Charles "Chuck" Colson

Charles W. "Chuck" Colson

Founder, Prison Fellowship ministry

Charles W. "Chuck" Colson is founder of Prison Fellowship, a Christian outreach ministry to the prison population of this country, as well as to ex-prisoners and crime victims. The "On Faith" panelist's daily radio commentary, BreakPoint, is aired daily on over a 1,000 radio outlets nationwide. Colson also is a syndicated columnist, lawyer, and author of 25 books, most recently The Faith (2008). He served as special counsel to the late President Richard M. Nixon (1969-73). After pleading guilty to a Watergate-related charge of obstruction of justice in 1974, Colson served seven months of a one to three-year federal prison sentence. His 1973 Christian conversion was documented in the internationally best-selling book and film, Born Again. He founded Prison Fellowship in 1976. In 1993, Colson was awarded the Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion and donated the $1 million prize to Prison Fellowship. In the last 28 years, Colson has visited more than 600 prisons in 40 countries and, with the help of nearly 50,000 volunteers, has built Prison Fellowship into the world's largest prison outreach, serving the spiritual and practical needs of prisoners in 93 countries including the U.S. Close.

Charles W. "Chuck" Colson

Founder, Prison Fellowship ministry

Charles W. "Chuck" Colson is founder of Prison Fellowship, a Christian outreach ministry to the prison population of this country, as well as to ex-prisoners and crime victims. The "On Faith" panelist's daily radio commentary, BreakPoint, is aired daily on over a 1,000 radio outlets nationwide. more »

Main Page | Charles W. "Chuck" Colson Archives | On Faith Archives


« Previous Post | Next Post »

Choices of Eternal Consequence

Yes, I believe in heaven and hell because I believe in a God of justice. If there were no consequences, my actions would have no significance.

The God who creates us gives us a free will, enables us to make free moral decisions, and also holds us accountable for those decisions.

As a Christian, I believe that at death my soul will be joined with the Lord and that when He returns in glory my body will be resurrected and I will live with Him during eternity.

That sounds all well and good, you say, but how about those whom God sends to hell? Why would a loving God do that?

God doesn’t send anyone to hell. He gives us the clear understanding of how we are to behave and how we may have faith in Him and therefore be saved for eternity. The invitation is wide open. It doesn’t exclude anyone, but it does call for us to do something: repent and believe. But if we choose not to do that, then we will remain for eternity in the state that we’re in. That is, rebelling against God.

We aren’t sent to hell by God, we send ourselves there by refusing God’s gracious offer. God is patient and is delaying judgment because he doesn’t want “anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:9).

Please e-mail On Faith if you'd like to receive an email notification when On Faith sends out a new question.

Email Me | Del.icio.us | Digg | Facebook

Reader Response

ALL COMMENTS (139)

Post a comment

We encourage users to analyze, comment on and even challenge washingtonpost.com's articles, blogs, reviews and multimedia features.

User reviews and comments that include profanity or personal attacks or other inappropriate comments or material will be removed from the site. Additionally, entries that are unsigned or contain "signatures" by someone other than the actual author will be removed. Finally, we will take steps to block users who violate any of our posting standards, terms of use or privacy policies or any other policies governing this site. Please review the full rules governing commentaries and discussions.

Top Local Global

On Faith is an interactive conversation on religion moderated by Newsweek Editor Jon Meacham and Sally Quinn of The Washington Post. It is produced jointly by Newsweek and washingtonpost.com, as is PostGlobal, a conversation on international affairs. Please send your comments, questions and suggestions for On Faith to editor and producer David Waters.