Dick Capen is a man that I have learned to respect from many different perspectives. As a strong man of God, as a very devoted and loving husband, and a very proud and loving father.

     Oh yes, he learned to overcome diversity at a very early age growing up in Brooklyn, but as he did so, he didn’t do it with any level of anger or disappointment, he did it with a strong desire to overcome and to capitalize on the strengths God has given him and not the weaknesses.

     In his early life as he grew up with his folks just able to make ends meet, he knew it would be difficult to get a college education. However, realizing that he would have the strong need for one, he made application for and received approval from the U.S. Navy for a Navy ROTC (Reserve Officers Training Program) scholarship. They would give him a complete college education, and he in turn would give the navy three years of hi life in the active duty as an officer in the Navy.

     As I got to know Dick and his life story, it was very apparent that he was a driven man, but had a very sweet spirit about him and that spirit came from a strong head and heart knowledge of a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. From the time I met Dick in the early nineties to the time I decided to write this book, I could see and feel how his relationship with the living Lord was mellowing him and his entire life style.

     Yes, I’m sure that serving as the under secretary of defense to Melcrim Laird, or serving as the editor and publisher of the Miami Herald, one of the largest papers in the United States would certainly leave a strong mark on his life. Or the experience that he and his wife Joan had as the ambassadors from the United States  to the country of Spain for President George Bush, was another incredible chapter of his life. However, all of the successes in the ladder of his life continued to impress me all the more of his humble and totally sold out position that he had in his relationship with the living Lord.

     As Dick and I were talking the year after he completed his book, “Finish Strong”, published in 1996. It became very apparent to me that the most significant position that he had ever fulfilled, was being a Board Member of the Billy Graham Evangelical Association. It was not because of the money or the prestige of being on the Board, just because of the opportunity of being in the presence of Billy Graham, who comes the closest to exemplifying a twentieth century Jesus Christ than any man who ahs lived in this century. I could sense in Dick’s voice hoe Billy Graham had had shared in the Board meetings and all the crusades that he has led, the unconditional love of his living Lord, Jesus Christ. Tat love has filled the life of Dick Capen in every part of his being, and as Dick shared the love and appreciation that he has for his wife Joan and their three children Chris, Kelley, and Carrie, I could feel his humble admiration for  and how important they are in his life as well.

     It is a real privilege and pleasure to have Dick Capen as a participant in this book. Because he to believes that it is very important to be transparent with your family as well as with the entire community at large, and as he says in his book, living the values that take you the distance, Finish Strong!