After his grandfather passed away, Matthew Brodersen posted a video sharing that Stanley had reached out when Brodersen was struggling with “drug addiction and alcoholism, depression, and loneliness.”
“I was super depressed,” said Brodersen. “For the first time in my life, I was actually suicidal.” Concerned, Stanley called him and asked, “Why don’t you just give Jesus one more try?”
“For some reason, that phone call really inspired me,” Brodersen said. “I had given up on Christianity. I had given up on my faith at that point. I decided, okay, I’m not going to kill myself. I’m just going to give Jesus one more try…that phone call was basically life-saving.”
In his Tuesday video, Brodersen said that Charles Stanley’s funeral was “as perfect as it could have possibly been.” Afterward, family members went to Stanley’s house, where they each got to choose from among his possessions.
“The family and friends and some of his employees, we all got to go through his stuff and find things that we would keep,” said Brodersen, who took some of his grandfather’s clothes, knickknacks, and some “other things that I thought were really special.”
One item Brodersen took that he is not selling is Stanley’s passport, which contains stamps from the pastor’s trips. “Each little stamp is a memory of somewhere that he probably went,” Brodersen said, “and people were thrilled to see him and he got to help them.” Stanley’s grandson said that he would “cherish” the passport.
There are some other items, however, that Brodersen took from his grandfather’s home office and which he is selling on eBay. The first that Brodersen displayed was a 13×13 picture of Charles Stanley. It appears to have been signed on the back by Stanley and is dated Aug. 30, 1996.
Under the description of the item on eBay, Brodersen noted that he cannot prove the writing is his grandfather’s, but added, “I can assure you, I pulled it off the wall in his office where he spent most of his time.” The person who wins the picture will also receive Stanley’s coin collection.
The second item Brodersen is auctioning off is a pocket watch with Charles Stanley’s initials engraved on it. The winner of this item will also receive other watches that Brodersen found in his grandfather’s desk.
Right now, the current bid on the picture of Charles Stanley is $1,025, and the bid on the pocket watch is $830.
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Referring to a comment that expressed outrage at what he is doing, Stanley’s grandson said, “I appreciate your concern for me. I went to my grandpa’s funeral and I grieved greatly…I’m a human being who has bills to pay, and you know how the economy is, so no, I don’t really have shame in selling some of his stuff.”
