Before Launching Life Surge, Joe Johnson Mowed Lawns. Inside His Remarkable Journey

Joe Johnson literally comes from the grassroots. As a young teen, he launched his first business, mowing lawns. He quickly learned to delegate, paying friends to mow lawns while he focused on acquiring new customers, leading to him employing a team before he even had a driver’s license.

This early venture set the stage for a career that would eventually lead him to create  Life Surge, an organization focused on helping Christians align their faith with business and wealth creation.

Who Is the Founder of Life Surge?

Joe Johnson is the founder of Life Surge, billed as America’s fastest-growing Christian business, and draws about 100,000 attendees to its live events annually. Johnson’s life today is far from his humble childhood in Brazil. Growing up in a family of missionaries, Johnson recalls recognizing early on in his life he was “just wired differently” than the rest of his family.

“I thought more about money because I didn’t have any,” Johnson says of his humble beginnings. “I was a go-getter, and I enjoyed it.”

However, Johnson’s entrepreneurial journey wasn’t challenge-free. When he was still in high school in Ohio, a drought hit, impacting his lawn care business. He decided to advertise his landscaping services despite having no experience in the field.

This led to another life lesson when Johnson and his team were hired to install a lawn after a pool installation. Lacking knowledge, they observed professional landscapers at construction sites and took notes. They meticulously followed every step they observed — except for one crucial detail.

“We forgot to put seed down,” Johnson admits. “So we had fertilizer, we raked the rocks, it looked beautiful, but when we were copying what to do, we forgot to write down that we needed to seed the lawn to make it grow.”

While his client was initially upset with the mishap, Johnson was able to grow from the experience and it led him to plant the dream foundation for Life Surge to sprout.

At 18, Johnson’s life took a dynamic turn again when he dedicated his life to Christ. For the next three years, he devoted most of his time to church work, neglecting his business.

During this period, Johnson discovered what he refers to as a “sacred-secular dichotomy,” in which church work was viewed as holy and nonchurch work as less so. This perspective, he believes, was prevalent in the Christian community at the time.

The consequences of this mindset became apparent when Johnson, at 21, found his business bankrupt. He owed $330,000 in debt, largely due to his focus on church activities at the expense of his entrepreneurial operations. This experience marked a turning point in Johnson’s approach to faith and business.

“I came to the conclusion the primary reason for my bankruptcy as a young businessman was because of my sacred-secular dichotomy,” Johnson explains. “I really did not see my business as the thing that God called me in terms of my ministry. Instead, I looked at it for church work and that’s where I spent most of my time.”

This spiritual commitment initially led him to believe he could spearhead a Christian-based business mission unlike any other.

Living, Learning, and Earning

Johnson admits he’s always found value in using life’s most difficult moments to come back better and stronger.

“My lesson I’ve learned is to get back up. You’re going to fail, you know, and if you’re not failing it to some degree, you’re probably not pushing the envelope,” Johnson said.

“I think the No. 1 problem with entrepreneurs is the inability or the lack of courage to get back up. Just getting back up, you’re 80% of the way there because now you have learned all those lessons. Why waste that education?”

This realization shifted Johnson’s focus and view of the marketplace, laying the groundwork for what would eventually become Life Surge.

Life Surge inspires, transforms, and equips each person to “surge your life God’s way,” particularly through business and finance. The organization focuses on helping Christians understand how their faith can integrate with business practices and wealth creation.

Life Surge hosts live events featuring some of the most well-known Christian speakers, from Heisman Trophy winner turned philanthropist Tim Tebow to Duck Dynasty’s Willie  Robertson. These events combine worship, wisdom, and strategies for wealth creation. Johnson emphasizes that they’re designed to create a transformative atmosphere through in-person community experiences and amp up the audience to get excited about faith and finance and how the two are more simpatico than many people realize.

“Billy Graham Jr. once said, ‘I believe one of the next great moves of God is going to be through the believers in the workplace,’” Johnson revealed. “It wasn’t just a vision; it was a call to action. At Life Surge, we’re actively participating in the ‘next great move of God.’”