Salvation Caps a Year of God's Faithfulness: 2024 Year in Review

    This year is one we will never forget! It was jam packed with traveling, weddings, ministry and most importantly, the Lord. We saw God working all over in our lives this year. His marvelous provision, His glorious presence, and His gentle peace.

    Looking back at this year is an incredible way to remind our hearts and minds of the faithfulness of God. We want to share with you some highlights of our year to glorify God and hopefully encourage you as it has encouraged us! One thing to note is that God graciously continues to give us opportunities to share the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ everywhere we go. This year we had gospel connections in six countries including Guatemala, Thailand, the USA and a few others. Working with Adventures in Missions, we had the opportunity to take part in training and discipling between 250 and 300 people this year through the World Race program. The Lord has given us a few different opportunities to cultivate community and discipleship in Gainesville through a weekly women’s breakfast and a weekly men’s lunch. Lord willing, both of those will continue through this next year. We share these things not to boast in ourselves but to share about how the God is moving in our lives.  As mentioned before, this year included multiple weddings, mainly in the summer, which was bookended by our very own on October 5th! The day was absolutely beautiful and was marked by the simplicity of the gospel and presence of God!!

    We had planned to spend the end of 2024 at a Christian conference in Dallas, Texas with some friends. We quickly discovered, however, that God had other plans for us! On our route to Dallas from Minnesota where we spent the holidays with Baylee’s family, we had a layover in Atlanta. Before we even boarded our plane to ATL, our flight to Dallas had been getting repeatedly delayed. When we landed in Atlanta, it was hours past dinner time, so we decided to grab something to eat, get to our gate, and pray about whether we should continue to wait out the delay. 

    While enjoying our cold Chick Fil A fries, we heard a distraught woman who had recently boarded a flight coming back down the jet bridge near our gate. She was yelling at the attendant, begging her to get her on a flight home as soon as possible. For a moment, I (Baylee) thought, “whatever she needs to get home for must be REALLY important, because she’s basically letting the whole airport know that she needed to be on that flight”. Then, I heard the Holy Spirit say to me, “Go to her”. 

A wrestle between God and I lasted for a few minutes as I came up with all the excuses not to go. 

“What would I even say to her, Lord?”

“What if I totally get rejected?” 

“It seems like she’s still very upset, what if I make it worse?”

My monologue of excuses continued, until, suddenly, the woman walked away from our gate. My heart dropped - by waiting and making excuses, I had just disobeyed what the Lord had asked me to do. As a flood of shame rushed into my heart, the Father, in His lovingkindness, interrupted my thoughts and so gently said to me, “my child, I knew you wouldn’t do it the first time. I’m going to give you another chance”. 

As I thanked God for His grace, the woman came back, passionately walking toward the desk to again beg the attendant to book her a flight. I knew that this time, I had to be bold. 

With my heart pounding, I walked over to the woman, introduced myself, and expressed that my husband and I were also having flight issues, and that I was sorry she was too. Immediately, I was met with minutes of opposition - the stress of her situation caused her to believe that I was airport staff sent to her to make more excuses for the delay in getting her home. I assured her finally, that I was just a girl who sensed that God wanted to tell her that He sees her, and that she’s loved. 

As soon as I expressed Jesus’ love to her, the woman’s face softened, and she invited me to come sit with her. As I walked her through the gospel, it was as if I was watching someone be resurrected from death to life! I told her the truth of Romans 10:9, that “if you confess with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord’ and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved”. As soon as I told her this, she began to pray, and in that very moment, accepted Jesus as her Savior!!! Praise God!! I got to walk her through some first steps in getting to know Jesus, exchange phone numbers, and watch as her demeanor completely changed when speaking with the attendant a few minutes after our conversation. This was now a smiling woman full of peace! 

After that interaction, we felt as though we had done what God has placed us in that airport, with multiple flight delays, to do. After more prayer, we decided to go home to Gainesville to rest and prepare for the World Race January training camp! We pray that this testimony encourages you and reminds you of the power of Christ’s cross, demonstrating His perfect love for all people!!!!

    With all of this being said, we are so honored and humbled to celebrate another year of God’s faithfulness and your kindness in partnering with us in this ministry! As we head into 2025, here are some prayer requests of ours:

• That we would seek first the Kingdom of God (Matthew 6:33) in 2025 in all areas of our life- as individuals, as a married couple, in family, in friendships, and in ministry!

• That we would be obedient and sensitive to the Lord’s guidance in 2025!

• We’d love even more boldness to disciple people and share the gospel more!!!

• Heading into 2025, we are 50% of the way to reaching our monthly fundraising goal of $2,100 / month! We’re praising God for His provision through our incredibly generous and kind monthly supporters!! We will need to reach 65% of this goal by February - pray that the Lord would stir more people to cover us in prayer and to come around us as the Body of Christ to support us financially in our ministry! 

• We will be in need of a vehicle very soon, so we’d love prayer for the right one to be highlighted to us at the right time!

If you’re feeling led to inquire about what it could look like to support us prayerfully or financially, please send us a message! Please feel free to send  us your prayer requests as well, we’d love to pray for you! You can reach us at:

ethanandbayleejohnston@gmail.com

    We love you all and are deeply thankful for the beautiful community of people God has provided us with! In closing, as we praise God for His presence will all of us in the new year, we will leave you with 2 Corinthians 3:18: “And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit”. 

With love, 

Ethan and Baylee Johnston