a Zoom call once a month?

Aaron Johnson (13:34):
We did not do that. We had a thing at the end. And of course like the save the date, we incentivized it. Not nearly to the degree that the save the date was incentivized. But the ones who stuck it out and names were drawn at the end, they got some prizes and people loved it.

Frank Barry (13:55):
Love that. Love that. I mean having dinner at home, who knows why, but it's hard.

Aaron Johnson (14:03):
Yeah. It's hard.

Frank Barry (14:05):
It's hard because life is busy in sports, and school, and church activities, and all the things, and work, and in everything. Focusing on it is a big deal, so I dig that. What's one that's coming up? You said save the date is coming up. Is there any other program somewhere?

Aaron Johnson (14:20):
This will be the second time we've done that, but the first one was five years ago. Every church has had some turnover in the last five years. We're no different. So, this will be new to a lot of people. And as people are coming back, we just want to encourage them to invest in their marriages, invest in themselves and have fun as they do it. And here in Texas, things are more open than they are in other parts of the country. So, it's really easy to get out and go around even without masks and all. So, we're getting ready to launch into that January one.

Frank Barry (15:01):
How did this become something that you're personally interested in, passionate about, driven to help families in this way?

Aaron Johnson (15:11):
Well, if I'm going to be honest then I might as well since this is being recorded.

Frank Barry (15:16):
Thank you.

Aaron Johnson (15:17):
Yeah. There was a point in time where I thought that the senior pastor was taking me to breakfast to tell me that he was going to add the youth ministry under my umbrella. The words that came out of his mouth were marriage ministry. And I thought that does not sound like youth ministry any way. I repeat it in my head. And so being the team player, I said, "Well, sure." And the more I thought about, I came back to him and later on I said, "I didn't wake up that morning with a real passion for marriage ministry, but I am going to make a go of this. And I am going to find out what it takes to do that." Because I know it's going to benefit my own marriage as I do that and it has. It's allowed for my wife, Liz, and I to do ministry together, where for 33 years we didn't have that opportunity really. So I have grown into this definitely, and it has become a passion. I didn't have it seven years ago on that day, but it is now.

Frank Barry (16:38):
What else have you done over the seven years? Give me some of the highlights you're like, "This thing we did was amazing. It really built up the families in the church or it built up the kids." Anything stick out to you?

Aaron Johnson (16:51):
One specific thing that we do for our fifth graders for example, we just really bland named it as fifth grade discipleship project. And we run it from the first week in November right up to the last Wednesday before Easter. And what it has turned out to be... Because it's really just a look at the life of Christ, and challenging fifth graders even to the point of questioning whether they really do have faith in God through Christ, because we want their faith to be their faith, not their parents' faith or anybody else's faith.

Aaron Johnson (17:28):
Into that, we build all kinds of exercise and nice stuff besides the Bible teaching. Because we patterned it after Luke 2:52 where it says, "Jesus grew in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and men." So it's very relational, very high energy. And those fifth graders, we've done it five or six years now, are becoming the leaders in the youth group as they grow older. And I really didn't have that mindset going into it that that was my intention that these kids will be the leaders, but they've become the leaders. And that's great, so that's a great thing. And we get their parents involved in that too. We have them come in, share their testimony. They're involved at different levels for that six months.

Frank Barry (18:22):
Right, right. So it's a six-month thing, but is it like a weekly everybody gets together? A monthly thing? What's the-

Aaron Johnson (18:32):
Well, it's weekly and it meets on Wednesday night when our youth meet, in the same space that our youth meet generally, about the same time our youth meet. So, all of a sudden these fifth graders are now feeling like they're part of the youth group Even though they're not. We feed off the energy of the youth group.

Frank Barry (18:50):
And why'd you pick fifth graders for that?

Aaron Johnson (18:54):
Well, I'm glad you asked that and that wasn't even a setup, but here's the deal. When I was in fifth grade living in a small town in Central Indiana that I lived in where my dad's mom, my grandmother, lived. She happened to ask me and some of my friends to come to her house for our study in the Book of Romans. I don't remember anything about that study in the Book of Romans. I only remember that she loved us enough to ask us to do that. I knew she was a woman of faith and woman of character. And she's really the greatest spiritual influence in my life up to the point of her death. That's fifth grade. That's what I remember about fifth grade. And around here it's the last grade before junior high and my last shot at influencing fifth graders, until they go off into the junior high. So, that's why we pick fifth graders.

Frank Barry (19:57):
Yeah. No, I mean I asked actually very specifically, because I've been thinking about that a lot lately personally. Just I have fourth graders and they'll be in fifth grade next year, and middle school's right around the corner. And so, I do think it's very pivotal. Fourth, fifth grade right in there are really important grades, ages that these kids are in before they hit middle school. And so, I just thought it was interesting that you said fifth grade and had some thought around going with that group of kids.

Aaron Johnson (20:32):
Yeah. It's highly relational. We talk about the things that they're experiencing with their friends or their families in school and at home, and we ask tons of questions. Nobody gets to be silent. Nobody gets to hang out in the corner or against the wall. And it's funny even how they change from not wanting to pray necessarily in the first couple of weeks to everybody being on board and just jumping in.

Frank Barry (21:06):
Yeah. And you mentioned that these kids are now becoming the leaders, but you're five or six years into doing it. How many years do you think it's taken for that investment to start to bear fruit?

Aaron Johnson (21:24):
Ask the question in another way.

Frank Barry (21:27):
If you did it for one year, it probably wouldn't have the impact that you've had now that you've done it for five or six years in a row. And you probably saw things... I'm just trying to get it... You did something and you probably saw some great things happen in year one and you kept going. But now that you've done it for five or six years, how long did it take for it to really start humming and be like, "Man, this thing is working. We've built into it. It's really going well."

Aaron Johnson (21:59):
Well. Like I said, I wish I could say I had the intention that this would produce leaders for the youth group. Well, it's done that. Just not because I intended for that to happen. And we got that feedback from the junior high and high school directors, pastors in that the minute they went up into sixth grade, those sixth graders began to be leaders. And now those sixth graders are juniors or maybe even seniors, and it's been through the whole youth group now. So, it's been highly influential.

Frank Barry (22:43):
Yeah, yeah. That's pretty cool. No, I love this stuff. So, thanks for pausing for a little bit and talking through just what you do and the influence you've had in that role. And maybe just a last question on that. How have you seen the families, over the seven years, grow? And just that that ministry get stronger through all these different things that you've been doing.

Aaron Johnson (23:11):
Well, I haven't done any surveys. But I think where we see it most are the parents are more actively involved on Sunday morning for example. And we know that they're participating in these initiatives at home, so they're eating it up for sure. And I can only imagine that it's having the desired effect in the home. But I know in our children's ministry, we have very little turnover, which means these folks want to invest in our kids even if they're not their own kids. That's one indication. But I think our families are definitely stronger as a result.

Frank Barry (24:01):
Yeah, yeah. I love that. Well, let's spend maybe the last few minutes here, it sounds like you're going on the last lap and hoping for the victory lap, but you're still working at the church it sounds like, so you're in this. But you're going to jump out and get into the world of life coaching. And how'd you make that decision and what is it that that is? In the context of faith and being a Christian and all that too, I think that's an interesting journey.

Aaron Johnson (24:32):
I how you framed that question, because that was part of my decision to not do a faith-based program, life coaching program, as I trained. Because I had that piece already. What I wanted to know was what kind of philosophy psychology is the world using these days? So, I went out and found what I think is the most robust program. It's called iPEC. I don't know if I should have said that but I did any way. And it was a really deep dive into what coaching is all about and what it's not all about. And the only question I really had as I went through it, was could I easily marry the secular coaching program with the sacred council of scripture? And I have found the answer to be a resounding yes.

Aaron Johnson (25:31):
Even for example, Psalm 139 says, "We've been fearfully and wonderfully made." In coaching, the thought is everyone has in them what they need to go where they want to go or get what they want to get. They just don't happen to know that it's God who put it there. And so as a coach, coach's role is to draw the good out of them and help them access what's in them so they can achieve their goals, so they can achieve their dreams and get where they want to go. It's been a great year for me. And so, the idea is I'm going to slowly pivot out of church in time and slowly pivot full time into life coaching. But I'm already coaching.

Frank Barry (26:20):
Yeah. All right. Okay. So you've already gotten into it and you've obviously done a bunch of training, and education, and things like that. What's the transition plan look like when you're making a move? I'm sure the church is going to hate to lose you. That's a big deal.

Aaron Johnson (26:37):
And this is not any news to anyone by any means because we've talked about it along the way. But as the revenue increases in the one, I'll probably lop off a day in the other so I can devote more to coaching. It'll be-

Frank Barry (26:57):
A slow transition. Yeah.

Aaron Johnson (26:59):
A slow transition. And one thing that we're going through right now at the church is we're in a search for a senior pastor, and I'm the old guy on the staff. I'm the one who's been there the longest. And one thing that I do want to see through is getting that person in place and settled really well. We've had a lot of transition in our staff this year. I want us to be as healthy as we can be when the time is right for me to fully make that transition.

Frank Barry (27:28):
Yeah, yeah. I love that. Well, like I said, I'm sure the church is going to hate losing you, but it doesn't sound like it's going to be a fast thing and you'll help get the right person in place, so that's awesome.

Aaron Johnson (27:40):
Yeah, yeah. I mean, would I move to coaching tomorrow if money weren't an issue? Maybe, but that doesn't mean I would disengage from the church either though. I would still be available to help see that transition to what it needs to be.

Frank Barry (27:57):
Right, right. Absolutely. I love that. Well, two quick things to close. Two questions I want to ask you. Give me a book that you've read, and it can be recent or something from long ago. But a book that you read that's had a major impact on your life.

Aaron Johnson (28:14):
Oh gosh. Well, everything Paul Tripp. Everything Paul Tripp. And a lady named Shaunti Feldhahn has written a lot of stuff. She's a researcher, but one of the things she wrote was 30-day Kindness Challenge. I'm going through that a second time. I love that because I think what a lot of marriages, a lot of families, a lot of just any type of relationship is missing, particularly in this day and age of... Well, a lot of what we saw last year in major cities and continues today in politics and all is this idea of kindness. People are just not being kind and there is an intentional way to be kind. And kindness has an absolute effect on marriages and in families, but it goes beyond that. And so, 30-day Kindness Challenge, I would recommend to anybody, any marriage.

Frank Barry (29:21):
Love that. That is a great recommendation. Okay. One last one, and I'm not sure... Some people just really lands on and some people are like, "No, I don't really do that." But are you currently listening to any podcast that you'd recommend to listeners?

Aaron Johnson (29:42):
Yeah. I just started one today. I think it's called Bible Recap with Tara Lee Cobble. And it's found within the Bible app. There's one on fathering that I listen to, but I've lost its name too. But the Bible Recap is the Bible in a year, in a chronological order. So, my wife and I are doing that.

Frank Barry (30:18):
Love that, love that. Well, Pastor Aaron, this has been awesome. Thank you for spending some time with us.

Aaron Johnson (30:24):
Absolutely. I hope it helps many people. Some people, one person.

Frank Barry (30:30):
100%. The listeners will eat it up. Whether you're thinking about moving on to another thing after your pastoral career or you're digging into marriage ministry and kids and all that. I think there's a bunch of great resources here.

Aaron Johnson (30:47):
Absolutely. Love to talk with anybody.

Frank Barry (30:49):
Yeah, absolutely. And maybe one quick one, do you have a website for your new coaching-

Aaron Johnson (30:56):
I actually do, I actually do.

Frank Barry (30:56):
Okay. What is it? Throw it out there.

Aaron Johnson (30:57):
Yeah. It's yourbetterlifecoach. All one word. Yourbetterlifecoach. Now, that doesn't mean I'm the better coach. It's just that I'm coaching you towards your better life.

Frank Barry (31:08):
Your better life. There you go. It's your better life.

Aaron Johnson (31:11):
Yourbetterlifecoach.com.

Frank Barry (31:13):
All right. Yourbetterlifecoach.com. Well, again. Thank you, Aaron. And thanks everybody for watching. Appreciate you guys. We will be back next week with another episode of Modern Church Leader. See you.

Narrator (31:27):
If you enjoyed this episode of the Modern Church Leader, consider sharing it with the pastor or minister you think would benefit the most from listening to this conversation. You can send them to modernchurchleader.com or share this episode directly from your podcast app. Be sure to subscribe for free on YouTube, Apple Podcast, or Spotify so you never miss an episode, and we'll see you again next week with another conversation here on the Modern Church Leader.