We can daydream all day long, telling ourselves, “Oh, I’m going to write a book, and it’s going to be a New York Times bestseller!” I don’t know if it’s going to be or not, but here is what I can tell you with full assurance: your book is your greatest business card. You can hand out a business card, but most of those end up in the trash today because of smartphones. However, a book has your story, your imprint, your fingerprints, your birthmarks. Those are in your book. It is your greatest business card. Open it up, sign it, write an encouraging word to that person, and give him or her your phone number or email or some other way to get in contact with you or a prayer-line member.
There is not enough encouragement in this world. We know from Hebrews 3:13 that encouragement actually keeps our hearts from being hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. We need to encourage each other daily. What greater way than to write a book to encourage someone and hand it out as a business card?
When you self-publish, you buy your own book for an affordable amount—so affordable that you can give out your books like candy bars or Starbucks gift cards. You can have a book or a Starbucks coffee. Which do you choose? You can give a book with encouraging, life-speaking words as a business card, or you can hand someone a five-dollar Starbucks card. That is ridiculous. Choose the book. Write down your story and encourage someone. The Starbucks gift card may be a temporary fix of contentment or encouragement, but the book will be refreshment people can go back to again and again. The drink, they will forget in a day. The book is going to ring in their ears. The gift of handing them something encouraging to read with a personal note in the front is going to last a lot longer.
Who knows how God is going to expand your influence and encourage people who are still silent, who are letting someone else do the speaking while they stand in the background, not sharing their own story or doing their part? We need an army to rise up. You can encourage that army to stand up in your circle. We can’t have one person out in front of a million people. That is not how it works. God wants an army that is one so the world can be won. He needs us to be one—in one voice, one boldness, one righteousness, one spirit, one love—working together and standing firmly on the truth of God. We don’t need one person out in front, teaching everyone. We all need to be speaking truth wherever we go. It changes the atmosphere.
You know that one person isn’t where I am today. I am sitting outside my gym right now, ready to go in and have a great workout. I am the only one here with the authority to take control of the atmosphere in the name of Jesus Christ. I am the only one here who can pray with people and minister to people everywhere I walk. I am the only one who can go out and pray for someone who has fallen off the treadmill. That leader over a million is not here with me today. I have to use my voice. I am a missionary everywhere I go.
My book is my greatest business card. It’s my greatest source of encouragement. When I pray for someone, I can say, “Hey, take my book. I am an author.” My book is my greatest business card, and you can have one, too. It’s really not difficult to do it. It just requires steadfast commitment and endurance to start at the beginning and carry it through and the willingness to be so vulnerable that you will pour out your life and your story. Everyone has a story. You have a story, and it needs to be told. You can tell it through a book. You represent Jesus Christ, so represent Him well. Give Him all you have. Give Him your most excellent work.
You have a story. I want to encourage you. This is why I started iKan publish—so that you could tell your story and have the greatest business card ever.
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