Bill Dallas (CCN) and George Barna

Because we do research, I have all kinds of chances to study people’s lives. But every once in a while I get to really delve deeply into someone else’s life experience and learn from it. That was certainly the case as I wrote Bill Dallas’s story of rags-to-riches-to-prison-to-joy.

Bill graduated with honors from a highly-respected university and then moved west to seek his fame and fortune. If you know Bill, then you know he is a take-no-prisoners kind of guy: he locks onto the objective and gets the job done. And that’s exactly how he approached his career, right out of the box. He built a highly lucrative and successful real estate development business in northern California. But the success simply fueled a life that was completely out of control. The women, the substances, the spending - lets just say that he denied himself nothing. And before he knew what hit him, he was under arrest and charged with a felony by the feds. After the lawyers were done negotiating, he was sentenced to prison.

During his spectacular crash, Bill was introduced to Jesus and accepted Christ as his savior. But it wasn’t until he had been in prison for a few years that his decision to be a follower of Christ made sense to him - or impacted his life. As only God can do, unusual circumstances occurred which placed Bill in San Quentin, one of the nation’s most the notorious federal prisons. And through a further set of odd events, Bill found himself surrounded by a group of men in San Quentin who had earned life sentences - the Lifers - but who had finally come to terms with reality and were intent upon helping Bill reclaim his life and make something of it.

After several years, during which he had ah-ha moments and life-changing experiences, Bill was finally paroled. He was indeed a new man. After a relatively short time, he founded Church Communication Network, which today serves the body of Christ as the largest satellite-based training network in North America. I have known of few people whose life has been so completely resurrected by the power of God - and who have so fully committed themselves to using their gifts to add value to His kingdom.

Lessons from San Quentin is a book about how God changed a selfish, materialistic, egomaniac into a humble man of God who is honored and content to serve the Lord’s Church. As Bill and I discussed his experiences leading up to prison, during his San Quentin years, and immediately after his release, we identified a series of moral and spiritual lessons that God taught Bill. There are a dozen chapters in the book that each take a single lesson and show how God orchestrated Bill’s wake up call in relation to that step along the journey. Briefly, those lessons concern:

1. the necessity of embracing the trials and suffering you face
2. clinging to hope is vital, even when such hope is minimal or not even evident
3. recognizing that work is an important vehicle for rebuilding your mind and heart, and re-establishing your identity in Christ
4. knowing that the fullness of life cannot be realized unless you make a definitive decision to pursue a deeper, more integrated faith
5. in our culture, our self-image gets out of whack; we must continually realign it to reflect who we really are, not the person we want the world to think we are
6. realizing there’s often too much of us and not enough of God defining our life
7. we need to regularly examine our core attitudes because they significantly influence how we respond to reality
8. you cannot expect to receive respect unless you give to those who deserve it - and that means everyone
9. required for a breakthrough in wisdom and heart change
10. you cannot take the world by force; you have to let it come to you, and be prepared to respond on the basis of appropriate beliefs and values
11. the simpler you make life, the better off you’ll be, and the more you’ll enjoy the journey
12. you’ll remain locked in an emotional prison until you forgive those who exploited or hurt you

Bill learned these principles through a difficult but rich series of encounters and opportunities that he experienced behind the walls. It was a revelation for me to discover these things through our conversations about his San Quentin era and to write about them in ways that I think you will find interesting and of personal, practical value.

So, this is not a book about prison. It is not really a book about Bill Dallas, although he is the instrument God has chosen to reveal these insights. This is a book about how you can grow to become a better disciple of Christ. I pray that you find it an arresting and useful resource on your personal journey toward transformation.

Blessings,
George Barna
January 2009