It’s been more than 10 years since Marine Johnny Montoya experienced Jesus through the witness of a fellow Marine. His life and his marriage to Shannon have never been the same.
Well over a decade ago, Johnny and Shannon Montoya landed in Alaska hoping to save their marriage.
In the years after Johnny’s deployments with the Marines, the couple was drifting apart. They felt like strangers living in the same house.
But in 2014, they hit rock bottom. Johnny attempted to end his life.
The Montoyas recommitted their marriage in Alaska, but it took years for Johnny to receive God’s forgiveness. Now they walk with others on their spiritual journey to Christ.
“I just kind of lost my way,” he said. “I was still rehabbing some injuries, going through counseling, just trying to do it all on my own.”
The next year they applied for Operation Heal Our Patriots. Shannon wasn’t ready to give up on Johnny and neither of them wanted to call it quits on their life together.
In Alaska they discovered hope that God could heal their marriage and Shannon found Jesus Christ. Johnny, though, wasn’t ready to crack. He was a hard-headed, foul-mouthed, liquor-drinking Marine who considered himself an atheist for years after Alaska.
This is why Operation Heal Our Patriots sends couples to Alaska for a new beginning, but not the end, of a lifelong commitment to military couples.
At our reunion in 2016, Johnny gave up on fighting the truth of who he’d become and what God was trying to do in his life.
They were talking to another couple and Johnny looked at the husband, a fellow Marine, and asked, “Can you bring me back to the Lord?”
“He said, ‘Yes,’” Johnny said, recounting how, as his friend shared the Gospel, he was finally able to hear about Jesus Christ and receive Him as Lord and Savior. “I began to feel like chains were just dropping.
“I will never go back to who I was because Jesus’ light will never burn out.”
The Montoyas served as Key Leaders with the Operation Heal Our Patriots Family Care ministry and now are serving faithfully in their local church.
In recent years, the Montoyas served together as Key Leaders with Operation Heal Our Patriots as part of the lifelong spiritual support, discipleship, and community provided through the program’s Family Care ministry, the same ministry components that helped lead Johnny to Jesus years after Alaska.
Now they are also serving faithfully in a local church.
Watch the video above and hear the Montoyas’ story of transformation and how God worked through Operation Heal Our Patriots, drawing them to new life in Jesus Christ.
