June 1948 – 30 Dec 2021 – A dear friend of the CMDFA

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From Luke’s Journal 2022 | Rest | Vol.27 No.1

Reverend Ian Johnston was a dear friend of the Christian Medical and Dental Fellowship (CMDFA) in Newcastle. He was often encountered at local meetings, the Hunter Christian Health Professionals (CHPN) Prayer Morning and Saline Process events, as well as his paid position in the Presbyterian Chaplaincy at John Hunter Hospital. Over the years, staff members and other chaplains regularly met with him in the hospital canteen on a Tuesday for fellowship, counselling and prayer. An encounter with a patient has been documented by Ian in prose, entitled “Ode to a Farmer’s wife”.¹

Ian was also an affiliate member of Nurses Christian Fellowship Australia (NCFA) and spoke at a workshop on Healing and Wholeness in a Broken World a few years ago. His generous spirit and humility were also evident during the Saline Process Witness Training he attended in February 2019. 

“Ian’s faith and humour, as well as the wonderful family he and wife Rosie have raised with Jesus’ love at the centre, will live on.”

Although his life had humble beginnings in country NSW, his conversation was richly peppered with events and stories of his life-long adventure with God – from country Australia to the Arctic circle. On 8 January 2022, more than 150 people gathered at the Hunter Christian Church to celebrate the life of this man of God. More than a thousand people have viewed the live stream video through Facebook. Ian’s faith and humour, as well as the wonderful family he and wife Rosie have raised with Jesus’ love at the centre, will live on. 

Ian’s last message to us was this:
“But my life is worth nothing to me unless I use it for finishing the work assigned to me by the Lord Jesus – the work of telling others the Good News about the wonderful grace of God” Acts 20:24 (NLT).

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