I first met Kerry about 8 years ago. We invited him in to Louisville to speak at a church planting conference and he did an amazing job. (I still have the evaluations on my computer and his marks were higher than mine... but who's counting.)

Kerry Shook and his wife planted Fellowship of the Woodlands in 1993, which is now one of the fastest growing churches in America. They average over 16,000 people at their their 3 campuses and operate with over 4,000 volunteers. They are looking to start additional sites in the future as they continue to grow. In the midst of all this extraordinary growth Kerry understands that what is happening at Fellowship is the result of God's activity among his people as he changes their lives. Lifeway Research interviewed him for the blog, and I think you'll find the discussion encouraging as he talks about the book he wrote with his wife, One Month to Live, and how God has used this emphasis in the life of his church.

LifeWay Research: Pastor Kerry, could you tell us a little about what's been happening at Fellowship of the Woodlands?

Pastor Kerry Shook: Last year we presented our staff with a challenge. I challenged them to live the next 30 days as if it was their last, not because they were going to die in a month, but, because, Lord willing, they were going to live many more years. I believe if you live the next month as if it is your last then you will really want to do something that makes a difference for eternity. You will want to leave a legacy. All of the stories that came out just from our staff team were amazing. Then my wife and I wrote this book and presented the whole campaign to our church in February and it was just amazing what it did. It really impacted the community.

I asked everyone in our church if they would ask their neighbors and friends to come over to their house and just experience this challenge with them. I said, "Just invite them over and, you know, maybe it is three or four of you or four or five of you and just talk about what you would do if you had one month to live. And throw out some refreshments." We gave them some DVDs and the books. It was amazing. We basically grew by 9000 in small groups just during that month. And then after the campaign ended we went down to about 7300 new people in small groups from the community. It was just crazy.

The end result was after our people really started inviting their friends to their house and then bringing them to church and really being a witness to them. We had 1500 people this summer who were baptized because of the study and we've never seen anything like that in our church over the last 15 years. This has really just sparked amazing life change and stories.

We had one woman in our church whose son had been murdered at college, and right as she took the challenge the young man who had committed the crime was convicted of the murder and she was able to speak to him in the sentencing phase because of victim's rights. And the judge warned her, "No cursing, no shouting, but you can say whatever you want to say." And this woman, Terry Lynn McDonough, stood up and read this beautiful letter of forgiveness. She said, "If I had one month to live I would want to forgive everyone including you, and I choose to forgive you for my sake because I see Jesus standing next to you begging me to forgive you. And if you become a saver of life instead of a destroyer of life then maybe my son's death won't have been in vain." She used the next 30 days to go visit him in prison. And he made a faith promise to Christ. He was baptized. And it is the kind of forgiveness that I can't even fathom.

LWR: Kerry you have talked about 1500 baptisms and the tremendous growth of your small groups. What did you have to do to realign your church to meet the needs of so many more people?

Shook: We are scrambling, but what is really exciting about it is that we have been praying and preparing for this for a long time. We knew it was going to be amazing when we started this campaign and that God was going to do some really great things because of it. It was a real passion on my heart but I didn't expect this to happen. And so once we had so many new people in small groups we have been scrambling to fill positions and we have also been raising up leaders and training leaders. But one thing this experience has done for our church, it has really called our people to a new level of leadership. We have also discovered that people want to be challenged.

You know, our people want to be challenged to make a difference in the world and they want me, as their pastor, to challenge them. And so I am constantly challenging people to step up to leadership. I have had hundreds of people come up to me and say "Thank you, Kerry, for challenging me. I am stepping up to lead and I am scared to death, but it is really rewarding." I love to hear that and so we constantly challenge.

We welcome the problems because they are just really opportunities. The cool thing is our staff sees it as that. We just celebrate the baptisms, the lives that are changed, and the spiritual growth that is taking place and all the missions trips. We had 200 students go on a mission trip this summer. I gather the whole staff together once a month and we just praise God. We celebrate and thank him for what he has done.

LWR: What was Fellowship at the Woodlands like before you began the "one month to live" campaign?

Shook: This church has been a wild ride since day one. We are only fifteen years old and we started with eight people. There have been a lot of exciting things that God has done, but there was just something about the one month to live campaign. I think one of the things we saw as a church was that it is not just about us. It is not just about church growth or what is happening in our church but it is about what God does in the community with lost people and it is also about what God does through other churches around the world. And this is one of the first things that we have done that has impacted a lot of other churches around the world to impact their communities.

So I think it was one of those things where we can never thank God enough for what he has done over this first 15 years, but this was just something really special and amazing and it really helped us move beyond just ourselves and God blessing our church to we have 1000 churches this fall who are doing the campaign. This is something that our people are just thrilled about because we are helping all these other churches.

LWR: How does it make you feel when USA Today and the Press Register compare the Next Thirty Days campaign to the secular mover The Bucket List.

Shook: We think that's great. You know there has been a lot of people who have thought about the idea of what would I do if I knew my time on earth was short. And so we just really took some time to formulate how a person could take that challenge in 30 days or how a church could take that challenge in 30 days with that central question, what would I do if I knew I had one month to live. I will tell you in the movie The Bucket List they did a lot of crazy things like skydiving and race car driving. But the thing that the character played by Jack Nicholson has the problem with is the toughest thing and that is reconciling a relationship. And that's what we have with so many people now who have taken the one month to live challenge is that it is in our relationships that we have our greatest regrets. And that is why I think that God has used it in churches because we have seen a lot of healing take place in churches and we have seen a lot of healing take place in families.

LWR: How important has this campaign been to the families of your church?

Shook: Very important. When I, personally, started living this one month to live challenge and this one month to live lifestyle, I started asking myself what I would do if I had one month to live. One of the first things I did was to go to my teenage sons and I said, "Guys, we got a great relationship, but I come home from work and you say, 'How was your day, dad?' And I say, 'Great.' And I say, 'How was your day, guys?' 'Great.' And that's about it. You know, we are guys and this is as deep as it got."

And I said, "I want to know your struggles and your stresses and your problems because I know you are going through stuff as teenagers." They replied "Well, dad, you never tell us your struggles and stresses. You just always say things are great." And I said, "Well, I didn't think you wanted me to dump all my stuff on you." And they said, "We can handle it." This conversation really took our relationship to a new level. I started every Thursday meeting them at their favorite restaurant and I would have the chili cheese fries on the table waiting for them when they got out of school. We would just meet and talk about stuff going on in their lives and in mine.

LWR: In our conversation you have briefly talked about how this campaign has changed the churches involvement in the community. I know that before the campaign your wife was involved in missions and women's ministry but what is different now about the church's involvement in the community and around the world?

Shook: Really the ultimate product of one month to live was that it has helped us want to leave a legacy. There are four principles we really taught: to live passionately, love completely, learn humbly and then lead boldly. The last principle is key. It's about doing something that is going to be here after you are gone and it really helped our whole church go to a new level and get excited about doing mission work and making a difference overseas and making a difference right here. For example in our community we did a huge feeding campaign where we gathered 20,000 pounds of food and filled up the local food pantries. We have really been focusing on Kenya and Malawi in Africa and Indonesia and Costa Rica and Sweden. Only one percent of the people go to church in Sweden. We have been partnering with churches to help them make some changes.

LWR: What would you say the "secret" is to your church's growth?

Shook: We always say that the secret to our church's growth is life change. When God changes someone's life, then they tell everyone and it is contagious. We use a lot of creativity and new technology, cutting edge things to use in our church, but really what it comes down to is God changing a life. And then, you know, they just want to tell everybody.

LWR: What's next, Kerry?

Shook: It seems like God is always up to something next. One of the things that we feel is real important for us is the satellites that we are starting. We are staring our third campus... and it is only about 25 minutes away from our main campus... We have a campus in East Houston where we had 1500 people come day one and we started that just last year. The influence that we have in Houston is totally from God but we have to step in and take advantage of it. Also the television ministry coming together to help us form these satellites is something that is real important to us because one of the things that God has given us a passion for is creative content and putting together creative campaigns for churches like a creative sermon series or other things that can really help churches and take them to the next level.

LWR: Pastor Kerry, what do you think is important for other pastors to know about your church or what encouragement/advice would you have for them?

Shook: I would encourage every pastor to ask this question. What would you do if you knew your church only had one month to live? How would you make decisions? Would you make them differently if you knew your church was only going to be here another month?

I think we would all take more risks to make a difference for the kingdom. We would all be in prayer more. We would all see the Lord more and his wisdom. We would want to do something that would be here after we are gone. I encourage pastors to make those one or two little changes that could make a huge difference.

Another thing I would say to other pastors is that only God can grow a church and there are principles that we need to follow to reach people for Christ from God's Word. But ultimately I will have to blame God for the growth of our church. There are churches that do the same things that we do but they have not experienced the growth that we have for whatever reason. Maybe they are in area where there is not as many people, but I do know that God will sort it out when we get to heaven. It is just being faithful that matters.