Shari Howerton was born and raised in Southern California. Her worldview was formed inside a tightly knit religious community, by the one pastor she had known from birth. In 1993, she and hundreds of others sold their homes in California and followed their pastor to Tennessee. In 2003, Shari left the church and soon thereafter found hope in a new life with her husband, John, and church family at World Outreach Church in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. In Breaking the Chains, Shari chronicles her life and the lives of others who were subject to control and abuse. She illustrates the profound challenges of leaving close friends and breaking free from a lifetime of harmful conditioning to find joy, hope and freedom in the cross of Jesus Christ.