.....my attitude towards other people and my
self-obsession—I had a lot to think about in my
life that I wasn't very proud of. For the first
time in my life, I realized I'd made a mess of
things.
I began to see the whole thing closing in on and
me and getting worse and worse and worse and
worse.
I began to have different values and a different
attitude. I began to study the Bible....taught
me lots of what I needed to know as a Christian
and helped me to live my faith.
I'm watching everything I've worked day and
night to build collapse around me.
As much as being worried about my own future, I
think that was what had me searching for
something more meaningful in life.
you don't make any close friends... no one
does. I realized how easily everything you put
your heart and soul into for two years, three
years, four years could go down the garbage.
That was the disillusioning part.
My biggest regret is that I saw things going on
that I should've known were wrong or I knew were
wrong but then I rationalized them away. I
didn't say anything. I should've spoken up a
number of times and said, "Wait a moment, this
isn't right," and I didn't. That's my greatest
regret.
What do you think stopped you?
to be perfectly honest, I wanted to stay in the
inner circle. It was self interest.
A person who rushes through life mostly using
people. I thought much more about my own
self-interest than anybody's else's. That led to
the breakup of my first marriage; I was
responsible for that.
I can't imagine I lived the way I did. I cannot
imagine. I shudder when I think about it,
because I feel so totally differently about
life. Now, please don't get the impression that
somebody who's a really bad guy and then all of
a sudden finds Christ, the next day he's a
saint. It doesn't work that way.
I've discovered that every year you grow a
little more than the year before. It isn't like
all of a sudden you turn a switch and you go
from A to B. You do in one sense, because your
whole worldview is very different; you realize
you've got to see things the way God sees them,
not the way you do. So that part changes fast,
but it doesn't immediately reflect itself in how
you live. That part takes time.
Paul, who was the greatest apostle of the
Christian Church, said, "I die daily." He meant
the old Paul had to die so the new Paul could
live, and I think if we're honest with
ourselves, we all need to do that.
I kept a lot of my old friends. And I have to
tell you, over a period of time, many of them
became believers.
Even to this day, I go out of my way to spend
time with people who are in the same position I
was in before my conversion, because I know how
much they need to find Christ, and how much they
need to have hope in their lives. I don't just
stop seeing people.
...it was part of what I needed as a Christian:
to see how other people lived, to be in a
position where I was helpless and had to learn
how to lean on God.
The prevailing view well into the 1970s was that
crime is caused by environmental factors—by
dysfunctional childhoods, by racism, by poverty.
So the criminals became victims, victims of
society, which to me didn't make sense. Then I
came across two people who were doing studies on
criminal behavior, and they came to the
conclusion that crime is not caused by
environment or poverty or deprivation. It is
caused by individuals making wrong moral
choices....WHY ????
Samuel Yochelson said something very, very
significant; he said crime is caused by people
making wrong moral choices. The answer (to crime)
therefore is the conversion of the wrongdoer to
a more responsible lifestyle. I think that's
exactly what a Christian conversion is: to leave
a wrongful style of life behind and realize, if
you want to follow Christ, you have to live a
different way. I think that's the answer... to every
problem...(to the crime problem..)
Of all the religions and philosophies in the
world, Christianity is the most interested in
people who've made mistakes, because it says you
can repent and be forgiven and start over again.
Buddhism doesn't offer that, nor does Hinduism,
nor does Judaism, nor does Islam. Christianity
is the religion of second chances....I talk
about the fact that you can be forgiven of your
sins and be given a new life. In Hindu
countries, their eyes open like saucers because
they've never heard that. I think Christianity
is one of the most tolerant of all religions
when it comes to making mistakes.
excerts from Colson...my testimony, his words
