Zondervan Blog

Chuck Colson Receives Presidential Citizens Medal

Charles Colson, author of The Faith (Zondervan, 2008), today received the Presidential Citizens Medal from President Bush during a ceremony at the White House. Colson served seven months in prison for his role in the Watergate cover-up, and after becoming a born-again Christian, founded Prison Fellowship in 1976.

During the last thirty-three years, Colson has visited more than 600 prisons in forty countries and, with the help of nearly 50,000 volunteers, has built Prison Fellowship into the world’s largest prison outreach.

His most recent book, The Faith, has received universal acclaim for its explanation of the foundations of our Christian faith—bridging the gap between belief, understanding and life.

Colson joins a distinguished list of nearly 100 people who have received the medal since the program was created in 1969. Past recipients include sports celebrities such as Henry Aaron, Roberto Clemente and Muhammad Ali, as well as former government officials like US Senator Bob Dole and Robert Rubin and entertainers including actress Elizabeth Taylor.

The Presidential Citizens Medal was established in November 13, 1969 to recognize US citizens who have performed exemplary deeds of service for the nation. The medal is bestowed by the President and is one of the highest honors the President can confer upon a civilian, second only to the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Chuck Colson’s Story about How The Faith Made an Eternal Difference

Watch Chuck Colson tell the story about how his new book The Faith made an eternal difference in the life of a person he had been witnessing to for years.

“Every pastor should read The Faith and every pastor should preach through this book with their congregation—it’s that good.”  —Bill Hybels

To learn more about The Faith, download the FREE study guide, and more, CLICK HERE.

To learn more about The Faith church campaigns, download FREE resources, get significant quantity discounts, and register for your church’s campaign, CLICK HERE.

Chuck Colson's The Faith Blog Tour recap

Zondervan and Breakpoint are pleased share with you a recap of Chuck Colson's recent 9-stop blog tour for the recent release of The Faith.  Below is a summary of the 9 questions bloggers asked Chuck about The Faith, along with a link back to the blogs where Chuck answered the questions.  Enjoy this Question and Answer blog tour recap!

Question #1: Chuck, you talk about the history of the faith and tradition in your book a great deal. What do North American evangelicals stand to gain from examining more closely their own history and traditions? In what sense ought Protestantism be understood as “catholic”? Part of that great Christian tradition has to do with the witnesses to the faith, which you survey in the book. What do the concepts of martyrdom and suffering have to do with a Western context where most Christians live comfortably and without the threat of persecution?  Read Chuck's answer on the Acton Powerblog.

Question #2: Mr. Colson, you make the point in several places that Christianity is a worldview.  The term worldview is becoming common in the Christian vernacular.  Many associate worldview with learning "isms".  How do you recommend we keep "worldview" from becoming just another cerebral exercise?  How do we connect it to the heart?  Also, in the chapter on becoming holy, you discuss social holiness.  "We are to bring God's holiness to bear in every area of life.  This understanding of holiness has moved Christians throughout history to some of the greatest advances in human dignity and freedom." How do you recommend we protect against losing the focus on God's holiness as our motivation for engaging culture?  In other words, it can become easy to slide into pursuing political or social causes for reasons having nothing to do with God's holiness.  What are good ways to guard against that? Read Chuck's answer on Voyage of the Dawn Treader's Blog.

Question #3:  A few years you said that America is no longer a "Christian Nation." Can you expand on this statement?  Also, in The Faith, you identify secular atheism and militant Islamism as the two main threats to Christianity today. If you had to pick between them, which do you think presents the greater threat and why? Read Chuck's answer on Reasoned Audacity's Blog.

Question #4:  Protestants have traditionally held that justification by grace alone through faith alone is at the heart of the Christian faith and thus a non-negotiable doctrine for anyone who considers himself a Christian. Yet this is anathema within the Roman Catholic Church. This would seem to be an unbridgeable divide when seeking communion between the two traditions. Is justification by grace alone through faith alone a doctrine fundamental to the faith? What theological distinctives are non-negotiable in determining who belongs to the Body of Jesus Christ?  Read Chuck's answer on Challies.com.

Question #5: Others have asked you erudite theological questions. I hope you haven't felt like you were facing some kind of theological inquisition! Welcome to the blogosphere, Chuck! I would like to be sneaky and ask you more than one question, although they are not as intellectual as some of the others.  First of all, will we ever see a Chuck Colson blog? Secondly, can you please tell us a bit about your hopes and aspirations for the book, i.e. how you came to be writing it, why you wrote it, who your target audience is, and what you hope the book will achieve in the Christian world?  Read Chuck's answer on Adrian Warnock's blog.

Question #6:  Congratulations on your ambitious yet comprehensive book. Well done!!!!! I know its risky but I admire your efforts to join with the other streams of the holy apostolic catholic church in gaining a wider, fuller more accurate understanding of the faith and I applaud the breadth of those authors you reference. I am familiar enough with your writings to know that "postmodern" is a negative word in your vocabulary, synonymous with "relativism". But I am also close enough to the emerging church scene to recognize that "postmodern" can just as easily mean "committed to context" or "open to the past". However, despite our disparate journeys and the words we chose to define them, I think many of us are finding ourselves on a similar a quest to rediscover the historical foundations of our faith or, as D.H. Williams put it, to "retrieve" the Tradition that has informed our practice through the centuries. So my question is "Why now?"  Read Chuck's answer on Tall Skinny Kiwi's Blog.

Question #7: Chuck, thanks for this concise and compelling summary of Christian faith and its implications for our lives. The Faith speaks to the challenges of our world with clarity and incisiveness. I am pleased to recommend it to my constituency.  I am the Senior Director and Scholar-in-Residence for Laity Lodge, an organization founded by Howard E. Butt, Jr. to advance God’s renewal of individuals, families, institutions, and society. One of our core convictions is that Christians can make a major difference in the world by living out their faith at work. You mention opportunities for believers to share the Gospel in the workplace (p. 156), something we encourage as well. But we also see great potential for broader renewal if Christians would only live out their faith holistically in the context of their daily work. In fact, one of our web-based ministries encourages believers to think in terms of The High Calling of Our Daily Work. We want all Christians to understand that they are called to serve the Lord, not only in church-based ministries or through their volunteer activities, but also in their daily work, whether this be in the marketplace, at school, or in the home. Given the breadth and inclusiveness of your vision in The Faith, I expect you would agree with this conviction. Would you be willing to suggest various ways one might live out the faith in the context of daily work? What difference could orthodoxy make at work?  Read Chuck's answer on Mark D. Roberts's blog.

Question #8:  On page 117 you write this: “True faith means putting the cause of Christ and the needs of others ahead of self and doing the gospel.” Can you explain what you mean by the phrase “doing the gospel”? What is included in doing the gospel?  Read Chuck's answer on Rebecca Writes' Blog.

Question #9:  Mr. Colson – thank you for your ministry and for this book, I think I have read all of your books, and this one continues the tradition you have established of depth and practicality and I am honored to be a part of this blog tour.  Since several of my friends in the blog world already took questions I would have asked you I would just like to ask you to elaborate a bit on a passage in the book.  On page 223 you write:  "This is why orthodoxy matters, for a renewal and strengthening of the orthodox Christian faith can provide not only joy and meaning for Christians but a bulwark of sanity and reason against barbarism.  Do we want Westminster Abby and the Houses of Parliament facing one another?  Or do we want to leave it to the merry pranksters of café society to confront an evil they cannot understand, appreciate, nor defend against?  This is the great battle of good versus evil of our time?"  I am just curious as to who you mean by “the merry pranksters of café society” and whether or not you see any groups on the horizon who are working effectively to re-establish orthodoxy in our day?   Read Chuck's answer on David Wayne's Blog.

Thank you to all of the participating bloggers on The Faith's blog tour!  To learn more about The Faith by Chuck Colson and Harold Fickett, visit www.Zondervan.com/TheFaith. 

Three new blog tour postings for Chuck Colson's The Faith

Zondervan and Breakpoint are nearing the end of an 8-day blog tour for Chuck Colson and Harold Fickett's new book, The Faith. 

Three new blog tour stops for The Faith were posted this past 12 hours:

Adrian Warnock's blog

Tall Skinny Kiwi

Mark D. Roberts's blog

Previous blog tour stops for The Faith include:

Acton Powerblog

The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

Reasoned Audacity

Challies.com

Upcoming blog tour stops for The Faith are:

Thursday, March 13 - Rebecca Writes

Friday, March 14 - One Year Bible Blog

Friday, March 14 - Jolly Blogger

Chuck Colson was also interviewed by James Dobson on Focus on the Family's daily radio broadcast this week  - click here and here to listen to those shows.  You can also read a recent interview with Chuck from Newsweek magazine at this link.

Chuck Colson's The Faith Blog Tour launches today!

Zondervan and Breakpoint are pleased to announce that Chuck Colson launched an 8-day blog tour today through March 14 for the recent release of The Faith.  A blog tour is a unique opportunity for blog owners and readers to learn more of the inside story of a book through thought-provoking questions and answers from Chuck.

The Faith's blog tour is set up such that each blog owner will pose a question to Chuck about the book and Chuck will answer each of the 9 unique questions on the 8-day blog tour.  Readers of each blog are encouraged to post comments during the blog tour as well.  Chuck will periodically respond to the blog comments during the tour.

Below is the schedule for The Faith's blog tour:

March 5 - Acton Institute PowerBlog

March 5 - The Dawn Treader

March 6 - Reasoned Audacity

March 7 - Challies.com (thank you to Tim for this book blog tour model)

March 10 - Adrian Warnock

March 11 - Tall Skinny Kiwi

March 12 - Mark D. Roberts

March 13 - Rebecca Writes

March 14 - Jolly Blogger

Thank you to each of the blogs participating in The Faith's blog tour.  We hope that you will join us in following the tour.  More details on The Faith are at www.Zondervan.com/TheFaith.

Chuck Colson's The Faith Blog Tour

Zondervan and Breakpoint are pleased to announce that Chuck Colson will embark on an 8-day blog tour March 5 through March 14 for the recent release of The Faith.  A blog tour is a unique opportunity for blog owners and readers to learn more of the inside story of a book through thought-provoking questions and answers from Chuck.

The Faith's blog tour is set up such that each blog owner will pose a question to Chuck about the book and Chuck will answer each of the 9 unique questions on the 8-day blog tour.  Readers of each blog are encouraged to post comments during the blog tour as well.  Chuck will periodically respond to the blog comments during the tour.

Below is the schedule for The Faith's blog tour:

March 5 - Acton Institute PowerBlog

March 5 - The Dawn Treader

March 6 - Reasoned Audacity

March 7 - Challies.com (thank you to Tim for this book blog tour model)

March 10 - Adrian Warnock

March 11 - Tall Skinny Kiwi

March 12 - Mark D. Roberts

March 13 - Rebecca Writes

March 14 - Jolly Blogger

Thank you to each of the blogs participating in The Faith's blog tour.  We are looking forward to the tour launching March 5 and hope that you will join us in following the tour.  In the meantime, more details on The Faith are at www.Zondervan.com/TheFaith.

Chuck Colson's "The Faith"

At a time when darkness and anarchy engulf our world and we’ve lost hold of the truth that prevents us from drifting away, best-selling author Charles Colson and Harold Fickett show us where we can stand. Not with man’s solutions or innovations. But with the truths of Christianity that we’ve relied on for 2000 years to give us a clear view of the world and how we’re meant to live in it.

We have watched with fear as the dark clouds of radical Islam and terrorism have gathered. Religion and Christianity seem to lack the answers today’s world needs. Or else they’re broken.

Many doubt that God has revealed himself in a way we can understand clearly. We are divided over what Christians believe. The belief that many religions stand alongside Christianity with equal footing has weakened our ability to embrace The Faith whose founder is Christ.

Can absolute answers be found, in spite of the confusion, the ignorance, and diverse understandings of what truth is?

Addressing the anguish of our times, in which the clash of civilizations has become ever more threatening, author Colson focuses on what Christians most need to know. He takes into account the public’s skepticism of traditional religion, its drive to be spiritual without being religious, and the many voices within the church urging that believers “reinvent the brand.”

Right belief, or orthodoxy, consists in what God wants us to know so we can meet and follow him. Unless we understand what God has communicated, his invitation cannot transform us and our culture. When we embrace that belief, we find joy and create cultures that are life-giving for believers and unbelievers alike.

The Faith, published by Zondervan, presents what all Christians have believed across the ages. The book ends by considering how God’s Great Story applies to our own historical circumstances and individual lives. The epic Christian themes, what God has revealed in Jesus Christ, describe our one true hope—the rock on which we can stand.

This is a book for our troubled times and for decades to come, for Christians and non-Christians alike. It is the most important book Chuck Colson has ever written: a thought-provoking, soul-searching, and powerful manifesto of the great, historical central truths of Christianity that have sustained believers through the centuries. Brought to life with vivid, true stories, here is what Christianity is really about and why it is a religion of hope, redemption, and beauty.

www.Zondervan.com/TheFaith

FREE Study Guide for Charles Colson's "The Faith"

Zondervan recently launched a feature page at www.Zondervan.com/TheFaith for The Faith, Charles Colson and Harold Fickett's new book. One of the highlights of the feature page is the opportunity to download a free 66-page Study Guide for The Faith.

In this powerful new book, Charles Colson and Harold Fickett identify the unshakable tenets of the faith that Christians have believed through the centuries—truths that offer a ground for faith in uncertain times, hope and joy for those who despair, and reconciliation for a world at war with God and itself.

Visit www.Zondervan.com/TheFaith for more information on the book, the Study Guide, and a video from Charles Colson discussing the book.