Editor’s note: Accolades for Watergate felon-turned-evangelical leader Chuck Colson have been numerous since his death on April 21 at age 80. Ginny Dent Brant, of Clemson, knew Colson through his relationship with her father, the late Harry Dent, who was an aide to Richard Nixon.
Chuck Colson, the former White House “hatchet man” who became a modern-day prophet, was the first in the Nixon administration to be incarcerated for Watergate charges. He became an evangelical leader, author of 30 books, cultural philosopher, founder of Prison Fellowship and The Chuck Colson Center for Christian Worldview, and commentator for his daily radio broadcast, BreakPoint.
Chuck Colson, felon-turned-evangelical leader.He proved that prison can be a good thing. It was the place where God obtained his full attention. Colson’s time there gave him a new mission in life: teaching and training prisoners to enable them to be “born again” in Jesus. What he lost in Watergate – his significance and power – was found in discovering God’s will for his life.
In 1975, his first book, “Born Again,” became a best-selling memoir. In 1978, it became a movie that impacted millions. Chuck Colson’s conversion also had an impact on my dad, Harry S. Dent Sr. My father started the Senate prayer breakfast and regularly attended the White House prayer breakfast. When Chuck Colson (who never darkened the doors of this White House event) showed up and proclaimed he was a changed man, several people, including my father, pondered, “How convenient, now that he was being investigated for the Watergate break-in.” When Colson came to my father and apologized for wrongdoings against him, my father realized his conversion was authentic. It took guts for Colson to ask my father’s forgiveness for how he treated “the Southerner in the White House.” It was the beginning of a lifelong friendship. It was also a wakeup call for my father and many others who were beginning to see something in Colson’s life that was lacking in their own: a real transforming relationship with Jesus Christ.
BrantAfter Colson’s release from prison, he began his prison ministry. In the early years, he visited Columbia to speak at our governor’s prayer breakfast and at Columbia International University. I’ll never forget walking into our den and catching him doing the unthinkable – smoking a cigarette. The horror on my face startled him into confession. “Ginny, please understand, I’m a work in progress, and smoking’s been a part of my life for 30 years,” he said. “I’m trying to break a tough habit.” Eventually, he did beat it. It was a great lesson for me: We are all a work in progress.
In the 1980s, Colson’s soul was burdened about the changes in our culture. I’ll never forget what he told me. It grieved him to see what was being shown on television and its effects on mainstream America. He boldly set up a meeting with the president of one of the major TV networks. “The violence, sexual promiscuity, and disrespect as shown in these TV shows is having a profound impact on this country,” he told the executive. “The evangelicals in America are concerned.”
That network president responded, “Mr. Colson, I have the research and polls right here that prove your evangelicals are watching everything you’ve just described to me.” It was a humbling moment for Colson to realize the very people he was going to bat for were batting .500 in hypocrisy. But Colson did not back down. He continued to stand for what is right and to be a transformer of our culture.
One of my fondest memories is of an Easter service my dad, Colson and I participated in during 1988, at a maximum-security prison in South Carolina. I sang and used sign language for visual effect. My father identified with the prisoners and gave his testimony, saying, “I came close to standing in your shoes. God delivered me from myself at age 48.” The home run came when Colson stepped up to the plate and delivered a message about freedom in Christ. Many prisoners’ faces beamed with their newfound freedom in Christ. After the service, my dad and Colson went to death row to pray with some of the inmates. I later discovered this was an annual event for Colson. For 34 years, he celebrated Easter by preaching a risen Christ to prisoners.
A professed Southern Baptist, Colson trained a new generation of church and lay leaders. His message through books and orations always inspired Christians to be God’s change-agents in this world. His latest book, “The Sky is not Falling: Living Fearlessly in These Turbulent Times,” cautions us not to cower in fear, but boldly restore this culture to Christian principles.
He was a modern-day prophet – a man whose mark was telling the truth, even when we were too comfortable to hear it.
– Brant, of Clemson, is president of Laity Alive and Serving and the author of “Finding True Freedom: From the White House to the World,” a father-daughter memoir. For more information: http://www.ginnybrant.com.