Who Is Bryce Johnson?

Bryce Johnson is the host of UNPACKIN’ it, a podcast dedicated to honest conversations about faith, sports, and the mental and emotional dimensions of competing and leading at a high level. Bryce works closely with Christian athletes and ministry leaders, helping them connect their faith to their everyday performance and decision-making. He brings a rare mix of transparency and depth to conversations that most people avoid.

What Does Sports and Faith Actually Mean for Athletes?

Bryce makes a distinction most people miss: faith in sports shows up in two different ways. There is faith in Jesus Christ: the belief that identity, worth, and purpose come from God, not from a scoreboard. And there is faith as confidence in skill: the trust an athlete places in what they have trained to do.

For Christian athletes, those two things are connected but not the same. And understanding the difference changes how they train, compete, and recover from failure.

Bryce also offers a reminder that is easy to forget: Christian athletes are not finished products. A twenty-three-year-old who loves Jesus is still learning his Bible and still growing in his faith. The same patience fans extend to an athlete’s on-court development needs to extend to their spiritual journey too.

What Did Dr. Dave’s Doctoral Research Reveal About Faith and Hockey?

Dr. Dave conducted a qualitative phenomenological study on faith with eight professional male hockey players. The research surfaced two distinct categories: faith rooted in Christian belief and faith expressed as confidence in one’s own abilities.

One of the most striking findings was a simple number. Of all active NHL players, only about 50 to 60 identify as Christian. Not 50 to 60 percent. Just 50 to 60 players across the entire league. That is one to two per team at most.

For those players, the community around them matters enormously. When the financial pressure of performance is tied directly to your contract value, separating your identity from your output is not a philosophical exercise, it is a daily battle.

How Does Identity in Christ Change the Way Athletes Perform?

When an athlete understands that their worth is not tied to what they do on the ice or the court, something shifts. Dr. Dave and Bryce both returned to the same idea: making the Stanley Cup or missing it does not define who you are. Winning the championship does not make you more valuable. Losing it does not make you less.

That is not a motivational phrase. It is a theological foundation. And when athletes actually build on it, the result is a different kind of competitor. Instead, it is someone who can perform at full capacity without the weight of self-worth riding on the outcome.

Bryce reflected on Wembanyama and the NBA Finals, asking whether losing might actually be the better long-term development tool. The answer, in a faith-rooted framework, is that both outcomes have value when your identity is secure in Christ.

What Are Toxic Motivators and How Do They Show Up in Sports?

Dr. Dave introduced the FLAP framework, which identifies four toxic motivators that undercut performance, leadership, and faith: Fear, Lust, Anger, and Pride.

Fear shrinks possibility. For an athlete, it shows up as risk aversion, playing not to lose, or making decisions based on what might go wrong rather than what God has made possible.

Lust is the craving for more (e.g., more money, more titles, more validation) rooted in the belief that what you have is not enough. It is insatiable by design.

Anger drives reactive decisions. In competition, it is the technical foul, the blown assignment, or the locker room conflict that fractures a team from the inside.

Pride refuses help. It is the athlete or leader who cannot ask a question, cannot receive coaching, and cannot admit weakness without feeling like they have lost something.

Bryce and Dr. Dave were direct about something most people soften: these do not go away. Awareness is not a cure. But awareness is still the first and most important move. When you know what is triggering you, and you can name it, you have a chance to respond rather than react.

What Is the Relationship Between Emotional Intelligence and Winning?

Emotional intelligence or EI is the ability to recognize, understand, and manage your own emotions and respond well to others, which turns out to be a significant competitive factor in sports and in leadership. The athletes who last, who lead well in a locker room, and who perform under real pressure are almost always the ones who have done some inner work on mastering their EI.

Bryce described his own morning before this recording. He woke up with anxiety, felt the weight of everything on his schedule, and had to stop. He had to pray, read, and process before he could show up well. That is not weakness. That is exactly what emotional intelligence looks like in practice: the awareness to notice what is happening inside you, and the discipline to address it instead of grinding through it.

Dr. Dave called that a win. And it is.

How Does the Plan to Win Framework Connect to Sports?

The Plan to Win framework Dr. Dave has built is fundamentally about awareness and preparation. It is not enough to know that the toxic motivators exist, you need to know specifically where you are vulnerable and plan for that in advance.

The adversary is not random. If you know your weakness is comparison, that is where the pressure will come. If you know you chase financial validation, that is what will be dangled. The leaders and athletes who win long-term are the ones who name their vulnerabilities before the moment arrives and put something in place before the temptation hits.

Bryce put it simply: you are going to revisit the same challenges as you grow. They just look a little different each time. Anger still shows up. Fear still shows up. The difference is whether you see it coming.

What Does Vulnerability Have to Do with Championship Performance?

Dr. Dave shared that he intentionally puts himself in positions of failure and vulnerability so his kids can watch how he handles it. His most recent example was enrolling in a long-range rifle class with zero experience and earning his certification after hitting a target at a thousand yards.

The point was not the achievement. It was the posture. Getting into a room where you do not know the answers, where you have to ask questions, where you have to rely on someone else, that is a form of spiritual and emotional training. It breaks pride and builds the kind of trust that leaders need to function well.

Bryce added the thread that ties it to faith: when you are doing something you cannot do alone, you grow in your reliance on both people and God. That reliance is not a liability. It is what a championship-level life actually looks like.

Key Takeaways

• – Christian athletes are not finished spiritual products. They need the same patience fans extend to skill development
• – Only about 50 to 60 NHL players identify as Christian, making community and accountability especially critical for that group
• – Identity rooted in Christ changes how athletes handle both winning and losing
• – The FLAP framework (Fear, Lust, Anger, Pride) names the four toxic motivators most likely to undercut performance and faith
• – Awareness of your specific vulnerabilities is the first move in the Plan to Win
• – Emotional intelligence is not soft. It is a competitive factor at every level of leadership and sport
• – Putting yourself in positions of vulnerability is a discipline, not a weakness
• – Championship success is worth pursuing, but it cannot be the source of your worth

Frequently Asked Questions

What does sports and faith mean for professional athletes? For Christian athletes, sports is an outlet to demonstrate that faith in Jesus has changed their heart. That shows up in how they train, compete, interact with teammates and coaches, and handle failure. Faith in Christ provides an identity that is not dependent on performance, which is one of the most powerful competitive advantages an athlete can have.

How many NHL players are Christian? Based on Dr. Dave Jones’s doctoral research on professional hockey players, approximately 50 to 60 players across the entire NHL identify as Christian. That represents roughly one to two players per team. The number is growing but remains a small minority within the league.

What is the FLAP framework? FLAP stands for Fear, Lust, Anger, and Pride. These are four toxic motivators that Dr. Dave Jones identifies as the primary forces that undercut leadership, performance, and faith. Each one has a corresponding virtue: love over fear, freedom over lust, peace over anger, and humility over pride. The framework comes from Dr. Dave’s Plan to Win work and his broader R7 process.

What is the Plan to Win? The Plan to Win is a framework built around awareness and intentional preparation. It operates on the premise that the challenges you face are not random and that naming your specific vulnerabilities in advance puts you in a position to respond rather than react when those moments arrive.

What is the R7 Christian Marketing Podcast? The R7 Christian Marketing Podcast is hosted by Dr. Dave Jones, founder of M is Good, a Christian marketing agency based in Raleigh, NC. Each episode explores the intersection of faith, vision, and strategy through conversations with leaders, athletes, and practitioners who are doing meaningful work in the world.

Who is Bryce Johnson? Bryce Johnson is a ministry leader and the host of Unpackin’ it, a podcast that covers faith, sports, and the mental and emotional dimensions of competing and leading. He works closely with Christian athletes and organizational leaders, helping them connect their faith to their daily performance.

About the R7 Process

The R7 Process is a God-inspired framework that walks leaders through seven steps: Destiny, Vision, Strategy, Brand, Communicate, Think, and Action. These steps help clarify their purpose and build a marketing strategy that actually works. It was designed specifically for Christian organizations who want to stop spinning their wheels and start leading with rigor. Every conversation on this podcast is grounded in that foundation.

To explore how the R7 process can revive your messaging and your customer experience, let’s chat.

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