November 6. Chuck Colson. On this date in 1969, Colson was appointed Special Counsel to President Nixon, and some people referred to him as Nixon’s “hatchet man.” After the Watergate scandal, after coming to know Jesus the Christ, Colson founded Prison Fellowship.
It has since become the United States’s largest Christian nonprofit that serves prisoners, former prisoners, and their families and is a leading advocate for criminal-justice reform.
From the ashes of broken lives, God can raise changed men.
Wealthy. Powerful. Proud. Three words that summed up Colson’s life at the height of his career as President Richard Nixon’s right-hand man. A man who “drank and smoked heavily, who partied with the rich, famous, and powerful.”
Never in a million years would he have imagined that God would one day destroy this powerful, sinful life.
In 1973, after government organizations and reporters revealed Nixon’s involvement in the illegal wiretapping of phones in the Democratic National Committee, the Nixon government came under intense public scrutiny. Colson, who had masterminded many of Nixon’s political schemes—including spying on political opponents—began to buckle under the pressure, especially when the Supreme Court demanded all of Nixon’s tape recordings of White House meetings.
Colson said, “My world was collapsing. I had an overwhelming sense that I was unclean.”
Before serving as Nixon’s Special Counsel, Colson’s law firm had represented the Raytheon Company, a major US defense contractor, and on a hot, humid night in August 1973, Colson decided to visit Raytheon’s president, Tom Phillips.
“Tom had become a Christian, and he seemed so different. I wanted to ask him what happened. He read to me from Mere Christianity by CS Lewis, particularly about the great sin that is pride. A proud man walks through life looking down on other people. He cannot see something above himself immeasurably superior—God. That night, Tom told me about encountering Christ in his own life.”
And Tom even offered to pray with Colson, who politely refused, promising that he would visit again after he had read the book for himself.
But escape from Tom didn’t go as planned. Colson said, “When I went to drive away, I couldn’t. I was crying too hard—and I was not one to ever cry. I spent an hour calling out to God. I did not even know the right words. I simply knew that I wanted him. God heard my cry. Jesus came into my life.”
Less than a year later, on March 1, 1974, Colson was named as one of Nixon’s 7 co-conspirators in the Watergate scandal. He initially pled the Fifth Amendment to avoid testifying against himself, but after much prayer, he pled guilty to a related crime: defaming Daniel Ellsberg, who had compiled damning evidence against the Nixon administration. Colson was indeed a changed man.
Colson was sentenced to seven months in prison, and although he had received Christ and was genuine in his conversion, his life appeared to be in ruins.
The Lord, however, chose this dark time to reveal His plans. Colson said, “I found myself drawn to the idea that God had put me in prison for a purpose. I felt God’s hand on my shoulder. ‘Submit yourself to Me, and I will guide you,’ were the words implanted in my mind.”
Colson emerged from prison with a new mission: to mobilize the Church to minister to prisoners. Prison Fellowship was founded in 1976, and as of 2020, God is still using the ministry to serve prisoners, former prisoners, and their families. Hundreds of thousands of men and women have encountered Christ through Prison Fellowship.
“I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will counsel you with my loving eye on you” (Psalm 32:8 NIV).
Have you surrendered your life to Christ, so He can make you a new man? From the ashes of broken lives, God can raise changed men.
Colson, Chuck. “Thirty-Five Years in the Light: Reflections on My Conversion.” Drell’s Descants. Published August 25, 2008. https://descant.wordpress.com/2008/08/25/chuck-colson-reflects-on-his-conversion/.
Colson, Chuck. “Breakpoint: Remembering Chuck Colson’s New Life in Christ.” Breakpoint. Published by Eric Metaxis, April 21, 2017. https://www.breakpoint.org/breakpoint-remembering-chuck-colson-new-life/.
Colson, Charles. Born Again. Ada, MI: Chosen, 2004.
Story read by: Chuck Stecker