What’s in this Episode?

We are sitting down with Pastor Mark Johnson to discuss Jonathan Hardy’s book, Arrow Striker, along with his 4-week sermon series, and the impact they had on Pastor Mark and his church.

Read the Transcript

Dick Hardy 0:06
Hey, thanks very much for joining us today. Jonathan Hardy and Dick Hardy. We’re hanging out with our good friend, Mark Johnson, from the great state of Illinois. Can you still call Illinois a great state, Mark? I’m just checking.

Mark Johnson 0:17
It’s questionable. There’s a lot of great people here. Great history here. Confused leaders here.

Dick Hardy 0:31
Oh, well, but you’re right there in the Land of Lincoln in Springfield, Illinois, so you’re good to go. We’ve got two people that joined our life group and they’ve moved from Illinois to hang out in Missouri. So we probably won’t get going on the Illinois and Missouri thing. But I’m sure all sorts of people have opinions on that.

Dick Hardy 0:50
Hey, listen, Mark has been a good friend for a lot of years. And he and I have worked together on a number of projects. Most recently, when Jonathan released his book, Arrow Striker, Mark was one of the first ones to jump on board and say, hey, we might like to engage with this. So Mark, tell us a little bit about what you saw at the beginning, when you saw the Arrow Striker stuff coming out?

Mark Johnson 1:17
Well, I’ll tell you both what happened for us as you guys sent us the book. And, you know, as a friend, I wanted to read the book. And so I picked it up. And what really captured me right off the bat was not necessarily the title, Arrow Striker, any of us who’ve read the Bible know about Joash, we know about the 2 Kings story, but that was kind of intriguing.

Mark Johnson 1:40
But that subline, and I’ve written it down so I can read it just right to you, Live with Purpose and Leave an Eternal Impact… Every Single Day. That really kind of captured me and how we work as a church. We have a vision statement that comes off of John 10:10 that says that we want every person to have life to the full.

Mark Johnson 2:05
And then we define that and one of our subtitles is that every person would find the fulfilment, the purpose of life, that comes from expressing the divinely given gifts. That fit right in with that, so I wanted to read the book. And as I began to read it, the stories and the things that Jonathan was telling in the book and the instruction he was giving, I thought it was just perfect for our church family.

Dick Hardy 2:34
Wow. That’s so cool. That’s very kind of you to say. Because obviously, I’m the dad and I’m proud of Jonathan for having produced the book. So, I think he did a great job with it.

Dick Hardy 2:46
Well, you know, right off the bat, you were literally the first one who said to us, Hey, what about having Jonathan come in? Would he be available to come in and speak? And so we did get that booked right off the bat. So what was your thinking in that whole process, after you’d read the book and you made that inquiry?

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Mark Johnson 3:08
Well, it was towards the end of the year last year, sometime in the last couple of months that we read the book. We were looking at the next four or five months, and we were looking at where we were as a church coming out of COVID. And a lot of us were struggling. I know we were at least struggling with getting people re-engaged in ministry.

Mark Johnson 3:30
And we wanted to find some way to try to re-engage people in ministry. So the first thing that I saw is, boy, if I can get people to read this book, this will spark a fire of desire to be used of God in their everyday life and ministry. And so we were looking and saying, let’s use this over the first four months of the year, to just try to get the book in people’s hands and get them to read it.

Mark Johnson 4:01
So we made a strategic decision to buy enough of those books that over the next four months we could sell them. We kind of know how many we’re going to sell every time we encourage people to buy a book. And we’ll usually sell 140/150 books. We know what visitors we have and we thought, let’s not only do that, let’s give one to every visitor. The thought being that we will put in that book an invitation to come back and hear the author talk about the book.

Mark Johnson 4:38
So we wanted to set all of that up and we looked at our calendar. When’s a good time to do that? And we thought, boy, if we can do that over a four month period, four months from now, right in the middle of April, right after Easter. And then go into a 4-week series.

Mark Johnson 4:56
And again, the thought was maybe it’s that people read this book and they’ll want to come back and meet the author. People who will be there on that Sunday of Easter will want to come back and hear. We’ll kind of make an emphasis of it that week. And so that was kind of the genesis of what we were working through on our church staff of how to use the book to encourage people to be used of God.

Jonathan Hardy 5:22
Well, and I will say, I’ll chime in Mark, that I really, first of all, appreciated that. It was a lot of fun. And I was so thankful to be able to come on out and be with you and your church, and all the people part of the church. And, it was just such a wonderful weekend there together. And so first, obviously, thank you for that.

Jonathan Hardy 5:42
And, you know, I’m curious to know, for those who might be thinking about doing something similar, how do you know how many books you think you’re going to sell? I guess maybe that’s just over time, you kind of ballpark that, or?

Mark Johnson 5:59
Yeah, we have had a history of encouraging people to read books. And so we kind of know, if we get up and give an emphasis on a book, this is the kind of response we’re going to generally get. And so we kind of knew that from history. And we kind of knew from history, you know, what kind of visitor accounts we would have, and people that would sign up. And so we were pretty secure in what we would do.

Jonathan Hardy 6:23
Now, do you normally give, outside of giving the book to your visitors, do you normally give another gift to them? Or was this something unique? Or was it a part of something bigger? What was that like?

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Mark Johnson 6:36
Well, there’s a normal package that they get, if they come and they fill out a connection card. And there’s several things that are in there. And it just happened to be at a point where maybe one of the larger things that we normally give, we were running out of them. And we said, well, let’s just replace that with this book at this point in time. And so we kind of switched those out.

Jonathan Hardy 6:37
Okay. Well, now I’m gonna get myself in trouble here with this, because I actually don’t know the answer to this question, but I’m just curious. Were you able, with the books you purchased and then resold, combined with the books that you purchased and gave away, were you able to recoup the money? Were you still in the hole? Did it profit for you? What did end up happening for the church?

Mark Johnson 7:21
You know, we were very, very close to even on it. And we may have been a few dollars behind or a few dollars ahead.

Jonathan Hardy 7:27
Oh, wow.

Mark Johnson 7:28
But what we did is we kind of figured that we were at a point that if we sold the books that we sold, we were selling them at $15 a book, or two for $20. And we figured, if we sold the number of books we normally sold, that would come very, very close to us recouping the money we invested in the books.

Jonathan Hardy 7:53
Okay

Dick Hardy 7:54
That you invested in the books you sold and the books you gave away.

Mark Johnson 7:58
And the books we gave away. And we told people up front, we said, Look, we’re giving these away to visitors. All of you who come here all the time, you’ve got to buy the book. You’re investing in visitors. And that was our deal, you’re investing in visitors.

Dick Hardy 8:07
Yep

Jonathan Hardy 8:08
I love that.

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Mark Johnson 8:16
And people don’t, they don’t resent that. They want to help. Some people say, Oh, what can I do? I said, you can go look online to try and buy it cheaper. You’re not going to get it cheaper than what we’re giving it to you. You can buy it here and it’s still a good deal. So there you go.

Dick Hardy 8:35
You know, you said that Jonathan came in there the Sunday after Easter. And then, what’d you run, a 4-week series, something of that nature?

Mark Johnson 8:46
Yeah, this year that was perfect. It gave us four weeks going up to Mother’s Day.

Jonathan Hardy 8:52
Yeah

Mark Johnson 8:53
And, so it gave us four weeks to work through that to Mother’s Day. And so we divided all of those things up and I think you guys gave us some things to look at. And we kind of took it from there to divide it up and how we were going to present the cause of being involved in ministry.

Mark Johnson 9:10
I love the double emphasis, this idea of getting involved in using your gifts, finding the place where your called. And inside the book it really explains that might be a church ministry, or it might be something bigger that God has for your life. Now, the truth is most people are not going to go become missionaries.

Jonathan Hardy 9:33
Right

Mark Johnson 9:34
Some will, but that all people should get involved in ministry in the church. And we were trying to re-encourage people back to that buy-in.

Dick Hardy 9:44
Yeah

Mark Johnson 9:44
But not only that, the buy-in that I can be going out every day and God may use me today. Be aware of the opportunities.

Jonathan Hardy 9:55
Yeah

Mark Johnson 9:56
And trying to help people capture the opportunities that just come our way, from day to day.

Jonathan Hardy 10:03
Yeah, I really liked, you know, you guys had that card that you have there for people to get involved. And it’s really helpful from from the speaker standpoint. It was helpful just be able to hold that card up and and say, Hey, for you guys today, this is an opportunity to strike your arrows. And, you know, I don’t know how many did it immediately in that day. I know sometimes people have to process it.

Mark Johnson 10:25
Sure. Over the four weeks, here’s what we did. Over the four weeks, we did that. We had places where people could sign up for ministry, get involved in ministry. And the first two weeks we really centralized that call to church ministries, things inside of our fellowship that they could get involved with. Whether that’s a youth group, or the children’s department, or the choir, or a music department. And then the last two weeks, we shifted gears just a little bit, that was still available, but we brought in about five or six of our local ministries to let people get involved in local ministries.

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Dick Hardy 11:08
Local, as defined as outside of the church.

Mark Johnson 11:11
Outside of the church, yes. One of them was a feeding program that gives food to homeless people and gives food to shelters. And basically they make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Hundreds and hundreds of them every day. And they go pass them out. And they have fruit an all sorts of other stuff that they pass out.

Jonathan Hardy 11:32
That’s my kind of ministry, right there.

Dick Hardy 11:32
That’s right. That’s what I like.

Mark Johnson 11:36
Here’s what happened this week. So this week, our kids are down at camp and one of our young ladies is down there, a young mother is down there with our high school students at camp. Her husband’s at home with her three daughters and he posts on Facebook this week of him and the three girls making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for that ministry that they got involved in…

Jonathan Hardy 12:04
Wow

Mark Johnson 12:05
back in May. They’ve got these young girls, they’re all grade school girls, making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for homeless people. And so that’s just one of the things that kind of came out of there.

Dick Hardy 12:20
That’s great. You know, one of the things that inspired me with Arrow Striker, is the looking for opportunities, as you said the byline there, every single day. When my wife and I pray in the morning, we haven’t prayed yet today, but we will. We pray for divine appointments.

Mark Johnson 12:41
Yes

Dick Hardy 12:42
We’re doing this recording on a Thursday. Yes, we ask for divine appointments on Sunday, or on Wednesday. But on Thursday, with nothing scheduled, other than what we’re doing this week, we ask for divine appointments. That’s what the book challenges you to do. It challenges you to listen to what the Lord is saying to you in the moment.

Dick Hardy 13:06
You know, Jonathan, maybe you could talk just a little bit about, to the pastors, about the 4-week sermon series that you make available to pastors, particularly those who are looking to book you.

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Jonathan Hardy 13:19
Yeah, we’ve got a 4-week sermon series. And so what we did with Mark, and we’ve done with another church as well, and there’s others that are on the docket, is you know, I’ve come out and kicked off the first week. Kind of introducing the concept of Arrow Striker, and you know, share a little sermon based on that 2 Kings 13 story with Elijah and Jehoash.

Jonathan Hardy 13:41
And then from there, the next three weeks are deeper dives into different aspects of what it looks like to be an arrow striker. Which essentially is to be making that difference, as we’ve already been talking about, for the Kingdom, getting the victory for the Kingdom, in whatever context and using whatever gifts people have, and so forth.

Jonathan Hardy 14:01
And the beautiful thing that I like about that sermon series is it gives the pastor, in this case Mark and Calvary Church, the freedom and flexibility to take as much or as little as they want. And we actually manuscripted all four sermons, so even for someone who doesn’t want to bring me in necessarily, you could even do a variation of the kick-off sermon yourself.

Jonathan Hardy 14:28
And then the three other sermons are fully manuscripted. And we have about a 10 minute video explanation for each of the sermons, so that way, you kind of can wrap your mind a little bit more into the rationale for why we pick the verses, and how this works, and how the sermon flows from start to finish.

Jonathan Hardy 14:28
And, you know, I don’t know in your case, Mark, I don’t know how much you guys actually utilized. I know that the other church that we have already done this with, they took some parts, but not all of it. And that’s really the design is, hey, if you want the whole thing in a can, here you go.

Dick Hardy 14:59
Pick and choose.

Jonathan Hardy 14:58
But, the nice thing is too, everyone’s going to put their spin and their flavor and their personality into it. But it certainly, hopefully, helps minimize some of the front loaded work you have to do in sermon prep.

Mark Johnson 15:15
Yeah, I think that’s exactly what we did. We looked at what is our goal at the end of the four weeks. And we looked at all the stuff that really fit with that and put that in place. And then any other adjustment we wanted to make, we were able to do that.

Mark Johnson 15:32
So we didn’t feel locked in to something, but we felt like we had a foundation of things to work with, that would help us move towards the goal that we had. That was really trying to help people emphasize and capture what was in the book on these points we just talked about a moment ago.

Dick Hardy 15:51
Yeah, very good.

Jonathan Hardy 15:52
Yeah. That’s awesome.

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Dick Hardy 15:53
Mark, you were literally the first one to schedule Jonathan. Now, we had a few others that actually happened before we got to your date there in April. But, you’re talking to a bunch of pastors right now, pastors and leaders. And as someone who has experienced this process, with the Arrow Striker book tour that Jonathan has been on, what would you say to a pastor who might think, Man, maybe I should look at bringing Jonathan in and kicking something like this off? What would you say to them?

Mark Johnson 16:29
Well, I would say to anybody that wants to help their people become people who think in the every day about ministry, that this book is a great book for them to read. If we want to get people involved in church ministry, it’s a great book to read. If you want them to think about why are we sending missionaries, why are we doing all this other stuff, this is a good book to read.

Mark Johnson 16:56
And then to bring Jonathan in, after your people have read that book and re-emphasize it, just reminds them and refreshes them. We all read stuff, and then it kind of peaks and we’re real excited, and then it kind of dies down and we forget about it. But to bring someone in, to bring Jonathan in, who’s the author, and give people a chance to hear that passion and then do the series, helps move people a little bit down the line. And some people way down the line, to really dive into ministry for the very first time.

Jonathan Hardy 17:31
Yeah

Mark Johnson 17:31
You know, I’ve been asking this question a lot to our church family. We’re in a time where we have the biggest churches we’ve ever had in our country. We have podcasts everywhere. We have books available every place. We have all sorts of things going on, faith seminars to go to. Things to go to. And with all this great stuff going on, our country’s moral culture is running from God.

Mark Johnson 18:04
And so why is there this weakness in us? And what I come back to is, you know, First Corinthians 14, where it talks about the gift of prophecy, and the importance of us being these people who are led by the Spirit, and speak in a language people can understand. Things that will bring life and the reality of God into their life. And I think we’ve neglected that.

Mark Johnson 18:35
And I think a book like this helps bring people back to a hunger to say, You know what, I don’t want to just go out and say, Oh, there’s somebody across the street, I think I’ll run over and preach at them. But, Hey, there’s somebody across the street, and God’s leading me over there to build a relationship with them, to help them, to serve them in some way. And they’re sensing that leading of the Spirit. And I think the Church just needs to release its power that God has in us. And I think Arrow Striker, this book, and this teaching, can help us move that direction with our people.

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Dick Hardy 19:10
Yeah, that is so good.

Jonathan Hardy 19:12
Wow, thank you, Mark.

Dick Hardy 19:13
Jonathan, any parting thoughts you’d say to a pastor who might consider picking up the book? And oh, by the way, let me mention, the book is available on Audible and Kindle. You can go to Amazon, of course, and get that. You can go to arrowstriker.com, and you’ll see the whole range of resources that are available relative to the book. But Jonathan, give us a parting shot. What do you want the pastor to take away from this conversation?

Jonathan Hardy 19:47
Well, I just want you to know that my passion is to help support and build the local church. And it’s to come alongside you, and sometimes an outside voice coming in to speak to people about getting involved in ministry and in using this unique story from the Old Testament, which is one that most people don’t know about.

Jonathan Hardy 20:08
And I’m amazed at how many people don’t even know that that was in the Bible. People have read the Bible before multiple times and have said, Man, I just missed that story. I never saw that before. And so it’s kind of a unique opportunity to have that particular story that really lends itself so perfectly toward ministry involvement, community involvement, and just helping people be aware of the service opportunities.

Jonathan Hardy 20:33
And I like what you said, Mark, about how people don’t have to go become a missionary of some other country. And that’s kind of the whole heart behind the book really, is to help people realize that right where they are, God has uniquely placed people to make a difference. They don’t have to drastically change their life.

Jonathan Hardy 20:48
Now, there might be some people who God does call to take big steps of faith like that. And certainly we want them to do that. But, you know, I’d say the majority of people, if they would just be more aware, being led by the Spirit like you’re talking about, looking and listening for the opportunities that God wants to give them right where they are, that’s where God wants them to be missionaries.

Mark Johnson 21:09
Yep, that’s right.

Jonathan Hardy 21:09
In their local community, their neighborhood, their school, the workplace, and of course then serving at the church. And so, my whole heart behind this is just like we did with Mark at Calvary Church, to simply come alongside and help lift your arms and to help motivate and inspire people. Whether they’ve been on the sidelines or maybe they’re involved, but God has more he wants to do through them, to help them to step into whatever God might have for each and every individual.

Dick Hardy 21:39
Man, you guys got me all excited. Now, as you might guess, as the Dad, I’ve already read the book I think four times.

Jonathan Hardy 21:47
Probably more.

Dick Hardy 21:48
I gotta tell you, the stories in the book will draw you in. And it’s an easy read. He was smart enough to make… what do you have, 17 chapters?

Jonathan Hardy 22:00
Yep

Dick Hardy 22:00
And so, it moves along.

Dick Hardy 22:03
What’s that?

Jonathan Hardy 22:04
About 10 pages each.

Dick Hardy 22:06
Yeah, so it’s an easy read, I think you would really enjoy it. So go to arrowstriker.com. You can get all the information. You can drop a note off to me because I’m the publicist dad, at [email protected] and I’d be glad to help you in any way. Get Jonathan booked or get you books or resources.

Dick Hardy 22:24
Really appreciate you taking time to be with Mark Johnson from Calvary Church in Springfield, Illinois and Jonathan and I both here with Leaders.Church. We pray God’s best on you as you continue to move forward and lead people to Jesus. Make it a great one today and be blessed.

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