Be the Message: Taking Your Faith Beyond Words to a Life of Action - Hardcover

Kerry Shook and his wife Chris Shook, are The New York Times bestselling authors of One Month to Live: 30 Days to a No-Regrets Life and Be the Message. They founded Woodlands Church in 1993, and it has since grown to be one of the largest churches in America. Kerry and Chris have been featured on NBC, ABC, PBS, Fox News, and USA Today; and they have a television show that goes to more than 200 countries. The recent establishment of Woodlands Seminary came out of their heart to train the next generation to make a local and global impact. Kerry and Chris live in The Woodlands, Texas.

FOREWORD BY RICK WARREN
Hudson Taylor once said, “All God’s giants have been weak people.” My favorite example of a giant is Jacob. Jacob was a deceiver, a manipulator, and even a schemer. He spent much of his life scheming to get his way, making one mess after another. Then he’d run from it. This was the pattern of his life: create a mess and run.

Then one night Jacob had an encounter with God. He literally wrestled with God and said, “I’m not going to let go until you bless me, God.” And God said, “Okay, I’ll bless your life.” The Lord grabbed Jacob’s thigh and pulled his hip out of socket. He touched him. God touched him at a point of strength and turned it into a weakness. The Bible says that from that point on, Jacob’s life was blessed, but he walked with a limp.

Kerry and Chris Shook know that instead of hiding and denying our weaknesses, we need to recognize them and learn from them. We need to learn to share them. We need to learn to glory in our weaknesses. If God is ever going to use us greatly, we’ll walk with a limp the rest of our lives. We can hear about people’s successes all day, and it will have absolutely no benefit to us. But when they start talking to us about their pain, all of a sudden they have our attention. Sharing our handicaps causes others to stop making excuses, to see the possibilities, and to rely on God.

If we’re going to have a Christlike ministry, that means sometimes other people are going to find healing in the wounds in our lives.

In Be the Message Kerry and Chris have written a powerful guide on how to stop hiding behind our images so we can truly discover and live our authentic life message. This book is not for those who seek to be impressed;it’s for those who want to have an impact on the lives of others. We can impress people by talking about our successes, but we’ll impact people when we admit our failures and weaknesses and point them to the God who can work a miracle out of our mess.

—Rick Warren
Pastor, Saddleback Church
Author, The Purpose Driven Life