January 2008 – The need for a Biblical understanding of life is what prompted the founding of two family ministries – JH Ranch in 1980 and Impact 360 in 2006. Both ministries seek to influence America’s present and future by teaching young people to take ownership of their faith, become servant leaders, build healthy relationships, function as a community, understand their purpose in life, and find significance – all according to God’s Word.

While both ministries share common goals, they function in different ways, at different places, through different people for different ages.

Get away to JH Ranch
JH Ranch began taking shape in 1979 when Gene Johnston and his wife, parents of 12, purchased a 300-acre hunting lodge in northern California as a means of fulfilling a promise to the Lord. In his early 20s, Gene had told the Lord, “If you will provide the resources, I will invest them in a manner that will have eternal value.”

Years later, that is exactly what he did by purchasing the land and turning it over to his son, Bruce Johnston, who made his father’s dream come true when Johnston Hospitality Ranch opened its doors in 1980. Its international office is located in Birmingham, Alabama, and the ranch now employs about 30 full-time staff and approximately 140 summer volunteers. Bruce remains the director and has watched the ministry flourish over the last 27 years.

The non-profit non-denominational ministry started with a leadership program called Second Wind. Five girls attended. Now, junior high and high school students from all 50 states and 14 countries come to various programs at the ranch.

“My desire was to pass on to young people part of my own personal journey of how … to find relevance in your faith, and it continued to grow and grow over the years into what it is now,” Bruce said.

The purpose of the initial leadership program was “to help students develop a practical understanding of life purpose, personal values, and leadership skills,” according to the ministry’s Web site.

Second Wind, which is for high school students, led to the development of Second Wind Challenge for junior high students. Later came Trac II, a follow-up to Second Wind; Parent and Son/Daughter Adventure, a one-week program designed to strengthen parent/child relationships; Husband and Wife Adventure, a one-week getaway that fosters understanding of a Godly marriage; and Cloud 9, a one-week program about marriage for engaged or seriously dating couples.

All these programs take place in the summer months in the great outdoors. According to the Web site, it’s a place that challenges people “to explore their true purposes in life. To develop their own strengths, while trusting God for His strength. To deepen their relationships with others, and with God.”

“I thought if I could get kids [and adults] in an undistracted environment outside the four walls of a classroom, that we could do a better job of teaching them by way of practical application,” Bruce explained. “For the most part, kids are information rich, experience poor.”

Therefore, the ranch seeks to equip teens, parents and spouses with an understanding of God’s purpose for life through content and application.

The content comes by way of Biblical messages taught under the Big Top – a large circus tent with a Western flare. Bruce does most of the teaching, which covers a variety of topics including problem solving, goal setting, relationships, obedience, and reconciliation, among others. Then ranch guests are given the opportunity to put the lessons into action through adventure-based activities such as ropes courses, wilderness experiences, white water rafting, rodeos, mountain biking and rock climbing.

“Most of these kids grow up and they’re pretty bored … and frustrated with religion because they don’t really see any relevance to it, …” Bruce explained.

So JH Ranch is helping its guests find personal relevance in knowing God while restoring and strengthening the relationships central for Christian growth.

“We have discovered that … what really bonds people together are shared goals and shared challenges,” he added.

“The adventure activities push both parent and child out of their comfort zones,” said Tom Spalding, father of five girls and multiple-time participant in the Father and Daughter Adventure.

“Getting to JH Ranch is a major commitment in time and resources,” Spalding added, “but the benefits are eternal.”

Spalding found that many of the Godly principles he was trying to teach at home were reinforced at the ranch.

“In fact, the dads were encouraged to spend most of their time listening and being vulnerable,” he admitted. “One of the main challenges for a parent is letting go in a wise and God-ordained manner. Now, I tend to spend less time talking, more time listening, and more time praying.”

Lauren and Jason Beckner also learned how to better relate to one another after participating in the Husband and Wife Adventure. At first, both were reluctant to spend a week in California away from their five-month-old daughter Reese.

“But things just fell into place, and I could feel God saying that by investing in our marriage we would be investing in Reese,” Lauren said. “Having time to ourselves in a setting that presses you so close to God just puts things in perspective.

“We were able to see clearer than ever, how when we are both in sync with each other and both spending our own separate time with God, we are more sensitive to each other and to hearing the Holy Spirit in our lives,” she added.

Spending time alone with God is one of the main disciplines taught at JH Ranch because it is central to all other aspects of life.

Sixteen-year-old Carly Rolfe, who took part in the Second Wind program before going into ninth grade, said her “solo time” – 24 hours alone with God – was the highlight of her ranch visit.

“It was so good to get away from everything … and just to focus on the one and true creator,” Rolfe said.

Not only was Rolfe’s relationship with Christ strengthened at camp, so was her relationship with her parents.

“I go to my parents for advice now, which is something I never used to do,” she admitted.

“When kids leave the program they begin to realize how much they need their parents to find the success they’re looking for in life, where the culture is doing everything to pull kids away from parents,” Bruce added.

In an attempt to combat the negative influences of the culture, there is a growing need and desire for what’s taking place at JH Ranch. Therefore, the ranch is now hosting weekend events called Outback America in select U.S. cities. The ranch is also going global.

“The government of Israel has been sponsoring Jewish kids to come to the ranch over the past six years and because of the long-term impact on the lives of these Jewish children, they have asked us to come and develop a national leadership program in Israel,” Bruce said. “Their desire is that 10,000 kids a year go through this program.

“And I believe that it’s just really the beginning of where it’s going to go in the future,” he added. “We just really haven’t even scratched the surface of the impact this can have.”

Get real at Impact 360
John and Trudy Cathy White were involved in international missions for 20 years before returning to Atlanta, Georgia, and founding Lifeshape Inc., a family foundation in association with Chick-fil-A.

The program’s Web site describes Lifeshape as being designed “to facilitate the development of Godly women and men shaped by a passionate walk and authentic personal relationship with Jesus Christ.”

One way Lifeshape does that is through Impact 360, a nine-month residential program that prepares 18- to 20-year-old high school graduates for college and life.

Impact 360 began in 2006 after the Whites decided that the most effective way to invest in young people would be to come alongside them during the crucial transitional period from high school to college.

“Our kids go away to college or university and they’re hit smack in the face with all these different ideas about how their lives should operate, and they don’t know how to handle it,” said Larry Cox, director of Impact 360. “Most of them, rather than take a stand for Christ, will simply be quiet and go along with the crowd.”

“I don’t know if you’ve been on a university campus anytime lately, but God is almost non-existent in those places,” said Zack Fallon, an Impact 360 graduate. “I grew up going to church and this faith thing that my family always talked about was something I thought I understood, but I, quite honestly, just didn’t really get it.”

So Impact 360 exists to help young people understand their purpose and calling, clearly articulate a Christian worldview and defend their faith, John explained.

“We aren’t trying to create missionaries or pastors out of them, although we know some will be,” John explained. “We really want them to be, as God calls them in the marketplace, vibrant believers [and] followers of Christ [who are] living out their faith.”

Therefore, Impact 360 is set up “to be an interactive and experiential living/learning community focused on Biblical Christian worldview, vocational understanding, spiritual and life formation and a month-long international experience,” as stated on the Web site. Students must apply for and be accepted to the program, much like the college enrollment process.

Impact 360 students learn to function as a community in which they go to school, work and minister. The program has an academic partnership with Union University that allows students to complete 15 hours of college credit by taking classes on core values, vocation, the church, Christian worldview and apologetics.

“We seek to bring in the very best Biblical scholars and philosophers that we can find,” Cox said. Norman Geisler, J.P. Moreland, David Dockery, Os Guinness, David Noble, Dale Tackett and Michael Flaherty are among those.

Students are also given the opportunity to put their education into practice by working and volunteering in the local community. One of the key aspects is teaching students about servant leadership. Chick-fil-A executives take the Impact 360 class through the Chick-fil-A University in Leadership program.

“So the basis of what we teach them is based on an acronym that is used with all the 45,000 employees of Chick-fil-A, and it’s called SERVE,” Cox explained. Through SERVE, students learn to shape the future, engage and develop others, reinvent continuously, value results and relationships and embody the values.

“Servant leadership was probably the [main] thing that I walked away [with] from Impact, …” said Fallon, who now attends Wheaton College as a changed man. He entered the program with a self-righteous attitude and left with a humbled heart.

“When I got to Wheaton, one of the things I just try to remind myself is I’m not here to get a degree. I’m not here to play baseball, which I am playing. I’m not here to make a bunch of friends, but I’m here to glorify the Lord by serving Him and serving others,” Fallon explained. “I’m just trying to be constantly humbled and constantly reminded that my role as a follower of Christ on this campus is to serve other people.”

Fallon takes his role seriously. That’s why he recently organized a service group within his baseball team. He believed the ball team should serve its players as well as the campus and local community.

Through Impact 360, students are also given the opportunity to serve others in a foreign culture by traveling abroad where they are challenged to live out, share and defend their faith.

The hands-on experiences combined with the Biblical training create a community that fosters spiritual growth by helping young people become better witnesses and defenders of the Gospel of Christ.

For Fallon, taking a year off from college and participating in Impact 360 gave him a greater sense of purpose.

“For nine months I just completely ran straight toward God, and the closer I felt like I was getting to God, the more I realized how fallen I truly was,” Fallon said. “[Now] I’ve gained such a deeper sense of why I’m living and breathing.”  

▶ JH Ranch
www.jhranch.com
800-242-1224
Now accepting reservations for summer programs

▶ Impact 360
www.impact360.net
678-999-2181, ext. 360
Enrollment process already underway for fall ’08. Only 25 applicants selected