Courage: Fighting Fear with Fear

by Wayne A. Mack, Joshua Mack, Jerry Bridges (Foreword)

From Genesis to Revelation, the Bible tells us to fear God, but our lives show where our true fears lie. Warping the shape of our lives from day to day, sinful, controlling fear also paralyzes us spiritually: we’re afraid to obey or trust God in the circumstances that scare us, and we care more about what others think of us than what God thinks.

Here the Macks encourage you to embrace the fear that is good for you—showing how the fear of God drives out all other fears and laying the groundwork for a strong foundation for courage in every situation.

This book can be used for individual growth and development, for group study, or for homework assignments for those in counseling.

Genres: Christian, Counselling, Christian Living, Nonfiction, Theology

304 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2002

About the author

Wayne Mack lives in Pretoria, South Africa, where he serves as a pastor-elder with his son-in-law and teaches biblical counseling at Strengthening Ministries Training Institute to pastors and aspiring pastors in the region. He also spends about six weeks in the USA teaching at various churches. He and his wife, Carol, have four adult children and numerous grandchildren.

Reviews

[Owen Lewis · Rating 5 out of 5]

Powerful, and convicting. The last two chapters were my favorites - they alone were worth the whole book for me.

[Michael Beck · Rating 5 out of 5]

This a wonderful book that every Christian should read. The father and son team have put together a godly work that interweaves Scripture, theology, quotes from the greats of church history, and much practical application on how to have the courage they call for! Highly recommended.

[Frank · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent book! The general premise is that a proper fear of God is the cure to fearing man. Only when a Christian fears God above all else, will the Christian truly be courageous for the cause of Christ.

[Kristin · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is clear and practical. There may not be any other Biblical study more practical in impacting the life of a believer: the fear of the Lord. The fear of the Lord changes everything: it gives us a right view of the Lord, our circumstances and it will bring genuine, lasting peace at all times. This book practically illuminates matters of the heart and attitudes of what it means to truly have the fear of the Lord which will always govern us to rest in His character, His sovereignty, His Word and His purposes

[Deryck Kennedy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Highly recommend this book! There are two types of people who need to read this book, those who struggle with fear and those who don't. The other two types of people that should read it are those who understand what it means to fear God and those who don't. Provided great insights into what it means to fear God and symptoms of unbiblical fear, whether it be of man or of circumstances or whatever else. One great insight is that what your fear reveals what you trust.

[Christopher Desruisseau · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good read. Should do it with a study group.

[ELISSON MONTEIRO · Rating 4 out of 5]

Esse livro é muito edificante, como o próprio título sugere, se trata sobre o assunto de medo, temor e coragem, apesar que seja um pouco enfadonho no começo do livro devido a tentativa do autor de deixar bem claro para leitor o que é temor, quais tipos e se é pecado ou não, os últimos capítulos são bem práticos e as perguntas no final de cada capítulo nós ajuda bastante a conhecer como está o nosso coração relação a isso.

Um dos assuntos que me chamou bastante atenção foi a definição de coragem do autor tratado no último capítulo, um assunto abordado de forma errônea pelas igrejas brasileiras e a sociedade no geral.

Aconselho muito esse livro para aqueles que estão com dúvida se deveriam ou não ler.

[Tori Samar · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interestingly, this book could have (and probably should have) been a home run. The authors diagnose our fear problem like this: "You shrink back because you don't know God the way you should."

That argument resonates with me on both a cognitive and an experiential level. If only we had a proper view and understanding of God, everything else would fall into place.

Unfortunately, the book's writing and approach didn't work well enough for it to be a home run. Primary issues were: excessive sequences of imperative sentences, a chapter order that seemed incoherent at times (some chapters didn't seem to fit the overall flow at all, and some contained ideas that I thought should've been discussed much earlier in the book), and an uncertainty about whether to focus solely on the fear of man or broaden to any kind of fear.

Nevertheless, it's important to remember that a 3-star rating on Goodreads still means the book was good. Replacing sinful fear with the fear of God is a good and helpful principle. So by all means, if you struggle with fear (don't we all?), you will benefit from reading this book.

[Brian J Matthews · Rating 5 out of 5]

A must-read

This is a must-read for every believer. There are some books that are valuable enough to read through multiple times. This is undoubtedly one of them. God has guided the Macks in the writing of this book to glean truths of gold from His word and apply them accurately to our lives. I cannot stress how life-transforming this book is if you will do the slow, thorough job of reading and digesting it. I encourage you to really work through the questions at the end of each chapter. I am going to start re-reading it right now.

[Mary Wilson · Rating 2 out of 5]

While the topic is intriguing, this book was repetitive and lacked engagement. It constantly used long quotes from other books or people while really broke up the point the authors were getting across and makes the reader think that they are less capable of producing their own ideas. I did this as a study with my small group and longed to finish it well before it was done. This may be good for some people who have little understand for the fear of God or newer Christians, but for the average Christian/person, it will be a long and repetitive way to get to the point.

[Morgan Mitchell · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a very convicting and encouraging book that discusses the real and dangerous pitfalls of falling into the fear of man. It helped me to try new things and overcome certain fears I had. Will definitely be keeping this book in my back pocket. The questions get a little long and the authors can be quite blunt, but overall I would 100% recommend this for anyone needing to tackle unbiblical fear head on!

[Isaac Butterworth · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is essential reading for anyone committed to living faithfully before God and for anyone who desires to help others do so. I intend to write a more complete review of this book, but I am not in a position to do that for the next several days. I hope this book gains a wide reading. I encourage any and every one to get a copy and plunge in.

[Joe Molinari · Rating 5 out of 5]

Quite simply, I loved this book. Initially, Courage was assigned reading…only a few chapters. However, I’m one who likes to read the entire book. It is difficult to express how impactful and edifying it has been. I shall certainly return to Courage again and, of course, I highly recommend it!

[Debbie Levis · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good counsel but could have been said in about half the amount of chapters. It got very repetitive

[Glenn · Rating 5 out of 5]

A solid exercise in understanding our lack of godly courage. Great study questions and would be a good book for a young men’s study.

[Daniel · Rating 5 out of 5]

An in-depth biblical look at fear and how to deal with it.

[Cortney Joy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Confession- i only read 2 chapters. It seemed really elementary. It felt like they assumed i knew nothing about counseling or the Christian faith. But also it pushed those elementary points really hard, with weird analogies. Hard to pinpoint what exactly i didn’t like about it, but i expected better considering Wayne Mack is a Biblical counseling expert.

Update: upon reading more, it occurred to me that the real reason it doesn’t sit right with me is that the book is written in second person. To “you”. It feels a bit offensive to read questions like “do you understand that?” And sentences such as “Why would you put your faith in yourself? What good does that do? You’re just a finite, limited person.”

Not my style.