Hello! My name is Scott Johnson, and I am a missionary with Alongside Ministries International, working in the Czech Republic with the Czech Evangelical Alliance as of May 2025.

{a brief bio}

I was born and raised in Richland, Washington USA, an only child to loving parents and a supportive church family.

I'm not sure what constitutes a "typical childhood," but I suppose mine was typical of a quiet, nerdy kid. Okay, so maybe I was a little weird. But I always knew that I was loved.

My family had instilled in me a passion for travel from a young age, hauling me around four different continents before I finished high school. It's one of the greatest gifts they ever gave me. Travel was a family value. It had a significant impact on my life in subsequent years.

As a teen-ager, I sensed God's call on my life to serve in full-time missions, and I attribute much of that to the value my family placed on experiencing and loving different corners of the world. As I entered adulthood, I began to make practical choices for how to get from "here" to "there." My calling became more refined, and was drawn to Latin America.

I graduated from Pacific Lutheran University in 1989, and then from the Lutheran Bible Institute in Anaheim, California in 1991.

I began my missionary service with the Latin America Mission (now merged with Mesa Global) in Costa Rica in 1991. There I worked with an organization called Roblealto, which served children and youth at risk in the San José area of Costa Rica. I worked with the kids and also in administration, getting more and more involved in the communication side of things.

My interest in communications as an important component of mission work prompted me to return to the United States to obtain a master's degree in communications, and after this, I returned to Latin America Mission's headquarters in Miami, to work in the multimedia department. This gave me opportunities to travel around Latin America, visiting various missionaries and ministries to document and share their work.

But then a new ministry opportunity presented itself. In 2003 I was invited to move to Utah to help develop a multimedia ministry from the ground up. I became involved in many areas of media production--filmmaking, television, web design and written communication. I helped produce several documentary and evangelistic films addressing the Latter-day Saint (Mormon) community. This was quite an adventure. It also involved travel; there were times that rarely a month went by when I wasn't on a plane going somewhere. It even afforded me the opportunity to live and work in Jerusalem for a number of months. 

My time with Main Street Church in Utah was a rigorous education on many fronts--from the challenges of a culture based on works-based salvation, to stretching my production skills beyond what I would have dreamed, to walking through difficult and traumatic circumstances and upheaval.

Through it all I gained a better understanding of the unshakable trustworthiness of a good God.

In 2018, my "ministry" took a much different turn. Because of my parents' failing health, I moved back to my home town of Richland, Washington to accompany them in their remaining days. This was perhaps one of the most challenging and yet deeply rewarding ministries that the Lord had placed before me. I was grateful to be able to continue my work with Main Street Church remotely, at least on a part-time basis.

My father passed away in 2019, just before the COVID pandemic, and my mother passed away in 2021. Needless to say these were some difficult, grief-filled years for me.

In the aftermath of my parents' death, I found myself struggling with all the garden-variety existential questions: What now? Was God through with me? Had all the best juice already been squeezed out of me? I was in my mid-50s...not old enough to retire, but feeling too old to pivot in my career.

I became increasingly despondent. My parents had admonished me often in their later years, "travel while you can." But I doubted I would ever use my passport ever again. I found myself without any real hopeful vision for the future. I was living in a cave of sorts--it was dark and cold, but it was also familiar and safe, so I was resigned to just making the best of it.

So it was against my better judgment (which fortunately can't always be trusted) that I found myself on an extended trip through Europe in the summer of 2023, part pilgrimage, part tourism, part short-term mission trip. On some level I knew it would be "good for me" but I embarked on this trip reluctantly. It felt like a desperate "Hail Mary" pass to ignite some kind of vision for the future, but deep down I knew that it wouldn't really change anything. It's not like I was going to Eat, Pray, Love my way out of the cave I was in.

Turns out, I was wrong about that. The trip was my undoing...undoing things that needed to be undone. It was beautiful and hard and I wrestled with angels and demons, and a lot of tears were shed. The last part of my journey took me to the Czech Republic--not a place that I had ever really cared to visit. However, immediately upon arrival, I had a powerful, inexplicable and completely unexpected sense that my relationship with this place would be long-term, followed by a series of deeply moving encounters there shook me to my core. It concluded with a chance conversation where I learned that there were ministry needs there that fit my skills and experience. I returned home in great turmoil and confusion, but mixed in with that was a sliver of hope for the future that I hadn't felt in a long time. I didn't know what it all meant, but I had a sense that I'd crossed a line that couldn't be un-crossed.

The months that followed involved a great deal of painful discernment, as I sought to sort out the big questions. Was this a completely insane, foolhardy notion? Was this something I could do? Was it something I was called to do? Was this something I even wanted to do?

I visited the Czech Republic the following January to prayerfully seek answers to those questions, and in the end, I sensed a clear invitation from God to join Him in the work He was doing in this part of the world. I took a deep breath and accepted His invitation.

From that time on, I began the process of joining a small mission organization called Alongside Ministries, which specializes in creating partnerships between North American missionaries and European ministries.

So now, after more than 30 years back in the United States, I have moved to the Czech Republic, to begin language and cultural training, anticipating full-time work with a local organization called the Czech Evangelical Alliance.

How long will I be here? That is something God alone knows. I arrived with no end date in mind. So for now...the adventure continues.

So...if you'd like to follow this journey, I invite you to check out my newsletter. If you want to learn more about my story and what I'll be doing, I've uploaded a video version of my presentation. I also unpack the last few years of this journey in more detail in this blog post. Or...if you just want to communicate with me in person, I'd love that as well! My contact info can be found below.