#152 Lee Strobel - Who is Jesus Christ the Son of God?

Lee Strobel is a best-selling Christian author, journalist, and apologist known for works exploring evidence for Christianity. Strobel began his professional career as a legal editor for the Chicago Tribune, earning awards for investigative reporting. Once an atheist, he set out to disprove Christianity after his wife became a believer, leading to his conversion in 1981. His most famous book, The Case for Christ, chronicles his journey and has inspired millions to explore faith thoughtfully and thoroughly. Strobel has served as a teaching pastor and founded the Lee Strobel Center for Evangelism and Applied Apologetics at Colorado Christian University. He has authored over 40 books, including The Case for Faith and The Case for a Creator. A sought-after speaker and filmmaker, Strobel lives in Texas with his wife Leslie, where he continues to equip others to explore and share their faith. Shawn Ryan Show Sponsors: https://helixsleep.com/srs https://shopify.com/srs https://bubsnaturals.com/shawn https://meetfabric.com/shawn https://ShawnLikesGold.com | 855-936-GOLD #goldcopartner Lee Strobel Links: X - https://x.com/leestrobel IG - https://www.instagram.com/lee_strobel Website - https://leestrobel.com Books - https://leestrobel.com/books Speaking - https://leestrobel.com/speaking Please leave us a review on Apple & Spotify Podcasts. Vigilance Elite/Shawn Ryan Links: Website | Patreon | TikTok | Instagram | Download Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:35Shawn Ryan?

  Lee Strobel, welcome to the show.

• 0:38Lee Strobel?

  Thanks, Sean. Great to be with you.

• 0:39Shawn Ryan?

  It's, I'm honored to have you here.

• 0:41Lee Strobel?

  I'm honored to be here. I watch your show and love the way you engage with your guests. So I thought, hey, that sounds like it'd be a fun experience. So I'm glad to be here.

• 0:49Shawn Ryan?

  Well, thank you. Thank you for saying that. So, sorry about the way I get nervous for every one of these interviews. So half the time when I say I'm down there going through my outline, I'm just procrastinating. But, uh, but, uh, no, seriously, though, I've been, we've been trying to get ahold of you for over a year now. And, um, we finally got you. And so I've just, I've been, I've been really anticipating this interview. And, um, and, um, it's just, you've been a major part in my, my journey to faith.

• 1:20Lee Strobel?

  Well, thank you.

• 1:21Shawn Ryan?

  I know you don't know that, but, uh, but as I'm sure you have been for, for millions and millions of people. And, uh, so it is, it is truly an honor to have you here.

• 1:30Lee Strobel?

  I appreciate it. It's been a great adventure. You know, if you told me, you know, years ago that I would end up not only being a Christian, but telling other people about Jesus, I would have slammed the door in your face. I would not have anticipated this at all, so.

• 1:45Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah. Well, I can't wait to dive into that. But, um, so we're going to release this episode on Christmas. Probably it'll be either Christmas Eve or Christmas. But, um, we haven't decided yet. But I, I've been wanting to do this, like I said, since last year. And so to have you here in time to get it edited for Christmas is, uh, I think, I think you're just the perfect guest.

• 2:09Lee Strobel?

  Oh, thanks.

• 2:10Shawn Ryan?

  So I want to dive into your backstory, some of the books you've written, especially Case for Christ. And, um, and I want to... I'm learning here, so I'm a very curious person. I use my curiosity in all of my interviews. And the thing that I'm most curious about more than anything, any of the other stuff that I interview is Jesus Christ and the Bible.

• 2:40Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:41Shawn Ryan?

  So if you can help me.

• 2:43Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:43Shawn Ryan?

  Um, I would like to keep the theme. We're gonna go into some dark places. I'm sure we're gonna go into some rabbit holes. But overall, I really wanna talk about who is Jesus Christ and what does he mean to you?

• 2:58Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:58Shawn Ryan?

  And the rest of Christianity.

• 3:00Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 3:01Shawn Ryan?

  And, um, and, um, so if you could.

• 3:03Lee Strobel?

  My favorite subject.

• 3:04Shawn Ryan?

  Good, good. Mine too.

• 3:07Lee Strobel?

  Good, good.

• 3:08Shawn Ryan?

  So, and like I said, I'm, I'm learning.

• 3:10Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 3:10Shawn Ryan?

  Um, I'm learning.

• 3:11Lee Strobel?

  We all are, we all are.

• 3:13Shawn Ryan?

  I read the Bible and most of the time, I'm just being honest, I have no idea what I just read.

• 3:18Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 3:18Shawn Ryan?

  And, uh, so I, I have a bunch of different versions. I've been diving into this one called, it's called the Action Bible.

• 3:25Lee Strobel?

  I haven't heard of that one.

• 3:27Shawn Ryan?

  It's more like a comic, it's like little comic book sections. But they have little snippets that break it down.

• 3:33Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 3:34Shawn Ryan?

  For dummies like me.

• 3:35Lee Strobel?

  I like that.

• 3:36Shawn Ryan?

  And, uh, it helps, it helps. But, uh, I can't wait to get your perspective on some of this stuff.

• 3:41Lee Strobel?

  Sure.

• 3:42Shawn Ryan?

  So, but Lee, I know we did this at breakfast, but, uh, I would love, I would be honored and I would love to kick this off with a prayer.

• 3:51Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 3:51Shawn Ryan?

  And have you lead it.

• 3:52Lee Strobel?

  Yeah, I'd love to. Let me pray. Father, thank you for Sean. Thank you for you've given him this curiosity about you, about faith, about issues that really, really matter. Uh, thank you that you've given him a platform where he can take people along with him on that journey and that we can all explore and discover together. Uh, we do pray for your blessing on our conversation, that it would be encouraging, that it would be illuminating, that, uh, I don't dare I even pray it, that it be life-changing for some people. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.

• 4:23Shawn Ryan?

  Amen. I would like to add just a couple of things. I just, you know, it's been a, it's been a, some turbulent times in the world and in the, and in our country, the United States, and, um, I just, I just want everybody to have a really good. Merry Christmas this year and, and hope it's filled with family and love. And, um, and Lee, just some of the things that we spoke about at breakfast.

• 4:48Shawn Ryan?

  And your family, I just hope you guys find some answers and relief and, um, amen.

• 4:52Lee Strobel?

  Amen. Thank you.

• 4:54Shawn Ryan?

  Thank you.

• 4:54Lee Strobel?

  Sure.

• 4:55Shawn Ryan?

  So, everybody starts with an introduction here, so. You have, uh,

• 5:03Shawn Ryan?

  quite the background, so we've abbreviated, I hope we got all the important parts here, but. Lee Strobel, you are a former atheist investigative journalist and legal editor turned Christian after investigating the evidence for Christianity. You are an author of forty plus books, numerous bestselling books on Christianity, including The Case for Christ, which documents your journey from atheism to Christianity. Your newest book, Is God Real?, exploring the ultimate question of life examines the evidence for the existence of God. Your books have sold over fourteen million copies and been translated into multiple languages. Several of your books, including The Case for Christ,

• 5:49Shawn Ryan?

  have been made into films and documentaries. You are a renowned public speaker and apologist, frequently addressing topics related to faith, evidence for God, and the resurrection of Jesus. You have become a household name in the Christian community and very influential in helping skeptics explore Christianity intellectually and spiritually. In addition to all this, you have been married to your wife for fifty-two years. You're a father of two children and have embraced the role of a grandfather. Congratulations.

• 6:20Lee Strobel?

  Thank you. Four grandkids.

• 6:22Shawn Ryan?

  Four grandkids. That's amazing. So, couple of things here. What is, what is the definition of an atheist?

• 6:33Lee Strobel?

  An atheist says, "There is no God." An agnostic says, "I don't think there's a God." So that's kind of the dividing line. A lot of people who call themselves atheists are really agnostic. Because when you think about it, to say "there is no God", you would have to be God, to have that omniscience to know that God does not exist. So it's kind of a self-refuting definition. But generally, people who are atheists say "there is no God", agnostics say "I just don't know, I'm not sure, I don't believe it, I'm not there, I'm questioning, I'm doubting, I'm a doubter."

• 7:12Shawn Ryan?

  But you were a straight atheist.

• 7:13Lee Strobel?

  Yeah, I was, yeah.

• 7:15Shawn Ryan?

  So is that... That sounds like a lot of work to prove that there's nothing.

• 7:21Lee Strobel?

  Yeah, it kind of came in stages. You know, so the first step was when I was in middle school. And I started asking all those questions that middle schoolers like to ask. Like, "Well, if there's a God, how can there be suffering in the world?" Or "If there's a God, why would he send people to hell?" And nobody wanted to talk about it. And I thought, "Oh, I get it. They don't want to talk about this because there are no good answers." That was my first step. Second step into atheism was in high school, when I took biology. And I was taught that neo-Darwinism explains the origin and diversity of life. So God's out of a job. You don't need God to be a creator, science explains it away. And then third and final step in atheism happened in college,

• 8:02Lee Strobel?

  when I took a course on the historical Jesus from a skeptic. And he taught me, "You can't trust anything that the Bible tells you about Jesus. It's all fairy tale, make-believe, wishful thinking." And that kind of was the final nail in the coffin that convinced me that, yeah, God doesn't exist. I tend to be a skeptical person, that's who I am. My background's in journalism and law. So you put those together, you know, you get kind of a jerk and kind of a skeptic. And that's who I was. So I just thought the mere concept of an all-loving, all-knowing, all-powerful creator of the universe... Come on, it's crazy. Wasn't even worth my time exploring.

• 8:43Shawn Ryan?

  So is it, so is it, so it is actually a belief system?

• 8:47Lee Strobel?

  It is, oh, definitely, definitely. I believe there is faith involved. That you have to have a certain amount of faith, not in God, but in your own intellect, in your own ability to discern and figure out that there is no God behind all this stuff. So I think there's faith involved. Faith means trust, you're putting your trust in yourself, that I'm smarter than everybody else, I know that there is no God, and I'm gonna live a life consistent with that. And that's what I did, I lived a life consistent with my atheism.

• 9:23Shawn Ryan?

  Interesting. So would you, would you, would you spend time trying to disprove God to colleagues, friends, family members, people that you've run into, anybody that brought up the existence of God?

• 9:41Lee Strobel?

  Yeah, I would scoff, I would mock, I would, I didn't spend a lot of time trying to deconstruct their faith, but I certainly didn't buy it and would make fun of it and make light of it. Cause my attitude was, okay, if there is no God, if there is no heaven, if there is no hell, if there is no judgment, if there is no ultimate accountability, then the most logical way for me to live my life would be as a hedonist, someone who just pursued pleasure. And so that's what I did. I, I, I lived a very immoral, drunken, profane, narcissistic, self-absorbed, in some ways self-destructive kind of life. That was my life.

• 10:25Lee Strobel?

  What people saw was my success. I was the legal editor of the Chicago Tribune, I was writing books, doing television, I mean, there you see the success side, they didn't see was me literally drunk in the snow in an alley on Saturday night. So they weren't getting the full picture of who I was. But for me, it's like, if there is no judgment, accountability, this is all you get, you might as well just try to keep yourself happy, live as a hedonist, try to, to bring as much quote unquote happiness into life as you can. And I was the friendliest drunk in the bar. You know, I would be the guy who'd get plastered by midnight, and then I'd get pitchers of beer and just go around, fill everybody's glasses up, and I was the friendliest guy in the bar.

• 11:08Shawn Ryan?

  Man, yeah, I could definitely relate to that. I'm sure we have a lot in common. I was also very, very similar for a long, long, long time. But before we get to in the weeds with everything, it is Christmas. So I got you a gift.

• 11:29Lee Strobel?

  Oh, come on.

• 11:30Shawn Ryan?

  No, everybody gets a gift, Lee. Everybody gets.

• 11:34Lee Strobel?

  Oh, fine. Should I open it?

• 11:37Shawn Ryan?

  Go ahead.

• 11:38Lee Strobel?

  All right.

• 11:41Shawn Ryan?

  Those are Vigilance League gummy bears.

• 11:43Lee Strobel?

  Gummy bears.

• 11:44Shawn Ryan?

  Made right here in the USA.

• 11:45Lee Strobel?

  Nice. Thank you. What else you got?

• 11:48Shawn Ryan?

  It's just candy.

• 11:49Lee Strobel?

  Oh, two of them?

• 11:50Shawn Ryan?

  That's it.

• 11:50Lee Strobel?

  Awesome. Well, thanks. I appreciate it. I got a gift for you.

• 11:53Shawn Ryan?

  Thank you.

• 11:54Lee Strobel?

  You know, I have a new book coming out in March of 2025. It's called Seeing the Supernatural.

• 12:02Shawn Ryan?

  Oh, wow.

• 12:02Lee Strobel?

  And one of the things that, and the subtitle is Investigating Angels, Demons, Mystical Dreams, Near Death Encounters, and Other Mysteries of the Unseen World. And so I spent a lot of time on this book. And what publishers do is they produce what's called an advanced reader's copy that goes out to reviewers and to the media. The actual book is a jacketed hardcover and everything. But, but this is the first copy.

• 12:26Shawn Ryan?

  That's copy number one.

• 12:28Lee Strobel?

  This is copy number one. I signed it to you, to Sean, first copy. I just thought you might like to have it.

• 12:33Shawn Ryan?

  Oh, man, that is, uh, thank you.

• 12:37Lee Strobel?

  You're welcome.

• 12:38Shawn Ryan?

  This is getting framed and put in the studio. Thank you, thank you, thank you. What, um, we're going to dive into this more towards the end of the interview a little bit, but what, I'm just curious, you know, what? There's a lot of talk about spiritual warfare right now.

• 12:54Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 12:55Shawn Ryan?

  And so I'm just, I'm always curious, you know, what gets people into it? What prompted you to write this book?

• 13:02Lee Strobel?

  It's a great question. We live in a scientific age. We live in a technological age. And there's a lot of people who say that science disproves Christianity, disproves faith, which I disagree with. And they say there's nothing more to reality than what we can see and touch. And I said, "That's not true." There is more to reality than what we can see and touch. And I wanted to document it in this book by looking at things like miracles, God's intervention in His creation in a way that cannot be explained in any other way other than God is entering into our world and creating a miracle. Deathbed visions, people see just before they die, often a glimpse of what's to come.

• 13:47Lee Strobel?

  Stephen in the Bible, just before he died, he saw a glimpse of heaven. And this is extremely common, so I have a chapter on that. Near-death experiences, people who are clinically dead and yet have an experience that's corroborated in one way or the other. Direct encounters from God, how God reaches down and touches lives, mystical dreams. I believe, and the Bible teaches this, that there is a realm beyond what we can currently see and touch, and it is every bit as real as the realm that we're in and experience day by day. Spiritual warfare comes in because part of that other realm is, there is a demonic element.

• 14:31Lee Strobel?

  We have angels, literally hundreds of millions of angels that exist, they're spirits, but there's also demons. And Satan, whose name had been Lucifer before he fell as an angel and is now in warfare with God's plan, you know, he sometimes reaches into our world. And there are, in my book, I document cases of possession, demonic possession. This is real stuff. Now, demons cannot possess a Christian because we're indwelled by the Holy Spirit. We can't be indwelled at the same time by a demonic spirit. But... Satan can hector us, he can harass us.

• 15:15Lee Strobel?

  And so spiritual warfare is a way that we protect ourselves through prayer and through vigilance and through reading scripture and understanding why we believe what we believe. These various things we can do to kind of ward off these attacks that we otherwise might experience. Interesting. When you say hundreds of millions of angels. Yeah. Where do you come up with that? Because there's a, there's a passage in scripture where John gets a vision of the post-resurrection Jesus on his throne. And he says, "There are 10,000 times 10,000 angels there." Well, that's 100 million angels just in that setting. Wow.

• 15:59Lee Strobel?

  Around the throne of Jesus, worshiping him. So, we got a minimum of 100 million angels. I believe that's just the tip of an iceberg. So, do we become angels when we die? No, no, we, we are made in God's image. We have capabilities that angels don't have. They have capabilities we don't have, but they are a separate creation. What kind of capabilities? That they would have? Both. Well, first of all, they're, they're, they're not embodied, so they're spirits. So, they have the ability to move and transport themselves at great speed. That's why you see many pictures of angels with, with wings on them. They don't technically have wings generally, but they're able to move, you know, a lot faster

• 16:43Lee Strobel?

  than we are, because they're spirits, they're not encumbered by a human body. They don't grow old, they don't age. So, because there's no physical body to get older and older. Have they always been? Yeah, no, God at some point created them. This would have probably been before the creation of the world. And he created this, these legions of angels whose purpose is, described in scripture, to minister to God's people. And, you know, there are indications, this is a bit of a dispute in the Christian world, but there are indications that we have a guardian angel. That is, an angel who specifically kind of guards over us and watches over us.

• 17:27Shawn Ryan?

  That's disputed?

• 17:28Lee Strobel?

  It's disputed, there are people who disagree with that. I think there's two passages in Scripture that suggest that it's real. Certain denominations certainly believe in it. The Orthodox Christian Church believes at the time of baptism, you are assigned a guardian angel. Others believe that you have one from the time that you're born, the time that you become a Christian. Peter, there's some indication that Peter had a guardian angel, we see that in Scripture. When Jesus was talking about little children, he said, "Don't disregard these little kids, because their angels see the face of God every day." Well, who are their angels?

• 18:12Lee Strobel?

  I think guardian angels, watching over them. So, there is some Scripture that is outside the Protestant Bible and in the Catholic Bible that talks more about guardian angels. So Catholics may have a little bit stronger view of this than Protestants would. But I think there's sufficient evidence, I talk about this in my new book, sufficient evidence that guardian angels really do exist.

• 18:39Shawn Ryan?

  We're getting way into it already here, but what evidence is there that we have guardian angels?

• 18:46Lee Strobel?

  First, Jesus talking about the fact that the children, their angels see the face of God every day. So who's he referring to? These little children have angels? Yeah, that would be consistent if guardian angels actually existed. There's another case where Peter escaped from prison, and everybody thought he was still locked up. And he goes, he knocks on a house to see his buddies. And the servant hears his voice and says, "Hey, Peter's here." And they say, "He can't be here, he's in prison." Maybe it's his angel.

• 19:24Lee Strobel?

  Okay, well, is that a guardian angel they're talking about? Uh, now, in Jewish culture in the first century, uh, they believed in guardian angels. And some people will say, "Oh, well, that's, that's not saying, according to the Bible, there are guardian angels." That's just a nod to the Jewish culture of the day. I'm not so sure. I think, um, um, when you look at these couple passages, um, and also, "What is the purpose of angels but to minister to God's people?" Um, I think it's logical that guardian angels may exist. Others disagree, so it is a point of contention.

• 20:01Shawn Ryan?

  What's, what is the, what's the disagreement? I believe it, I believe it. We talked about my, my 444 experience.

• 20:07Lee Strobel?

  Right.

• 20:08Shawn Ryan?

  I tell everybody this.

• 20:09Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 20:09Shawn Ryan?

  But, uh...

• 20:10Lee Strobel?

  It, it, um, I think the disagreement comes where people think that the scriptural support for it is not strong enough. That if indeed we did have guardian angels, it would be more explicit, it'd be clearer in the Bible that we've got guardian angels. And there's no one verse that I can point to that clearly and unequivocally says, "Oh yeah, everybody has a guardian angel," or "Every follower of God," or whoever, "has a guardian angel." Um, but I think the passages I just mentioned, at least two passages, are suggestive that Peter had his angel, and these children had their angel. Well, who are you talking about there? If it's theirs, that suggests that there would be an angel who was assigned to them. So I, I, I lean toward the idea

• 20:55Lee Strobel?

  that there is a guardian angel for, for folks.

• 20:59Shawn Ryan?

  So would it be safe to say that angels are the arch-nemesis, the, the, the equivalent of good to a demon?

• 21:10Lee Strobel?

  Uh, in a sense, I mean, they would certainly be our protectors against demonic influence and demonic harassment and so forth. Um, we see instances of them as being warriors. I'll give you an example. Billy Graham tells this story. There was a true story of a, um, a missionary from Scotland who was in a South Pacific island. And, um, the local tribe got very upset that he was there to talk about Jesus, and they went to murder him and his family. And they came and surrounded his house. And so him and his family got in there, and they, "What can we do? We can pray, that's all we can do. This crowd, this mob is intent on killing us."

• 21:52Lee Strobel?

  And so they prayed all night, "God protect us, God protect us." And the mob by dawn dissipated and nothing happened. Well, the leader of that mob later became a Christian. And that missionary talked to him and said, "Hey, by the way, what happened that one night when you came to kill us? And the mob was formed around our house. Why didn't you kill us?" And he said, "Well, we couldn't do it with all those men you had guarding the house." He said, "What are you talking about? I didn't have any men guarding the house." He said, "No, we saw them. There were these men, they had swords that were drawn. And they surrounded your house. And we figured there's no way we can go in and attack these people in light of these guards around the house."

• 22:37Lee Strobel?

  Well, who are they? They were angels. And God had sent angels to protect them. And there's stories like that. I mean, in my book, I document stories where people have experiences with angels. I was talking to a famous theologian. You know how theologians are, they're very kind of buttoned down. And he was talking about growing up in a Pentecostal church, family, Pentecostal church. And he said, "Yeah," he said, "one day, years and years and years ago, this local family from our church was driving in their car. And their son was in the backseat, he was like 10 years old. And we didn't have seatbelts back then. And he opened the door and he fell out of the car, going like 70 miles an hour." And they thought, "My gosh, our son's been killed."

• 23:20Lee Strobel?

  And they turned around, they came back, and there he was, standing there, perfectly fine. And they said, "What happened?" And he said, "You didn't see the man catch me?" And this theologian began to weep. He began, he got tears in his eyes. He had to take his handkerchief out and wipe his eyes. He said, "I miss that, that, that, that, being in a church that really took this otherworldly stuff seriously. Because I believe it was an angel, that, the savior." Can I tell you something I don't generally tell people? Absolutely. This is like a confessional, but I was visited by an angel.

• 24:00Lee Strobel?

  When I was a child, I was a youngster and I had a dream. It's the only dream I remember from my childhood. It was more vivid, more real, more colorful than any dream I'd ever had. And an angel appeared to me. And I just knew intuitively he was from heaven. He was, and he started telling me about heaven and the beauty and the wonder and the joy of heaven. And I'm kind of nodding along. We're in the kitchen of our house and I'm kind of nodding along. I said, "Well, you know, I'm gonna go there someday." And he looked at me and said, "How do you know?" "So, what do you mean? How do I know? I'm a, I'm a good kid. I, I obey my parents pretty much. I've, I've been to Sunday School a couple of times.

• 24:45Lee Strobel?

  I, I, I, I try to be nice to people." And he looked at me and he said, "That doesn't matter." And this cold chill went through me. It's like, "Well, how can that not matter? All my efforts to be good, all my efforts to be obedient, you're telling me that don't matter?" And he said, "Someday you'll understand." And that was the end of the dream. 16 years later, that prophecy came true. When my wife dragged me to a church as an atheist, January 20, 1980. And the pastor got up and he talked about heaven. And he talked about heaven is not a place that we earn our way there and try to achieve something, somehow be good enough to enter into heaven.

• 25:29Lee Strobel?

  None of us is good enough to enter into the presence of God in heaven. Forgiveness and eternal life in heaven is a free gift of God's grace. Cause he loves you. You're made in his image. He wants to spend eternity with you. Offers forgiveness and eternal life is a free gift of his grace. And my first thought was, that's what that angel was talking about. 16 years ago, when he said, "Someday I'll understand." And I got it that day. I didn't believe it. Took a while, but this first day I got, "Oh, I get it now. That's what Christianity is about. It's not earning your way to heaven. It's receiving a free gift of forgiveness and eternal life."

• 26:08Shawn Ryan?

  Wow, how old were you when that happened?

• 26:10Lee Strobel?

  You know, I'd say, um, maybe 10, 11, sometime 10, 11, 12, somewhere in there. It was funny, my ordination, when I was being ordained as a pastor years ago, I thought, "Do I even tell this story? They're gonna think I'm nuts." And I told it and they all, "Yeah, okay, I mean, that's par for the course. We all have stories like that, and not exactly, but we all have experiences of God." But, uh, yeah, that was, uh, that was my experience with an angel.

• 26:38Shawn Ryan?

  What, what did the angel look like?

• 26:40Lee Strobel?

  Um, he, it was, it was male, and by the way, um, I did read some scholarly articles from Jewish writers, uh, saying that, uh, angels can be female, but in Scripture, they're all male. Uh, doesn't mean they couldn't manifest themselves, because they're spirits. So they can manifest themselves as a male, I assume as a female, but all of them in Scripture are male. Um, he was, he, he had a soft glow to him. Uh, didn't have wings, um, uh, didn't look like a cartoon character, but there was a gentle glow to him that just intuitively, I, I knew, "Oh, this is an angel. I'm, I'm talking to an angel."

• 27:22Shawn Ryan?

  So it looked human?

• 27:23Lee Strobel?

  He looked human, exactly. And even the Bible talks about the fact that, uh, sometimes when we provide hospitality to someone, we're really providing hospitality to an angel, um, unbeknownst to us. And so angels can manifest themselves as people, for all I know, you're an angel, I don't know. But, but they can manifest themselves as human-like.

• 27:48Shawn Ryan?

  Well, I told you about my experience in Sedona.

• 27:50Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 27:50Shawn Ryan?

  You know, with the, with the, with the, with the gate guard.

• 27:54Lee Strobel?

  Yep.

• 27:55Shawn Ryan?

  I think that's, may have been what that was.

• 27:57Lee Strobel?

  Could very well be.

• 27:58Shawn Ryan?

  What do you think?

• 27:59Lee Strobel?

  Could very well be, I mean, now, we also have instances where demons will, um, you know, Bible says Satan can, can appear as a, um, uh, uh, some counterfeit of light. In other words, he can, he can pass himself off as being from God, or whatever. So, we have to be careful, because, um, that's why we have the Bible, I think, to kind of be a, a plumb line to test, is this legit or not? Because demons can, they can possess people, they can influence people, they can harass people, they can appear in different ways. I think, we talk about ghosts, I think ghosts are demons.

• 28:42Lee Strobel?

  Because a technical definition of a ghost is someone who dies and their spirit refuses to enter into the next life. Well, that's not a biblical description of what can happen. So if ghosts are not biblical in that sense, maybe they're demonic. And I believe they are. I believe that, you know, are ghosts real? Well, there's some instances where we see apparitions that I believe are ghostly apparitions that have been quite real, but I believe they're satanic.

• 29:17Shawn Ryan?

  I've had encounters with ghosts. Actually, the guy filming this right now, who's behind the scenes here, had the exact same experience as us in the old Civil War cabin.

• 29:28Lee Strobel?

  Ah.

• 29:29Shawn Ryan?

  I've had a couple of experiences. We caught it on camera.

• 29:32Lee Strobel?

  Wow, yep.

• 29:33Shawn Ryan?

  But what are, what are some of the capabilities that humans would have that angels do not?

• 29:41Lee Strobel?

  Well, we have physical mobility in the sense of, we have, we are a body, we are a spirit who has a body. So God created us, it's a dualistic thing. We are spirit, but we're also physical. We also have a physical body. That's an advantage in some ways, I think. We're also, I think in the pecking order, we're actually above angels.

• 30:08Shawn Ryan?

  Really?

• 30:10Lee Strobel?

  In many ways, yeah, I think, well, actually in the Psalms it says we're created a little bit lower than the angels. But I think there are ways in which we kind of have capabilities that angels maybe don't have. And I mean, in terms of having a physical body gives us certain advantages that a spirit that doesn't have a body would not have.

• 30:34Shawn Ryan?

  Okay, okay.

• 30:37Shawn Ryan?

  Well, that was, that was a great discussion. Great little warm-up. But, um, Lee, I have a, uh, I have a, a Patreon account. That's a subscription account, and those are our, our top supporters.

• 30:51Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 30:52Shawn Ryan?

  And, uh, so one of the things I do, they've been with us since the beginning, is I always offer them the opportunity to ask each guest a question.

• 30:58Lee Strobel?

  Oh, great.

• 30:59Shawn Ryan?

  And, um, so, we had a ton of questions for you.

• 31:03Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 31:03Shawn Ryan?

  This one is from, uh, Jared Russo. Are Christians guaranteed heaven, once they confess with their mouth and believe it in their heart, as Jesus, Paul, and many others have said? If not, what have Christians done that caused God to say, "I never knew you," like it says in the Bible?

• 31:25Lee Strobel?

  Well, a definition of a Christian would be someone who has done exactly what he said. In other words, someone who confesses that, um, uh, Jesus is Lord, Jesus is God, repents of their sin, turns from their sin, admits that, receives this free gift of forgiveness and eternal life that Jesus purchased for us on the cross, when He died as our substitute to pay for all of our sins. And when that happens, when a person, the Bible says, it's the verse that brought me to faith, John 1:12, "But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name." So the formula there is believe plus receive equals become.

• 32:06Lee Strobel?

  So, we believe, based on, um, the data of, I believe, anyway, based on the data of history, that Jesus is who He claimed to be. He proved it by returning from the dead. Um, so I believe that, but I had to take another step. I had to receive. And receiving is confessing that Jesus is who He claimed to be. He is God, He is Lord, um, admitting my sin, receiving forgiveness from Jesus. When I do that, I become a Christian. Um, someone who is told someday by Jesus, "Be gone, I never knew you."

• 32:44Lee Strobel?

  Would not have been a Christian. Because a Christian, to be a Christian, would need to receive Jesus as a forgiver and leader through a prayer like that. And, and, once that happens, I believe, once saved, always saved. Once you are adopted as a son of God that way, then he never disowns his children. And so, you're safely in the kingdom of God, and that when you pass from this world, you'll ultimately end up in heaven.

• 33:12Lee Strobel?

  So, Jesus is not talking about tho-- he's talking about those who are hypocrites, who claim to be his followers, but who aren't really his followers. Those are the ones that are in trouble. The ones who, who profess certain things, and claim to be holy, and claim to be righteous, and so, and, um, Jesus says in the end, "I never knew you. Um, sorry, be gone."

• 33:34Shawn Ryan?

  Could you?

• 33:37Shawn Ryan?

  Could you give me an example of, of that? Is there anybody in, in, in history that, that you think that is? I mean, who? I guess what I'm asking is, who claims to be a follower of Jesus, but doesn't really follow? And, or believe? And, and so...

• 33:58Shawn Ryan?

  This is gonna sound bad, and I don't know the right way to put it, but... Because I do believe in Jesus, and, and I do, I think about him all the time, and I think about, you know, that old saying, "What would Jesus do?" I, I think about... I, I have that in my head all the time now. And then, when I hear something like that, for whatever reason, I always have in my head, "Shit, is it? Is that me?"

• 34:28Lee Strobel?

  Am I really okay?

• 34:30Shawn Ryan?

  Am I? Do I really believe that? Do I really believe in Jesus?

• 34:33Lee Strobel?

  This is what happened to my wife. After she came to faith, um, she kept wondering, "Am I really okay with God? Am I really saved? Am I really going to heaven?" And so, she kept praying repeatedly, this prayer, "God, I believe you are who you claim to be. I believe you're Lord. Um, um, come into my life, change my life, change my character, change my values. Um, I receive this free gift." She kept praying these prayers. And her mentor, who would let her to the Lord, came up to her one day and said, "Are you calling God a liar?" No, I'm not calling him a liar. Well, the Bible says, "But as many as received him, to them he gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in his name."

• 35:13Lee Strobel?

  If you believe and you've received, then you have become a child of God, according to Scripture. And you don't need to worry, and you always can go back to that. I can go back to November the 8th of 1981, 3 o'clock in the afternoon, after a two-year investigation where I tried to use my journalism training and legal training to disprove Christianity, and I came to the conclusion, no, it's true. Jesus not only claimed to be the Son of God, he proved it by returning from the dead, and the historical documentation is overwhelming. And that's when I go back to that moment where I realize I'm in deep weeds, because

• 35:50Lee Strobel?

  I am a sinner of sinners. I live in a moral, narcissistic, obscene life, and I need, God, I confess that, and I admit that, and I turn from that, and I want to receive you as my forgiver and as my leader. I want to receive your free gift of forgiveness and eternal life. Sometimes I need to go back to that and say, "Did I do that at 3 o'clock in the afternoon, November the 8th of 1981?" Yep, I did. I'm okay. Has God changed my life since then? Absolutely. So I have evidence of it. If there's no evidence of a life change, then you really have to ask, has God really taken root in my life? Have I really received

• 36:33Lee Strobel?

  him as my forgiver, but also my Lord? In other words, someone who leads my life? Is he really leading my life? So I can look back and say, "God's changed my character, my values, my worldview, my philosophy, my attitude, my parenting, my marriage," I mean, all these things. Over time, over time, God's changed for the good. So I have evidence that I can look at and say, "No, I can see God how..." Because the Bible says in 2 Corinthians, that when a person receives this free gift of God's forgiveness and grace, they become a new creature. The old is gone, the new has come. It doesn't mean we become perfect. We're still struggling in a world of sin to, you know, to try to follow Jesus as best we can. We still make mistakes.

• 37:18Lee Strobel?

  We still take one step forward and two steps back sometimes. That's okay. But the general orientation of our life ought to be different. It ought to be, it ought to be much more pointed toward God as being the leader of my life. And so, when you, when you look at that kind of evidence, when you look at that moment I can go back to and say, "Yep, that's the moment," then it dispels those fears that, "Oh, somehow this didn't take." Or somehow I don't know that I'm okay.

• 37:47Shawn Ryan?

  You know, I think that, well, I don't think I know, because I was one of them. How can a, I think a lot of people always, people that are on the fence, people that don't believe, I think they, a big question was for me is, is how does, how does a good person who lives a honest life filled with integrity and, and love and, you know, all the good virtues, what if they didn't have the opportunity to?

• 38:23Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 38:24Shawn Ryan?

  To learn about Jesus?

• 38:26Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 38:27Shawn Ryan?

  And, and to believe Him. And when I interviewed our mutual friend, John Burke?

• 38:32Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 38:33Shawn Ryan?

  Um, I didn't even ask him that question, but it, in interviewing him, I think I learned the answer, and it seems like everybody gets the opportunity to, to believe. And he, I remember he was talking about hellish NDEs.

• 38:54Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 38:55Shawn Ryan?

  Hellish, near-death experiences where you actually go to hell.

• 38:58Lee Strobel?

  Like Howard Storm's case, famous case.

• 39:00Shawn Ryan?

  Yes.

• 39:01Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 39:02Shawn Ryan?

  And it's, it's, and so even that guy who didn't believe, if this is the correct person, who didn't believe any of it.

• 39:11Lee Strobel?

  Yeah, he was an atheist.

• 39:13Shawn Ryan?

  Christ showed up and when he was dying and he was in hell and he did have the opportunity to say that I believe.

• 39:23Lee Strobel?

  Yeah, here's my hesitation on that. Because I know Howard's story and you're right, he was an atheist, he died physically, is clinically dead and demons were mauling him, he said, "I was like roadkill" and he called out to God, "Save me" and this orb of light came and literally saved him. It was so profound, then he eventually recovered from his clinical death and he not only renounced his atheism, he became a pastor, so he's a pastor today. That's how profound that was to him. But here's the problem, he wasn't clinically, he wasn't dead like he's never returning, he was clinically dead, but he was gonna come back.

• 40:06Lee Strobel?

  And so, I have a little hesitation in terms of saying that that's a universal experience.

• 40:12Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 40:13Lee Strobel?

  Here's what I would say, based on what I understand best in Scripture, especially the Old Testament in Jeremiah, the New Testament in Hebrews. First of all, none of us lives good lives. We're all sinners. We've all screwed up, we've all made mistakes, not just made mistakes, we've probably, I could say this, I think, we've all done things, we knew they were wrong before we did them and we did them anyway. I have, you have, right? We all have. We've sinned. And so, yes, we do good things too, but that doesn't negate the sin. It's like if you rob a bank and then you live a perfect life, do you think the government would come up to you and say, "Yeah, we're gonna forget about that bank robbery, we got all this evidence you committed"? No, you're guilty of that bank robbery.

• 40:56Lee Strobel?

  You need to pay the penalty for robbing that bank, even though you did all these good things, it doesn't wipe out the bad things that you've done. And so, so none of us is good. We all, none of us deserves to go to heaven. We're all sinners. That's number one. Number two, I would say that...

• 41:18Lee Strobel?

  Anyone, anywhere, in any culture, at any time, who calls out to the one true God and says, "God, help me, save me," like Howard did when he had that near-death experience. Said, "God, help me. I can't save myself. I need help. I need you to come to my rescue." I think anybody in any culture who prays a prayer like that to the one true God, God will provide a way for them to find redemption. And I'll give you an example. I knew a guy later in his life. He grew up in India, and in the province in India where he lived, it was illegal to share the Christian message. He was mentored in the Hindu faith by some gurus.

• 42:02Lee Strobel?

  He got to be about 17, 18 years old, and he said, "Wait a minute. I look at these Hindu scriptures. They all contradict each other. They can't all be true. They contradict." He said, "God, I'm at a loss. If you're there, I want to know you. I want to meet you. I want to experience you. God, if you're there, show me." And in a remarkable set of circumstances, God brought a couple of missionaries into his life, shared the message of Jesus with them. He came to faith in Jesus. He later immigrated to the United States, and he became a member of the church where I was a pastor at in Chicago. Wow. So there's an example of how God intervened in the life of this guy. He probably didn't even know the name of Jesus. He just knew,

• 42:46Lee Strobel?

  "I'm a mess. I need help. I need rescuing." And God rescued. God's not playing hide-and-seek from us. He's not hiding from us. The other phenomenon that's going on, that I write about in my new book, is that in the Middle East, in many Middle Eastern countries, it's illegal to share the Christian message. And so what is God doing? He's bringing dreams about Jesus to these people. This is a phenomenon that is sweeping the Middle East. People are not going to sleep as a Muslim, meeting Jesus in a dream and becoming Christians. That's not how it happens, because that could be just a subjective experience. No, there's corroboration to these dreams.

• 43:31Lee Strobel?

  So I'll give you an example. So a woman named Noor, mother of eight, Muslim, lives in Cairo. One night, she has a Jesus dream. It's the most profound, vivid dream, unlike any other she's ever had. And Jesus appears to her, and she feels the love and the grace and the forgiveness and the kindness of Jesus, just radiating from Him. And she's overwhelmed by it, she's never felt anything like it. And they're walking along a lake, and she says, "Jesus, tell me more about You." And He says, "My friend will tell you." And she says, "Who's your friend?" And He gestures to another person, she hadn't even noticed, because she was so mesmerized by Jesus. A guy was walking with them along the lakeside. He said, "My friend will tell you."

• 44:16Lee Strobel?

  She wakes up from the dream. The next day, she goes to the crowded marketplace in Cairo. She's walking in this crowded market, she saves the man from her dream. She goes up to him, "You, you were in my dreams." He said, "Whoa, whoa, whoa, what are you talking about?" Same face, same clothes, same gla-- "You were the man in my dreams." And he said, "Did you have a dream about Jesus?" She said, "Yes." He was a missionary, undercover, in Cairo. He wasn't gonna go to the crowded marketplace on that Friday afternoon, because it's chaotic. But he felt God had a mission for him, and he went that day. He met that woman, and he took her aside, opened the Bible, and shared the message of Jesus to her. So that's external confirmation, that it's not just something going on in her head,

• 45:01Lee Strobel?

  but this was a special dream that points to something outside that dream. See what I say, I mean in terms of corroboration. That's how these are happening. And I'm telling you, Sean, these are so common in the Middle East today. That sometimes you see an ad in the Cairo newspaper, and it says, "Call this number and we'll tell you about the man in white that you met in your dream last night."

• 45:23Shawn Ryan?

  Are you serious?

• 45:24Lee Strobel?

  Yep.

• 45:25Shawn Ryan?

  How are you finding this stuff out?

• 45:26Lee Strobel?

  Yep. Well, Tom Doyle, who is an expert on the Middle East and travels all over the Middle East, I interviewed him for my new book, um, coming out, um, Seeing the Supernatural. And, um, he describes this whole si-- he said, "Lee, I could pick up the phone right now and call Saudi Arabia, call Jordan, and give you five more stories from just this past week. This is happening all over the Middle East." Well, that tells me something about God. It tells me something, he's seeking us first. That he's not playing hide and seek from us, but that, but that he's reaching out to us. And it's interesting when people say, "Well, what about the guy who lives on an island who never hears the name of Jesus?" That always comes from someone who has heard the name of Jesus. You know?

• 46:09Lee Strobel?

  And my question to them is, have you responded? Have you responded to what you know about Jesus and received him as your forgiver and your leader? Um, because that's not an issue for you. Um, but it is an issue for some people, and I believe that anyone who calls out to the one true God saying, "God, help me, save me. I, I, I realize I messed up things. I, I, I want to know you. Are you there? Tell me, show me." I believe God will find a way through a dream, through a missionary, whatever, to make that happen.

• 46:41Shawn Ryan?

  When you say, when you say this gentleman took this woman and gave her the message of Jesus in one day.

• 46:48Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 46:49Shawn Ryan?

  What? What is the, what is that message?

• 46:53Lee Strobel?

  Yeah. It's a great question. You know, the Bible is almost 800,000 words. And, you know, if you try to read the Bible, it can mess your mind up. I mean, it's, it's difficult.

• 47:03Shawn Ryan?

  I mean, there's a lot of messages.

• 47:05Lee Strobel?

  There is a lot of messages in the Bible. There's a lot, there's a lot there. And to really understand it takes a lot of study and so forth. But... I can summarize the central message that God wants us to know from the Bible in one verse, 21 words. And the verse is Romans 6:23, which says simply, "For the wages of sin is death." But, the free gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord. So, the wages of sin is death. What we've earned, what we deserve, because we've ignored God, we blasphemed against Him, we violated His commands, we turned our back on Him.

• 47:47Lee Strobel?

  The wage, what we've earned because of that is death, which means eternal separation from God. We pay for our own sins, separate from God forever. But, it says, there's another part to the story. The free gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus your Lord. In other words, you can't earn it, because if you try to earn a gift, it's not a gift anymore, it's a wage. No, it's not a wage, it's a gift. The free gift of God is eternal. How do you receive a gift? You know, this is Christmas. You know, there's a bunch of gifts probably under Christmas trees all over the world. They don't become yours until you receive them.

• 48:29Lee Strobel?

  And so, when we receive that gift, we become a child of God forever. You know, there's a lot of different religions in the world. They all contradict each other. But Christianity is different from, I think there's 4,200 religions in the world, something like that. Yeah, I think that's right. Every other faith system I've ever explored, and I've looked at thousands, every other one is spelled DO. You gotta do something to try to earn your way to God. Use a Tibetan prayer wheel. Go on a pilgrimage to Mecca. Give alms to the poor. Do good deeds. Do, do, do something, and maybe someday, maybe, maybe not,

• 49:14Lee Strobel?

  but maybe you'll do enough. To earn your way to heaven. That's how every other religion functions. Christianity is not spelled DO, it's spelled D-O-N-E. It's done. Jesus said in the cross, "It's finished, it's done." He paid the penalty we deserved for the sins that we've committed. In other words, we don't have to pay the penalty, He paid it on the cross, on our behalf. And all we have to do, and then He offers forgiveness as a free gift. We just need to receive it in repentance and faith. Say, "I'm sorry for how I've lived. I don't, I don't want to be separated from God. I want to know you personally. How do I do that? I receive this free gift of your grace."

• 49:58Lee Strobel?

  That's what grace is, by definition, it is free. And so that's the difference between every other religion and Christianity. Because they all contradict each other. I have a good friend who's a Muslim, and he comes over to my house and we barbecue and we're buddies and... So I've read the Quran. And, you know, in the Quran, it's Surah 4, verse 156, it says, "Jesus didn't die on the cross, and therefore He wasn't resurrected." The Quran also says that God does not have a son. The Quran also says that no one can bear the sins of another. Specifically, the Quran says that. Okay, those are three things I need to believe to be a Christian. Now, maybe the Quran is right.

• 50:43Lee Strobel?

  Maybe that's, maybe that's correct. Or maybe Christianity's correct. But they can't both be correct. They, they, they conflict. They can't both be correct. And so I look at the evidence that Jesus did die on the cross, and that He was resurrected from the dead, the historical data that convinced me that He not only claimed to be the Son of God, He backed it up by returning from the dead. And I look at that and I go, because of that, I can trust that Jesus is who He claimed to be. So I say, "His message is the one that I want to respond to." His message of grace and hope and redemption, this gift of God that He wants to give all of us.

• 51:26Lee Strobel?

  Why was, why was Jesus sent here? I think a couple of reasons. And what, let me, yeah, let's start with this.

• 51:36Lee Strobel?

  What is Jesus? Or who is Jesus? Yeah. God has existed from eternity past as the Godhead. God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit. They have always existed in a perfect love relationship. And so, God, when He decided to create humankind, because they're in this love relationship, He wanted us to experience love. And so, He gave us free will. But what have we done with the free will? We turned our back on God. We've denied Him. We even look at the world, it's a mess. We've used our free will and given God the middle finger, basically. And so, God loves us. He made us in His image. We are made as, which means not physically,

• 52:21Lee Strobel?

  but our souls are fashioned in the image of God. And He loves us. And so, He said, "I'm gonna send Jesus into the world to be born of a virgin, fully God, still, and fully man. And His ultimate purpose is Easter. His ultimate purpose is to die. To die, why? To die as our substitute, who says, 'I'm gonna pay the penalty you deserve, 'cause I love you. I'll pay the penalty, you don't have to, if you receive this gift of forgiveness as a free gift of grace.'" I'll give you an example.

• 53:03Lee Strobel?

  There's a story, I don't think it's a true story, it's more of a parable, of a judge. And he's an honest judge. He's a righteous judge. And one day, a woman is brought in front of him on a charge of shoplifting. And it's his own daughter. And he says, "What is the evidence against my daughter?" And they present the evidence that she's clearly guilty. Clearly guilty. Well, now, what does he do? He loves his daughter. It's his only daughter. He loves his daughter. But he's a righteous judge. He can't just wink and say, "Ah, yeah, never mind. I forgive you. Forget the whole thing." He can't do that, because if he did that, he would not be a righteous judge. He would not be an honest judge.

• 53:48Lee Strobel?

  So what does he do? He looks out at his daughter, says, "I find you guilty. I'm sorry, but you're guilty, and I have to say that, and I have to declare it. You are guilty. And I sentence you to jail for 60 days."

• 54:03Lee Strobel?

  And a fine, or a fine of $10,000. Well, he knows, she doesn't have $10,000. She's gonna have to be separated from him in jail for 60 days. But what else could he do? He's an honest judge. You know what he does? He takes off his robe. And he walks down in front of the bench. And he opens his checkbook. And he writes out a check for $10,000. And he rips it off and he says, "I want to give this to you. So you can pay the penalty that you deserve. But I'm gonna pay it for you." Now, she has a choice. She could turn it down, say, "No, no, no, I'd rather go to jail." I don't think she'd do that. I think she'd say, "Thank you, Father, for loving me so much.

• 54:47Lee Strobel?

  That you paid the penalty I deserve, because I'm guilty." And she receives that check and she's set free. That is a analogy for what goes on with Jesus. Why Jesus came into the world, to die in our place as our substitute. So that our sins could be wiped out, because only perfect people can go to heaven. And so, we have to be forgiven, completely forgiven. And we have to be clothed in the righteousness of God, which also happens when we receive Him as our forgiver and leader. And then the doors of heaven are flung open for us. But that was the only way, because God is a righteous judge. He is holy. He can't just wink and say, "Yeah, yeah, yeah, forget it.

• 55:31Lee Strobel?

  I know you've done all these evil things in your life, but yeah, yeah, yeah, let's just forget about it." No, they have to be paid for. If I lend you my car. And you're gone for a day and you come back and it's got a big scratch down it. I could say, "Oh, I just forgive you." But then I gotta pay for the scratch. I gotta pay to have it repaired. Or if I don't, when I sell the car, I'm gonna take a loss for the amount equivalent to fixing that scratch. I'm gonna have to pay the penalty in one way or the other. I can't just wink and say, "Forget it." So God can't just wink and say, "I'm gonna ignore the fact that you're sinners." No, no, no, because that would be a lie. And He can't lie. So do you see? So the purpose of Christmas, ultimately?

• 56:15Lee Strobel?

  Is Easter. Now, along the way, God showed us how to live life. You know, I mean, I mean, um, he talked about how we should care for others, how we should, prioritize people who are hurting, how we should reach out in love to people who are, who are in need of our love and our kindness and so forth. He showed us how to live the perfect life. But you know, if he only did that, none of us would get to heaven. He had to, Easter had to happen. He had to go, he had to not only die on that cross, but then be resurrected from the dead, so that when we die, we can be resurrected as well.

• 56:56Shawn Ryan?

  So I got a, a few questions. One is, I want to rattle them off just so I remember them. One is the difference between Father, Son, Holy Spirit. Another one is, and we'll come back to that, but you know, another one is, and I would like to address this right now, is it, is it, who is Jesus or who was Jesus?

• 57:18Lee Strobel?

  Uh, who is Jesus? He is still alive. He is still, yeah, he is, he is still with us, so to speak. I talked to him this morning. We talked to him at breakfast when we prayed. So he is still who he is. Uh, now, he was united with a human form at the time of his incarnation and born on Christmas of a virgin. Um, and when the Holy Spirit overcame Mary, it says, "Therefore, the child was born holy." So that, that process of the Holy Spirit,

• 57:59Lee Strobel?

  leading to the birth of Jesus, made it possible for him to be without sin. Uh, he was made holy somehow. We don't understand the entire process. The incarnation is mind-boggling. It's the timeless becoming time-bound. It's the eternal becoming time-bound. It's the immaterial becoming material. I mean, it's beyond our ability to understand. But clearly, Scripture says, because of the way the incarnation took place, it means that Jesus was holy, Jesus was without sin.

• 58:28Shawn Ryan?

  So if, if God is Jesus's Father, then who is Joseph?

• 58:34Lee Strobel?

  Joseph would be, um...

• 58:36Shawn Ryan?

  Is he the caretaker?

• 58:37Lee Strobel?

  He would be an earthly quote-unquote "father", just like if you adopted a son. Um, you're not the biological father, but you're the father, you're an adopted father. Yeah, be more of that, yeah.

• 58:49Shawn Ryan?

  Okay. And, and, I have another question, I mean,

• 58:56Shawn Ryan?

  I'm learning there are a lot of rules in...

• 59:03Shawn Ryan?

  How do I say this? And, I don't wanna say Christianity, I wanna say...

• 59:11Shawn Ryan?

  There are rules that

• 59:20Shawn Ryan?

  the other realm has to abide by. It seems like there are rules that, that, that good and evil need to abide by. That demons, demons and angels and God and Jesus and good and evil, the farther I dig into this stuff, it seems like there are a lot of, of a lot of rules that I don't understand.

• 59:46Lee Strobel?

  Well, there's certainly, God restrains evil.

• 59:49Shawn Ryan?

  And if, if-

• 59:50Lee Strobel?

  To some degree.

• 59:52Shawn Ryan?

  If, if there are specific...

• 59:57Shawn Ryan?

  Why are there rules?

• 59:59Lee Strobel?

  Well, I, I wouldn't posture it as rules, I would posture it more as, um, um, God rules over all.

• 1:00:05Shawn Ryan?

  It seems like there's some kind of, some kind of law.

• 1:00:10Lee Strobel?

  Hmm. Okay, I see where you're going. Yeah, there, there is a moral law.

• 1:00:16Shawn Ryan?

  Like, like this morning, I had told you,

• 1:00:21Shawn Ryan?

  and I don't know the laws.

• 1:00:22Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:22Shawn Ryan?

  But, you know, I've, I told you I've interviewed an exorcist.

• 1:00:26Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:26Shawn Ryan?

  Um, I've dug into these things a little bit. A lot of it I don't understand. Even this morning, I, I had mentioned, right before we had breakfast, we're, we're building that new studio. I went out there, they're pouring the foundation and the footers, and, um, me and, and, um, one of the guys that has worked here the longest went out and, and we, we, we, we wrapped bibles up so that they're protected and then we, we, we put them in each corner of the foundation.

• 1:00:55Lee Strobel?

  That's awesome.

• 1:00:56Shawn Ryan?

  Because-

• 1:00:58Shawn Ryan?

  Maybe it's superstition, maybe it's not.

• 1:01:00Lee Strobel?

  I think it's a great gesture just to say, "We want our foundation to be God."

• 1:01:04Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:05Lee Strobel?

  I love that.

• 1:01:06Shawn Ryan?

  But, but, but what I'm getting at is, you know, I, I, I've heard of priests doing that. I've heard of, I've heard of that it may keep demons out and, hey, if there's any chance of that, then I'm gonna take advantage of it. And I, and I do, I do. I mean, it's symbolic and I do think, and, and, and I, it seems there's some sort of law that all of these, for lack of a better term, entities need to follow.

• 1:01:34Lee Strobel?

  Well, I mean, when you told me about burying those Bibles in the foundation, I just thought, "That's a great symbol of the fact that we want our, our organization as best we can. Yeah, we're gonna make mistakes, we're gonna mess things up from time to time, but we want ultimately to, for God to be honored by what we do."

• 1:01:56Shawn Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:01:57Lee Strobel?

  Um, that's one thing. I don't know, and I would, you know, we can get into the realm of superstition at some point and say, "Does that mean that demons cannot somehow penetrate that because the foundation?" I, I, I think that's more of a superstition than it would be. Now, it could be that if you are declaring to the world that is our hope, is our intention, is our desire, that our organization be honoring to God, that's gonna be deterrent to demonic activity.

• 1:02:32Shawn Ryan?

  Let me, let me bring up another example.

• 1:02:33Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:36Shawn Ryan?

  I had mentioned, uh, my friend Eddie Penny at lunch, and I, and, uh, and, and he was a Christmas episode.

• 1:02:43Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:44Shawn Ryan?

  And I don't even know if we, he's been somewhat of a mentor to me, not somewhat, he has been a mentor to me, um, in, in, in, in my journey to faith. And, and I don't know if he said this on the show, or if this was a phone call, I can't remember, sometimes I get, you know, the lines get blurred here, but, and I've, and he's not the only one that I've heard say this, but he is, he has talked about... Demons in his house. Um, we spoke about exorcisms.

• 1:03:12Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:12Shawn Ryan?

  You know, and, and, and people that are levitating and, and whatnot. And, you know, Eddie's, Eddie, I remember him saying, people say, in the name of Jesus Christ, leave my house.

• 1:03:24Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:24Shawn Ryan?

  And they have to leave your house.

• 1:03:26Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:26Shawn Ryan?

  So that would be, that would be one of the.

• 1:03:29Lee Strobel?

  Okay.

• 1:03:29Shawn Ryan?

  One of the laws.

• 1:03:31Lee Strobel?

  And that goes back to the Bible. That goes back to Jesus, um, um, casting out. And one of the things that Jesus is best known for are not only miracles, but exorcisms, uh, casting out demons. I think half of Jesus' activity in the, in the Gospel of Mark involves casting out demons and so forth. So how did he do that? He, you know, it was, it is something that he instructed his followers to do to, um, challenge and, and, and confront the demons, um, in the name of Jesus, to depart. So that comes from the Bible. So, I mean, do I believe that demon possession exists? Yes. And in my book, um, coming out in March, I mean, I deal, I have a whole chapter on that. Uh, yes, I believe it can happen.

• 1:04:16Lee Strobel?

  I don't believe it happens to Christians because we are by definition indwelled by the Holy Spirit, so we can't be indwelled by a demon at the same time. But Satan can hector us. He can harass us. And that's why we want to, as the Bible talks about, put on the full armor of God to protect ourselves from that through understanding and reading the scriptures, through prayer and so forth. Um, so yeah, that's a good example of, I want to call it a rule, but it's a, it's a, um, an action we can take to cast out the demonic, um, as Jesus did in his ministry. So that would be a good example. Um, but I think sometimes, um, you know, it, it's hard to, um,

• 1:05:02Lee Strobel?

  To draw a line between what can be a superstitious belief versus what's a biblical belief. And so, I can look at that and say, is casting out a demon in the name of Jesus, is that a rule that God approves of? Yeah, because we have examples in Scripture of Jesus casting out demons, and we want to do that in His name. But if you tell me that, "Oh, if you wear a crucifix around your neck, that it will ward off the demonic," I don't see that in Scripture. So, I always go back to, is it in the Bible? Can I trust it? That gives me a plumb line. It gives me something that I can speculate about other stuff, you know?

• 1:05:46Lee Strobel?

  But that's just me speculating. And what does that really matter? I think the Bible has more weight than that.

• 1:05:52Shawn Ryan?

  What version of the Bible do you read?

• 1:05:56Lee Strobel?

  I read several. I think it's healthy to read several sometimes to get a little bit translation difference. I like the NIV. That's my publisher. Also publishes that version. It's a great version. The ESV is a good version. The New King James Version is a good one. The new, what's it called? The NLT. The New Living Translation. That's a really good translation. So, what people have to understand, though, is there's a difference between a Bible translation and a paraphrase. So, a translation goes back to the original, as best we have them, the existing documents in the Greek and in the Hebrew,

• 1:06:41Lee Strobel?

  and translates those into modern language that we can understand. That's a translation. There are also things like a thing called the Message, which is a Bible, but it's a paraphrase. It's a well-educated Christian scholar who kind of puts it in vernacular that maybe we can understand better, and maybe he takes a little liberty with it, and that's okay, because it's consistent with what the Bible says. So, there's a difference there. And I encourage people to use a translation, because that is staying true to what was originally written, as best we can determine it. By the way, talking about, I want to give you a little anecdote,

• 1:07:25Lee Strobel?

  because we talked at breakfast about numbers and how numbers can be really interesting sometimes. And you know, it's very commonly said that the number of Satan is 666.

• 1:07:35Lee Strobel?

  A friend of mine is named Dr. Daniel B. Wallace. He's a professor at Dallas Seminary. He's probably the world's leading expert on the manuscripts of the New Testament. And his ministry is to travel the world and to go to museums and seminaries and places that have ancient manuscripts and to take high-quality photographs of them for scholars so we can preserve them forever. And I was talking to him once and I said, um, he said, "Yeah, I discovered something interesting." I said, "What?" He said, "I took the oldest manuscript we've got of the Book of Revelation, and I examined it under a microscope. And the number of Satan is not 666, it's 616."

• 1:08:22Lee Strobel?

  I said, "Really?" And it always stuck in my mind. I called him back about a year later, I said, "Did I understand you right when you said you examined it under a microscope and the real number is 616?" He said, "Yeah." So, I mean, that's why it's important that we go back to the sources as best we can. You know, the original documents are all lost. They're all reduced to dust because they were made of papyrus and so forth, scrolls. And, um, but we have reliable documents because handwritten copies were made. We have thousands of copies that we can compare and contrast, and we can come to a conclusion about what the original said. And that's the translations we have.

• 1:09:03Shawn Ryan?

  So are all the different versions different translations? Or is this different, or is there more than that?

• 1:09:08Lee Strobel?

  Um, different versions of what?

• 1:09:11Shawn Ryan?

  The Bible.

• 1:09:11Lee Strobel?

  Of the, that you see in a store, for instance? Yeah, they're all translations, but a translation committee may choose a certain word. Um, say the Greek says this, "We're going to translate it this way." And another group might get together of scholars and say, "Yeah, that's good, but we think it's a little sharper, a little better to translate it this way."

• 1:09:33Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 1:09:33Lee Strobel?

  And so they're very careful about that. There's a Bible called the NET Bible. I think it's the New English Translation. Daniel B. Wallace, who I mentioned, is the editor of that. That has thousands, literally thousands, of footnotes that explain why they translate the Greek and the Hebrew in the way they did. So it says, "You know, we had a choice here. We could have used this word in English, or we could have used this one. This is why we chose this one. But we just want you to know, you know, we could have chosen this other one, but these are the reasons why." So it's really a handy Bible to have. I've got one. I refer to it all the time.

• 1:10:08Shawn Ryan?

  I want to go back to my other question too about the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit.

• 1:10:14Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:10:15Shawn Ryan?

  What is, what is the difference?

• 1:10:21Lee Strobel?

  There's a relational component to it. In other words, God the Father has existed from eternity past. God the Son has existed from eternity past. Well, that relates, that refers to a relational, how they relate to each other. God the Holy Spirit has existed from eternity past. And so in some ways, they have some different functions in the sense that it was Jesus that came and left behind the perks of heaven, was born among us on Christmas, lived the perfect life, went to the cross to pay the penalty for our sin. That is a role that He fulfilled as part of the Godhead

• 1:11:02Lee Strobel?

  with the permission of, and the, and the leading of the Father and the Holy Spirit. So there, there is one God, but three persons. And how do I know that? Because if you read Scripture, you can see it teaches four things.

• 1:11:22Lee Strobel?

  The Father is God, the Son is God, the Holy Spirit is God, and there is one God. So those four teachings are clear in Scripture, and so how that plays out is kind of a mind bender, but we can know that they are all God, they are God, there is one God, and that is God in three persons.

• 1:11:44Shawn Ryan?

  Sven described to me, it's like water, ice, vapor.

• 1:11:49Lee Strobel?

  Yeah, there's a problem with that. There's a heresy called modalism. Modalism says that there's one God, but he changes, like he's the Father now, but then he changes, like water changes to steam when it's heated, and now he becomes the Son, and then he changes again, because water can become ice, and becomes the Holy Spirit. That's a heresy, that's not how it works. He is, there are three distinct persons in the Godhead who are God. So it's not like they change roles, or go from water to ice to steam. A lot of people use that illustration, and it's, you just have to be careful, because

• 1:12:32Lee Strobel?

  that can lead to a heretical belief, that God changes from the Father to the Son to the Holy Spirit, depending on the circumstances. That's just not what happens.

• 1:12:40Shawn Ryan?

  So did you say that they each have different purposes?

• 1:12:42Lee Strobel?

  Well, they can each have different roles.

• 1:12:44Shawn Ryan?

  What would those roles be?

• 1:12:46Lee Strobel?

  Well, the role of the Holy Spirit, for instance, in my life, is to indwell me, to live in me, to guide me, to be sort of an internal conscience, to help me incrementally over time, to become more like Jesus, to change my values, to change my character. So one of the roles of the Holy Spirit in our life is to minister to us as we grow in our relationship with God. That's one of the roles that He performs. But there are other roles too, like it was through Him, through the Holy Spirit, that Jesus was conceived in the womb of Mary.

• 1:13:23Lee Strobel?

  So, and Jesus has the role of being the Savior of the world, but they all have that role, in the sense, the Holy Spirit was involved. When you look in Genesis, even in early Hebrew writings...

• 1:13:40Lee Strobel?

  You can see the Spirit and you can see the different elements of God, the different elements of God, is the wrong term. You can see the three persons of the Trinity playing a role in creation. Jesus played a role in creation. The Father played a role in creation. The Holy Spirit played a role in creation. So they're working together as one Godhead to accomplish all the creation that we have.

• 1:14:04Shawn Ryan?

  How did Jesus play a role in creation?

• 1:14:07Lee Strobel?

  There's a scripture in the New Testament that says, "Nothing that was created was created without Jesus." So He played a role from eternity past in the creation of the world.

• 1:14:19Shawn Ryan?

  Wow.

• 1:14:20Lee Strobel?

  Yeah, pretty wild.

• 1:14:22Shawn Ryan?

  Fascinating stuff.

• 1:14:23Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:14:24Shawn Ryan?

  Lee, let's take a quick break. When we come back, I want to get into what sent you on your journey.

• 1:14:31Lee Strobel?

  Sure.

• 1:14:32Shawn Ryan?

  To disprove God and what you found.

• 1:14:34Lee Strobel?

  Okay.

• 1:14:35Shawn Ryan?

  Thank you.

• 1:14:38Speaker 00

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• 1:15:16Shawn Ryan?

  All right, Lee, we're back from the break. Sorry about the mini interrogation there.

• 1:15:20Lee Strobel?

  (laughing) Sorry, it was interesting.

• 1:15:21Shawn Ryan?

  But I'm just curious. A lot more questions are gonna come up.

• 1:15:25Lee Strobel?

  Sure.

• 1:15:26Shawn Ryan?

  But I want to do, I want to get into... A little bit about what sent you on the journey to disprove the Bible?

• 1:15:36Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:15:37Shawn Ryan?

  Or God?

• 1:15:38Lee Strobel?

  Well, I was legal editor of the Chicago Tribune. And got married young. And I was an atheist. My wife was an agnostic. She didn't know what to believe. And she came up to me one day and gave me the worst news any atheist husband could get. She said, I've become a Christian. I thought, oh, great. You know, now she's gonna start judging me. Now she's gonna try to get me not to hang out with my friends. Now she's gonna make the kids think that there's something wrong with me because I don't believe in God. I thought, I just saw trouble on the horizon. And trouble came. Because all of a sudden, she becomes a devout Christian, and I'm an adamant atheist.

• 1:16:22Lee Strobel?

  Well, we're just butting heads. And we'd never done that. We met when we were 14. We got married at 19 and 20. You know, we're best friends, and yet, for the first time in our marriage, we're at loggerheads. You know, she wants to go to church. Well, am I gonna stay home with the kids while you go to church? I got other things to do. She, I remember when she came to me, she said, I'd like to give some money to the church. I said, I got a good idea. Why don't you take the money and flush it down the toilet? Because that'll have the same effect. So that was, that was what she was up against. I mean, and I thought, I gotta get my marriage back together here. How do I do that? Well, wait a minute, there's an easy way.

• 1:17:08Lee Strobel?

  All I have to do is disprove Christianity. You know, I went to Yale Law School. I understand what evidence is. Take me a long weekend, maybe a three-day weekend, and I'm sure I can poke enough holes in Christianity that it would fall apart.

• 1:17:23Shawn Ryan?

  What brought your wife to faith?

• 1:17:25Lee Strobel?

  It's interesting. We moved into a condo in suburban Chicago. And the doorbell rang. And it was a neighbor. It was a woman, she was a nurse. And her name was Linda. And she had a child on her hip who was six months old. Well, we had a nine-month-old daughter. And so Linda introduces herself, brought a plate of cookies.

• 1:17:51Lee Strobel?

  And said, "Hey, you know, let's get together sometime." So they became best friends. Well, Linda was a Christian, a strong Christian. And they would have long conversations about God. And Leslie wasn't hostile like I was. She, she just had questions, like anybody would. And Linda had answers. And she went to church with her, she checked it out. And then she brought me that news, that she had become a Christian.

• 1:18:22Shawn Ryan?

  And that just enraged you?

• 1:18:24Lee Strobel?

  Oh, my gosh, I just saw, this is, this is the last thing I need in my life. Because I just had this caricature of Christians who were gonna be judgmental and gonna look down their nose at me. And, and, and by the way, I thought I was a man in her life. Now who's this Jesus character?

• 1:18:40Shawn Ryan?

  Well, you weren't wrong.

• 1:18:41Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:18:42Shawn Ryan?

  I do see a lot of those things that you just described still today. And I'd love to chat about that later on.

• 1:18:46Lee Strobel?

  I know, there is a lot of that. And that's what I was recoiling against. And so, I thought I could disprove it. I ended up spending a year and nine months, taking my journalism training, my legal training, and probing the historical data concerning the resurrection of Jesus mainly. Because even as an atheist, I understood, everything, everything, everything, depends on whether Jesus returned from the dead or not. Because clearly, Jesus made transcendent and messianic and divine claims about himself. He claimed he was the Son of God. At one point, he gets up before a group of people. And he says, "I and the Father are one."

• 1:19:31Lee Strobel?

  And the word in Greek there for "one" is not masculine, it's neuter. Which means Jesus was not saying, "I and the Father are the same person." He was saying, "I and the Father are the same thing. We're one in nature, we're one in essence." And the audience got it. They said, "Oh, you're a man, and you're claiming to be God." So they were gonna kill him for claiming to be God. Well, he claimed to be God, but so what? I could claim to be God. You, well, maybe not you.

• 1:20:00Lee Strobel?

  Anybody could claim that they're God. But if Jesus claimed to be God, died, and then three days later rose from the dead? That's pretty good evidence he's telling the truth. So even as an atheist, I recognize this is the ballgame. And if I could just disprove it, I'd be home free. I could rescue her from this cult and go on with our life as it was. Where do you start to disprove something? It's so funny you ask that because this is back in, you know, 1980 or so, when, you know, you're at the library with microfiche and microfilm and you're doing interlibrary loans that take four months to get an ancient book out of the library. You're going to museums to look at manuscripts. You know, but, you know, I was trained to investigate.

• 1:20:44Lee Strobel?

  I was investigative reporter for the Chicago Tribune. I did major investigations. I did a lot of the original reporting on the Ford Pinto case, which is before your time, but it was a big deal back then. And so I knew to pick up the phone and say, call a scholar and say, I'm Lee Struble from the Chicago Tribune. Oh, he probably thought I'm working on an article. And say, hey, I got a question for you. What about this? Oh, okay. Well, great. Thanks. So I just began calling people, researching history, checking stuff out. And nowadays, it's a lot easier. Nowadays, it's very easy to investigate this stuff. One of the greatest scholars, probably the greatest scholar on the resurrection,

• 1:21:29Lee Strobel?

  Dr. Gary Habermas, is writing a four or five volume set. Each volume is like 800 pages or so on the resurrection, refuting every counterargument out there and presenting the case affirmatively and so forth. So there's plenty of stuff out there now if someone wants to check it out. I ended up writing a book on it called The Case for Christ. When I did the book, I, you know, I needed to retrace a lot of these interviews that I did because I wasn't planning to write a book. I didn't keep notes. This is for me, my curiosity, like you. I had a bunch of questions. But then when I wrote the book, of course, I had to do in-depth interviews, tape record them, make sure they were accurate and so forth.

• 1:22:14Lee Strobel?

  And so that book really summarizes the evidence. So...

• 1:22:19Shawn Ryan?

  Earlier you had mentioned there was a passage, I think, did you say John 1:12?

• 1:22:23Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:22:24Shawn Ryan?

  Uh, that, that did it for you? Is that really, what is, what is, what is John 1:12?

• 1:22:30Lee Strobel?

  Yeah, John 1:12 says, "It's not enough just to believe that Jesus is the Son of God." The Bible says demons believe that Jesus is God, and they shudder, because they know the implications of it for them. Um, it's not enough just to believe it, we have to receive, receive this free gift of forgiveness and eternal life, this free gift of God's grace. And when we do that, John 1:12 says, "We become a child of God forever." Um, well, I didn't believe, and I didn't, I didn't, you know, I thought it was, I thought it was fairy tales, I thought it was make-believe, I thought Christianity was, was based on wishful thinking, mythology and legend, that's what I thought.

• 1:23:15Lee Strobel?

  But as I began to investigate the resurrection, I was stunned, because I, when I was a little kid, I don't know if you had this when you were a kid, my parents for Christmas gave me this punching clown. It was, it was weighted on the bottom, it was about three feet tall, and it was inflated, and it was a clown, and you would hit it like a punching bag, and because it was weighted on the bottom, it would go down when you would hit it, but then it would bounce back up, and then you'd hit it again. It was a toy that I got when I was a kid. That's how I pictured this. I thought I had a knock-down punch, I thought I could disprove Christianity, so I'd hit it with an objection, and it would bounce back, there's an answer to that. Doggone it, what about this?

• 1:23:56Lee Strobel?

  Bang, I hit it again, and it would bounce back, there's an answer to that. So, I was stunned, because I did not expect there to be any historical validity to the fact that Jesus died on a cross and rose from the dead. But I can summarize it really quickly, what I found, using four words that begin with the letter E, that way people can remember, because remember, it's Christmas, the reason Jesus came was Easter, the resurrection, how do we know it's true? Four letters, four words that begin with the letter E, execution. Jesus was dead after being crucified. I thought maybe he survived and the cool damp air of the tomb resuscitated him. That's what I thought. No, we have no record anywhere of anyone surviving a full Roman crucifixion.

• 1:24:41Lee Strobel?

  Anywhere. Not only do we have multiple accounts in the documents of the New Testament that tell us that Jesus was dead after being crucified, we've got five ancient sources outside the Bible that talk about him being dead.

• 1:24:54Shawn Ryan?

  What are those sources?

• 1:24:55Lee Strobel?

  Oh, like Josephus, Tacitus, these are early historians, Mirabarsa Rapian, Lucian, even the Jewish Talmud admits that Jesus was executed. So Jesus was clearly dead. In fact, get this. The Journal of the American Medical Association, a secular, scientific, peer-reviewed medical journal, carried an investigation into the death of Jesus. And this was their conclusion, quote, "Clearly, the weight of the historical and medical evidence indicates that Jesus was dead even before the wound to his side was inflicted." So that's the Journal of the American Medical Association. You could go to an atheist New Testament scholar like Geert Ludeman, and he will tell

• 1:25:38Lee Strobel?

  you the death of Jesus on the cross by crucifixion is historically indisputable. That's the atheist speaking. So the first E stands for execution, Jesus was dead. The second E stands for early reports that he rose from the dead. In other words, reports that didn't come after decades of legendary development, but go right back to the cross itself. In other words, I used to think as a skeptic, okay, I gotta give you the fact, Jesus was dead, get it? But the resurrection is a legend. And I knew it took time for legend to develop in the ancient world, you know? The great historian A. N. Sherwin White of Oxford said, "The passage of two generations of time is not even enough for legend to grow up and wipe out a solid core of historical

• 1:26:23Lee Strobel?

  truth." So I knew it took a few generations for legend to develop. Well, what I learned... Is that we have a report of the resurrection of Jesus, including named eyewitnesses and groups of eyewitnesses. It says he died, why, for our sins, he was buried. On the third day, he rose from the dead. And these eyewitnesses, groups of eyewitnesses and individuals, this report has been dated back by scholars to within months of his death. Within months, yeah, wow. That is, that's a news flash. You can see this. That you could, it's in, it's in the Bible. 1 Corinthians 15, starting at verse 2.

• 1:27:04Lee Strobel?

  That is a nugget that talks about the resurrection of Jesus. Who wrote 1 Corinthians? Paul. Paul had been someone who didn't believe in God. He was a Pharisee. He didn't believe in Jesus. He was persecuting Christians. He's on the road to Damascus. Boom, he has this encounter with the risen Christ. He realizes that Jesus is God and he becomes the Apostle Paul. 22 years later, he writes his letter to the church in Corinth. That's what we call 1 Corinthians in the Bible. And he includes this report about the resurrection. Where did he get that report? Well, we know that it was one to three years after the death of Jesus

• 1:27:46Lee Strobel?

  that he had this experience with the risen Christ and became the Apostle Paul. He immediately went into Damascus and he met with some apostles. Many people believe that's when he was given this report about the resurrection. Some people believe it was a few years later, a couple of years later, he went to Jerusalem and he met for 15 days with two eyewitnesses to the resurrection who were mentioned in that report, Peter and James. And the Greek word that Paul uses to describe that meeting is this is an investigative meeting. They're checking each other out. What did you see? What do you know? What do you know for sure? What did you experience? Some people believe that's when he was given this report by two people named in the report, but either way, it means within one to six years after the death of Jesus,

• 1:28:30Lee Strobel?

  this creed, this report is already in existence, and therefore, the beliefs that make up this report go back even earlier, virtually to the cross itself. So, there's no huge time gap between the death of Jesus and the later development of a legend that he rose from the dead. We got a news flash, and probably the greatest historian on the first century is Dr. James D.G. Dunn of the United Kingdom. He analyzed this report, which comes in the form of a creed of the earliest church with eyewitnesses to the resurrection. He analyzed it historically, and here was his conclusion.

• 1:29:05Lee Strobel?

  He says, "We can be entirely confident that this report was written originally within months of the death of Jesus." Within months. That is a news flash from ancient history, much too quick to be a legend that developed over the generations. So, we got an execution, he's dead, we got this early report, and we got other early reports right there. First generation, same generation of Jesus in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and then John comes a little bit later, but also, I would say, in the first generation. So, we've got these other reports too, but this one that I mentioned-

• 1:29:45Shawn Ryan?

  Is it the original report too?

• 1:29:47Lee Strobel?

  What's that?

• 1:29:48Shawn Ryan?

  Is it the original documentation?

• 1:29:50Lee Strobel?

  Well, he's reporting it in his letter to the church in Corinth.

• 1:29:54Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 1:29:55Lee Strobel?

  And that's what we have today, as we call it.

• 1:29:57Shawn Ryan?

  But it is the original letter? Is it the original letter?

• 1:30:00Lee Strobel?

  Well, the original letter's been turned to dust, because it was written in parchment or on scrolls and papyrus and so forth.

• 1:30:08Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 1:30:09Lee Strobel?

  But we have people who copied it.

• 1:30:10Shawn Ryan?

  Gotcha.

• 1:30:11Lee Strobel?

  And so, we've got multiple copies. So, we got an execution, we got the early report, third E is empty tomb. And what's interesting about that is, even the enemies of Jesus admitted the tomb was empty. How do we know? Because we know from history, sources inside and outside the Bible, that when the disciples began saying, "Oh, Jesus had been resurrected," what the enemies of Jesus said was, "Oh, well, the disciples stole his body."

• 1:30:42Lee Strobel?

  Think about that. That's a cover story. They're admitting the tomb is empty. They're just saying, "This is how it got empty. They stole the body." So they're conceding implicitly that the tomb is empty. It's like if you're a student, and a teacher comes up, if you're a teacher... You mean the government lied? Even in the first century. Can you... I can't believe that. But, you know, if you're a teacher and a student comes up to you and says, "A dog ate my homework." He's admitting he doesn't have his homework, but he's trying to explain what happened to it. It's the same thing. So, even the enemies of Jesus admitted the tomb was empty. The disciples didn't have the motive, the means, or the opportunity to steal the body. Nobody did. And then we look at the fourth E: eyewitnesses.

• 1:31:27Lee Strobel?

  Most of what we accept as being true from the ancient world is based on maybe one source, or two sources of information. When you get right down to it, we know things about famous people through ancient history because maybe one source or two sources. For the conviction of the disciples that they encountered the resurrected Jesus, we have no fewer than nine ancient sources, inside and outside the New Testament, confirming and corroborating the conviction of the disciples that they encountered the risen Christ. That is an avalanche of historical data. So, I mean, I've looked at this kind of stuff for almost two years. Wow.

• 1:32:10Lee Strobel?

  And, I mean, there's much more depth we could go into, but... Let's go into it. Yeah. Yeah, well, here's a fact, that this was the final fact that convinced me. It was like I was putting together a jigsaw puzzle. I didn't know what the picture was gonna be. And I got this final puzzle piece to go in. And when it went in, I stepped back and I saw it was a picture of Jesus. What was that puzzle piece? People would tell me, "Oh, the disciples really believed that Jesus appeared to them resurrected, because they were willing to die for that conviction." And I would say, "That doesn't convince me, so what?" In World War II, kamikaze pilots crashed their airplanes into boats.

• 1:32:54Lee Strobel?

  Why? Because they thought if they died that way, they'd go to heaven. Today, why would a terrorist crash into the World Trade Center in an airplane? And kill himself and a whole bunch of people? Because he sincerely believed with his whole heart. If he dies that way, he's going to paradise. So don't tell me that the disciples' willingness to die means anything. And then, somebody clarified. They say, "Wait a minute. Let's use..." I'm fast-forwarding, because this is before September 11th. But we use that as an illustration, the September 11th terrorist attacks. So huge difference between the terror attacks of September 11th and the disciples being willing to die for their convictions.

• 1:33:35Lee Strobel?

  The difference is, those hijackers who hijacked the plane and crashed them into the World Trade Center did not know for a fact if they died that way, they'd go to heaven. They believed it with all their heart. They were taught it. They believed it. They had faith in it. And having faith in it, they were willing to die that way. That tells me nothing about the truth of their convictions. Now, let's think about the disciples. Of all human beings who've ever lived on the planet, they were in a unique position. They were there. They touched the resurrected Jesus. They talked with him. They ate with him. Of all people who ever lived, they knew the truth

• 1:34:19Lee Strobel?

  about whether he had returned from the dead and proved he's the Son of God. Because they were there. They knew the truth. Knowing the truth, they were willing to die for it. That's the difference. And I went, a light bulb went on and said, "Whoa, I get it." That gives me confidence in what they were saying. Because they were there. They touched him. They ate with him. They talked to him. They knew whether this was a lie. Somebody said to me, "Lee, nobody knowingly and willingly dies for what they know is a lie."

• 1:34:56Lee Strobel?

  They knew if this is true, or was it lie? They were willing to die for it. Why? Because they knew it was true. Wow. That was the last puzzle piece. It was November the 8th of 1981. It was a Sunday afternoon, about 3:00 in the afternoon. And I thought, I believe, based on the data of history, that Jesus claimed to be God, and backed it up by returning from the dead. But now what? Do I just go back to life? Do I just... Because remember, the demons believe this too. And they shudder.

• 1:35:30Lee Strobel?

  And then, my wife Leslie pointed out a verse to me, John 1:12. "But as many as received him, to them he gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in his name." And I looked at that, and I thought, okay, I get the equation. Believe. I do. Plus, receive. Oh, that's what I have to do, to become a child of God. So I got on my knees, and I poured out a confession of a lifetime of immorality that would absolutely curl your hair. And at that moment, I received complete, total forgiveness through Jesus Christ, and I became a child of God.

• 1:36:14Lee Strobel?

  And I remember, I went out, and I told Leslie. And she burst into tears, and she threw her arms around my neck, and she said, "I almost gave up on you a thousand times." She said, "When I was a new Christian, I told some women about you at church." I said, "I don't have any hope for my husband. He is a hard-headed, hard-hearted legal editor of the Chicago Tribune. He's never gonna bend his knee to Jesus." And this one elderly woman, named Sylvia, put her arm around Leslie's shoulder, pulled her to the side, and said, "Oh, Leslie, no one is beyond hope." And she gave her a verse from the Old Testament, Ezekiel 36:26.

• 1:36:56Lee Strobel?

  It says, "Moreover, I will give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit within you. I will remove from you your heart of stone, and give you a heart of flesh." And so what I never knew, that whole two years that I'm on this investigative journey, what I never knew at the time is my wife, every day, on her knees, in private, prayed that verse for me.

• 1:37:21Lee Strobel?

  And God, on November the 8th of 1981, when I received His free gift of grace, became a child of God,

• 1:37:32Lee Strobel?

  that verse became true because He began to change, not overnight, but over time. My values, my character, my morality, my attitudes, my philosophy, my everything about my life. Am I perfect? No, far cry from it. Do I still sin? Yes, I do. But I grieve when I do now, and I pray for God to help me next time so I won't sin. And so I take a couple steps forward, a couple steps back, but I grow a little bit every year in my relationship with God, and He changes me from the inside. That's the work of the Holy Spirit in the life of a Christian.

• 1:38:11Lee Strobel?

  Things that I used to do that didn't bother me now would... I couldn't, you know... I mean, when I was an atheist in college, I helped set up an abortion for a girl I knew who was gotten pregnant, her boyfriend had walked out on her. I said, "Don't worry about it, we'll just get rid of the baby." I set up that abortion. We killed that child. Didn't bother me a bit back then. I realize God's forgiven me of that, and now I know. I mean, God's changed my values. If I could go back, of course, I wouldn't do that again. So, things change, fortunately. The Bible says in 2 Corinthians, you know, "When you come to faith like that,

• 1:38:55Lee Strobel?

  the old is gone, the new is come."

• 1:38:59Lee Strobel?

  Wow.

• 1:39:01Lee Strobel?

  Sorry to get emotional, but, you know, I kind of relive it when I tell it, you know? I mean, I go back to that moment and think, "Gosh, I just poured out my heart of this gross things that I had done in my life, terrible sins, and just laying that all out to God and saying, 'God, I believe based on what I've learned.'"

• 1:39:28Lee Strobel?

  That Jesus has paid for all that. He paid the penalty I deserve for the sins that I've committed. And I want to receive that gift right now. And that sense of being forgiven, of having that washed away, wiped away, was just so liberating. Just I felt like I was 10 pounds lighter. And, you know, it's a pivotal moment in my life. A pivotal moment, I think, of my eternity.

• 1:39:56Shawn Ryan?

  So you spent two years

• 1:39:58Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:40:00Shawn Ryan?

  just to disprove this?

• 1:40:03Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:40:04Shawn Ryan?

  Just to try to get your wife to quit believing?

• 1:40:06Lee Strobel?

  Yeah. I thought it'd be a lot easier. I really did. I thought, oh, my gosh, you tell me someone rose from the dead? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Give me a break. I think I could disprove that overnight. Gosh, it was like hitting that thing and it would just bounce back up.

• 1:40:20Shawn Ryan?

  So going back to kind of the laws that we were talking about, you know, that I guess that I had brought up.

• 1:40:26Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:40:28Shawn Ryan?

  Why did God need to send Jesus here to suffer? To forgive us for our sins? Why didn't He just forgive us?

• 1:40:38Lee Strobel?

  Great question. If He were just to... There's always a payment involved when forgiveness happens.

• 1:40:45Shawn Ryan?

  Isn't that part of... Wouldn't you consider that some type of a law that needs to be abided by?

• 1:40:51Lee Strobel?

  In a sense, yeah. In a sense, it's kind of a law of the world in that when you sin against me and you scratch my car or something, I can forgive you and just say, yeah, just walk away. But then I gotta pay for it. I gotta pay to have it fixed or I'm gonna lose money when I trade it in. So I'm gonna end up paying for it. Someone has to pay the price. And, you know, who can pay the price except...

• 1:41:17Shawn Ryan?

  If it's God, then why does somebody need to pay the price? If God can do anything,

• 1:41:22Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:41:23Shawn Ryan?

  then why did somebody have to pay the price?

• 1:41:25Lee Strobel?

  Because the only way that God... The only way that God could forgive all of humankind would be to send the perfect...

• 1:41:35Lee Strobel?

  Person, that is, Jesus, who is fully God and fully man, who lived the perfect life, who himself was without sin, to pay for the sins of others. So it had to be someone who himself was sinless. Well, who's that? Well, it's only God himself, and it's who Jesus is, fully God, fully man. So he lived the sinless life, so he becomes the sacrifice. In fact, the whole sacrificial system in the Old Testament, among the Jewish people, was pointing toward this. How, on the day of atonement, the high priest would go in, and he would sacrifice an animal, symbolic of that animal's life being taken to pay for the sins of the Jewish people. You know, how did that work?

• 1:42:19Lee Strobel?

  It worked because it was foreshadowing. It was trying to say, ultimately, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world, is gonna come. He's gonna be born in Bethlehem on Christmas. He's gonna live the perfect life, and he's gonna be the one who's gonna be sacrificed to pay for the sins of the world. So there's always a payment. It's kind of one of those realities. And Jesus is the only one, by virtue of his sinless life and his nature being fully God and fully man, the only one who could be a sacrifice for all of humanity.

• 1:42:52Shawn Ryan?

  Man, it's just...

• 1:42:55Lee Strobel?

  It's mind-boggling.

• 1:42:56Shawn Ryan?

  It's not... It is. It's...

• 1:43:01Shawn Ryan?

  I'm still not... I understand what you're saying. I don't understand why it had to happen if it was God. Was it...

• 1:43:11Lee Strobel?

  Well, I think-

• 1:43:11Shawn Ryan?

  Was it a message to us? Was he trying to prove something to us?

• 1:43:16Lee Strobel?

  No, I think it's more that he loves us. God is love, the Bible says. God loves us beyond a love that we can even comprehend.

• 1:43:25Lee Strobel?

  And he knows because we have used our free will to turn our back on him, to violate his laws, we've sinned. And because we have sinned, we can never enter heaven.

• 1:43:37Lee Strobel?

  So what's God to do? You're right, God can't do anything. He can do many things. He's powerful. He's omniscient. He's omnipotent. He can't do everything. He can't lie. You know, there's certain things he can't do. But in order for him to accomplish the atonement for our sins, because the choice is this, Shawn, you can pay for your sin. The sins that you've committed, you want to pay for those? Okay, you can do that. The Bible says the wages of sin is death. You'll be separated from God forever because you can't come into his presence because you're a sinner. If you want to do that, that's your free will. That's your choice. But God didn't want you to do that. He loves you. He wants to spend eternity with you in heaven.

• 1:44:22Lee Strobel?

  And so he said, how can I erase this sin from Shawn's life? Jesus, what if Jesus paid for that sin? What if he atoned for that? What if he was the sacrifice, who paid the penalty that you deserved for the sins that you've committed? He said, no, no, no, I'm paying for them. Not as some third party, but he is the God that we sinned against. He's not some innocent third party. No, he is the God we sinned against. So he is the one who's going to go to the cross to pay that penalty. Because God loves you, he wants to spend eternity with you. And by wiping out the sin,

• 1:45:02Lee Strobel?

  clothing you in the righteousness of God, the doors of heaven are opened up and you can spend eternity with him forever. So I don't know what else God could have done.

• 1:45:16Lee Strobel?

  How else could he have achieved payment for the sins of the world, apart from forcing all of us to pay for our own sins?

• 1:45:27Lee Strobel?

  I don't know how else he could have done it. I think it was the only, only path that makes sense to me.

• 1:45:35Lee Strobel?

  And I think, honestly, God has left a trail in history. For people like you and me and others who are curious, does this really make sense? Did Jesus really return from the dead and prove he's God? And that Christianity is true? And therefore, we can trust what he says and so forth? I think God intentionally left evidence that leads us, that can be used to lead us to the conclusion that Jesus is who he claimed to be. You know, when I was in law school, one of my heroes was a guy who was the greatest lawyer in the world. He was in the, later, I think it was, he was in the Guinness Book of World Records as the most successful defense attorney who ever lived.

• 1:46:19Lee Strobel?

  His name was Sir Lionel Laku. Get this, you'll appreciate this. He won 247 murder trials in a row as a defense attorney, either before the jury or on appeal. Wow. Yeah, nobody's ever done, he's in the Guinness Book of World Records, greatest lawyer ever lived. He was a skeptic like I was about the resurrection. He thought, Jesus didn't return from the dead and prove he's, give me a break. And then someone challenged him, Sir Lionel, you're the greatest lawyer. Have you ever taken your monumental legal skill and applied it to the historical record and come to an informed conclusion about whether or not Jesus did return from the dead? He said, no, I haven't, but I will. So he set out, he did what I did. He spent years investigating the evidence.

• 1:47:01Lee Strobel?

  And I'll recite to you one sentence he wrote that summarizes the conclusion. He says, "I say unequivocally that the evidence for the resurrection of Jesus Christ is so overwhelming that it compels acceptance by proof, which leaves absolutely no room for doubt."

• 1:47:19Lee Strobel?

  This is a guy that knows evidence. He could take what looks like an airtight case against his client and find all the flaws. He was knighted twice by Queen Elizabeth. He became a member of the Supreme Court of his country. And that was his conclusion about the evidence. By the way, I shared that story in California at a church where I just moved back in 2000. And a woman came up to me afterwards. And she said, "I'm your new neighbor. You just moved into my neighborhood. You haven't met everybody yet. I lived on the block." "Oh, great to meet you." She said, "Yeah, I'm Sir Lionel's sister."

• 1:47:50Shawn Ryan?

  Wow.

• 1:47:51Lee Strobel?

  It's his sister.

• 1:47:52Shawn Ryan?

  Wow.

• 1:47:53Lee Strobel?

  And I said, "Did I tell the story accurately?" She said, "Absolutely." She said, "In fact, let me show you some of his private papers where he did his research and so forth." And so she showed me some of his private writings and stuff. He later resigned from practice of law and became an evangelist. But that just shows you. Now, do most people check it out? No, most people don't. You know, most people don't take two years of their life like I did and really delve into it. But that's why I wrote the case for Christ, to say, you know, maybe this is a way. So I just interview scholars and let them present the case in an affirmative way. But, you know, I just encourage anybody who's watching to say, you know, if you question, if you doubt it, do what I did. Check it out.

• 1:48:38Lee Strobel?

  There's plenty of evidence out there. Do the due diligence and come to an informed conclusion about whether Jesus is who we claim to be. Because if he is, then what he says about us, how he says we should live, what he says about heaven, what he says about the eternal condition of our soul and so forth, we can trust it if he is who we claim to be.

• 1:49:02Shawn Ryan?

  When we're talking about sin.

• 1:49:05Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:49:06Shawn Ryan?

  And that if you get to know Jesus, all sins are forgiven.

• 1:49:15Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:49:18Shawn Ryan?

  I've also heard, I've heard both things, that all sins are equal. There is not one that's...

• 1:49:29Shawn Ryan?

  Stealing is the same as murder, is the same as rape, is the same as all of these things. And then I also, I've heard there are cardinal sins and what, which is it?

• 1:49:43Lee Strobel?

  I think there are gradations of sin. I don't think they're all equal. Jesus said a couple of times, for instance, that people in villages that he went into and demonstrated his divinity through his miracles and still rejected God, they will suffer greater punishment than others. The Bible also says-

• 1:50:06Shawn Ryan?

  Say that again.

• 1:50:06Lee Strobel?

  In other words, people who had advanced knowledge of him through his miracles and so forth, and yet reject him anyway, they will be judged more harshly than those who didn't see those miracles and so forth. The Bible also talks about the unforgivable sin, the sin that can't be forgiven.

• 1:50:26Shawn Ryan?

  What is that?

• 1:50:27Lee Strobel?

  And that's the blaspheming of the Holy Spirit. Says that it will not be forgiven in this life or the life to come.

• 1:50:33Shawn Ryan?

  What exactly does that mean?

• 1:50:34Lee Strobel?

  That's a good question, and here's my best attempt at an answer. The Holy Spirit is who draws us toward Christ. It is God reaching out to us, whispering in our ear, "God loves you, Sean. God made you for him to spend eternity with you." He is the one seeking us before we even seek God. To blaspheme the Holy Spirit is to turn our back on that and say, "Forget you, don't want anything," and you live your life saying, "I don't care about God," and you die in a way that means you're gonna end up paying for your own sin because you didn't accept Jesus' payment on your behalf. And so, I believe the blasphemy

• 1:51:18Lee Strobel?

  against the Holy Spirit, the unforgivable sin, is rejecting the God who is calling out to you to come to him.

• 1:51:25Shawn Ryan?

  Did you not do that when you were an atheist?

• 1:51:29Lee Strobel?

  I did it, I did it. But, the end of my life wasn't there yet. In other words, after that, then I accepted.

• 1:51:36Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 1:51:37Lee Strobel?

  Yeah. So, you can, you know, you live a life opposed to God as an atheist, or I did, but then that turns when you come to faith.

• 1:51:53Shawn Ryan?

  You know, I kinda wanna, I don't know how to initiate it, but I wanna talk a little bit about the...

• 1:52:01Shawn Ryan?

  Everybody's just so judgmental.

• 1:52:03Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:52:04Shawn Ryan?

  These days.

• 1:52:04Lee Strobel?

  I know. Isn't it true?

• 1:52:06Shawn Ryan?

  Including myself. And I catch myself all the time, but, you know, and we're both somewhat active on social media.

• 1:52:16Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:52:16Shawn Ryan?

  And, um, you know, it's like it doesn't matter what I post, I didn't, you know, and I'm never gonna let people's judgment interfere with my curiosity, but I've had, I've had all kinds of people on the show. I've had remote viewers, I've had, I've had John Burke, and no matter who it is.

• 1:52:36Lee Strobel?

  Yeah, you get pushback.

• 1:52:38Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:52:38Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:52:39Shawn Ryan?

  Even, even...

• 1:52:42Shawn Ryan?

  Even today.

• 1:52:43Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:52:43Shawn Ryan?

  When I talked about, you know, putting the bibles in the foundation.

• 1:52:47Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:52:47Shawn Ryan?

  I got people judging me for that.

• 1:52:49Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:52:49Shawn Ryan?

  I'm just trying, you know what I mean? I'm just trying to do good.

• 1:52:51Lee Strobel?

  And social media, it's so public and it's so instant and it's so in your face and it's people that don't know you and don't have the courtesy to call you up and say, "Hey, why are you doing this? Oh, really? Oh, okay, I guess I get it." You know, I mean, they judge you based on what they see, that may be a slice of what you've done and... I know, it's hard and there's a lot of churches that, that have that kind of reputation of being judgmental.

• 1:53:15Shawn Ryan?

  Um, do you think that they, they realize how many people? You know, I wonder if they, because maybe I'm wrong, but it seems like we're all here to kinda spread the word, right? And so, and to, to bring people in. And so, you know, I hear this and I read it and it really pisses me off.

• 1:53:39Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:53:40Shawn Ryan?

  You know, and that, it drove me away for a very long time. And I, you know, I, I have no proof of this, but I would imagine that they, they push people away.

• 1:53:52Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:53:53Shawn Ryan?

  From God, from Christ.

• 1:53:57Shawn Ryan?

  If I were a betting man, I would bet that they push way more people away from coming to than they do bring in.

• 1:54:05Lee Strobel?

  I hope not, but I fear you may be right. I mean, it's sad. You know, the Bible says, should we judge? Yes, we are to judge, but the Bible says with gentleness and respect, we should make judgments about things. That's okay. That's good to do.

• 1:54:22Shawn Ryan?

  It does say that.

• 1:54:23Lee Strobel?

  Yeah, Bible says that. But, but,

• 1:54:28Lee Strobel?

  it's how we judge. In other words, judgmentalism is a hypocritical, holier-than-thou, looking down your nose, pushing people away, you're not good enough,

• 1:54:43Lee Strobel?

  excluding people on whatever basis. And that's what chases people away.

• 1:54:51Lee Strobel?

  You know,

• 1:54:54Lee Strobel?

  when we talk about Jesus, it's gonna be a natural divide. There're gonna be people who're gonna say, yep, yep, gotcha, I'm with ya. There're gonna be people, I don't wanna hear that, or I reject that, or he's making me mad. I'm not gonna shy away from the people that makes mad because there're people who need to hear the message, who wanna hear the message, and they're gonna respond to the message. So I get all kinds of hate mail. I get people fantasizing about murdering me. I get all kinds of stuff like that.

• 1:55:19Shawn Ryan?

  Are you serious?

• 1:55:20Lee Strobel?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:55:20Shawn Ryan?

  Why would they wanna do that? What did you say?

• 1:55:23Lee Strobel?

  I know, I know. Well, look at what happened to Jesus. They killed him. You know, they killed the disciples. So, or the apostles, and

• 1:55:35Lee Strobel?

  so, that comes with the territory in a sense.

• 1:55:38Shawn Ryan?

  What do you think about humanity as a whole?

• 1:55:41Lee Strobel?

  I think we are...

• 1:55:43Shawn Ryan?

  From the position that you're in, you see thousands of people. Million...

• 1:55:51Shawn Ryan?

  Fourteen million copies sold of your books.

• 1:55:54Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:55:55Shawn Ryan?

  You got a lot of exposure.

• 1:55:57Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 1:55:58Shawn Ryan?

  What do you think of humanity as a whole?

• 1:56:01Lee Strobel?

  I think we are headed on the wrong path generally. That we are sinners that are manifesting our sins in a variety of different ways. I think we, there's a lot of good people, I say good, not perfect people, but people who, who want to do what's right, who are trying to follow the teachings of Scripture, who want to love others, who want to encourage others, who want to be positive and share this message of hope and grace and love and redemption and eternal life.

• 1:56:34Lee Strobel?

  But you know, the Bible says we're coming to a crisis, we're coming to a conclusion. At some point, history's going to be consummated and Jesus is going to come back. And when that happens, it's going to be too late for people who haven't made that choice yet to receive Him as their forgiver and leader. So, you know, in a sense, I've, I've read the end of the story. And the end of the story is, history will be consummated, Satan will be thrown into Lake of Fire, that's metaphorical, but, and Jesus will come back to judge. And, and, you know, you don't want to be found wanting at that moment. You want to be someone who's safely adopted as a son or a daughter of God, because He

• 1:57:19Lee Strobel?

  won't disown His own children.

• 1:57:21Shawn Ryan?

  What does that mean for my one-year-old daughter when he comes back?

• 1:57:25Lee Strobel?

  Yeah, that's a great question. What about children who are too young to really understand right and wrong, who are too young to...

• 1:57:31Shawn Ryan?

  Their brain has not developed enough to make educated decisions or to learn that type of stuff.

• 1:57:38Lee Strobel?

  Exactly. My conviction on this, I've written about this and interviewed scholars about this, that in the case of people below the age of accountability, who don't really have that sense of right and wrong, who are too young, that...

• 1:57:58Lee Strobel?

  They will not be held accountable for the things that they've done that may have been, shouldn't have done, the naughty things that they've done as infants and so forth. So in other words, I think that God will, it's sort of, you know, there's a, there's a term, a Latin term, in loco parentis, and it means, "I act in the place of your parents." So if you're, if my parents are out of the country, if you're a kid and you're injured in an accident, and your parents are out of the country, the court can say, "I can act in loco parentis, I can act in your parents' place and make decisions about you."

• 1:58:38Lee Strobel?

  I kind of picture this as, when you're that young, Jesus acts in loco parentis. He steps in the place of your parents, and in a sense, brings redemption to children. You know, there's a, there's a scripture that says that David, who committed sin with Bathsheba and so forth, says that, "That child cannot come to me, but I can go to him." So in other words, that child's gonna be in heaven, I'm, someday I'm gonna go to heaven, I will be with that child someday. So, yeah, I think that before the age of accountability, children are not responsible.

• 1:59:21Lee Strobel?

  They're not committing a sin because that, that involves some volition, you know, some choice, and, you know, kids are kids.

• 1:59:31Shawn Ryan?

  Did Jesus judge when he was on earth?

• 1:59:35Lee Strobel?

  Definitely, but he did it with gentleness and respect. You know, we're told that in 1 Peter 3:15, all Christians, you know, are to present evidence for the faith, to defend the faith, but do it gently and respectfully. There's nothing wrong with judging, as long as it's done respectfully and gently. We make judgments all the time. Now, there's a famous verse that says, "Do not judge," but you have to keep reading, and when you keep reading, you understand it says, "Don't judge inappropriately. Don't be judgmental in a way that is hypocritical, that says, 'I'm better than you,' and, and who are you, who are you to call in the name of Jesus? You're, you're, no.

• 2:00:18Lee Strobel?

  That's being judgmental. We need to make good judgments. We make judgments about everything, every day. And that's okay. But to be judgmental is to be sort of like the Pharisees in the New Testament, who were, you know, they would make a show of their faith, and they would pray on the street corners. And Jesus said, "You know what? You're gonna pray? Go to your prayer closet. Pray in private. Don't make a show of it, the way these hypocrites do." And that's kind of judging others by, "I'm better than you. Look at me. I'm praying on a street corner. Boy, I must be really loved by God." No, that's judgmentalism. That's hypocrisy.

• 2:01:02Shawn Ryan?

  You know, we had,

• 2:01:06Shawn Ryan?

  you were talking a little bit earlier about,

• 2:01:10Shawn Ryan?

  you can't, what did you say? Something about,

• 2:01:16Shawn Ryan?

  you can't good deed your way into heaven.

• 2:01:20Lee Strobel?

  Right.

• 2:01:21Shawn Ryan?

  You know, and I think about that a lot.

• 2:01:24Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:01:24Shawn Ryan?

  I've had a lot of bad things that I did in my life. And probably more bad than good. Without a doubt.

• 2:01:32Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:01:33Shawn Ryan?

  And not probably, without a doubt.

• 2:01:39Shawn Ryan?

  And so now, I feel like I'm trying to make up for a lot of lost time. And, you know, I talk to a guy like you, and you say, you know, "Good deeds aren't gonna get you into heaven."

• 2:01:55Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:01:55Shawn Ryan?

  And I've been, I had a priest on a couple of months ago, I told you. And I've been meeting with him every once in a while, and having coffee, and kind of picking his brain off-camera. And I asked him about that, and

• 2:02:17Shawn Ryan?

  he didn't necessarily say the opposite. And I don't want to put words in his mouth, but he had kind of...

• 2:02:26Shawn Ryan?

  Alluded to the fact that maybe, maybe he does pay attention to some of the good that you're injecting into the world.

• 2:02:35Lee Strobel?

  Oh, definitely. Here's, here's how I would envision it. I'm kinda, um, I like mathematics. So here's kind of the equation as I see it. And as I believe the Bible presents it. Jesus plus nothing equals eternal life plus good deeds. So in other words, coming to faith in Christ is a gift. We can't earn it. We don't deserve it. We don't merit it. We can only receive it in a prayer of repentance and faith. I'm sorry for my sins. I want to turn from that. I want to receive you as my Lord and Savior, my forgiver, my leader. I want to follow you all the days of my life. Thank you for forgiving my sins.

• 2:03:17Lee Strobel?

  Jesus plus nothing that we can merit equals eternal life. But then there's another part of the equation. So now you've become a Christian. Now you have eternal life. So it's Jesus plus nothing equals eternal life plus good deeds. The good deeds are on the other side of the equation. They don't earn your way to heaven. They come because now you've become a follower of Jesus. And you do good deeds because the Holy Spirit is working in you. And, and, and you wanna, you know, like I, I did this abortion, set up this abortion for this woman when I was an atheist. Um, now as a Christian, I do fundraising for crisis pregnancy centers that help women who have a pregnancy that is unwanted

• 2:04:01Lee Strobel?

  to realize that they could keep their child or they can adopt it out and, and to help them through that crisis. So am I doing good deeds to earn my way to heaven? No, I'm doing that because God has changed my life. I'm doing that because God has changed my values. You're doing good deeds, not in a desperate attempt to claw your way to God. And I hope I do enough. I hope my, my balance between good and bad is... No, you're doing good deeds because when you come to Christ... As a free gift, now your values change, and now, yes, you do do good deeds. You do serve others. You do live, hopefully, with a sense of the way Jesus lived, in helping other people who are in need and so forth.

• 2:04:47Lee Strobel?

  So, yes, good deeds have a role in the Christian life, but not a role that contributes in any way to salvation. It comes after salvation. After we've received Christ as our forgiving leader, then we do good deeds because we're changed. And, you know, I do things today I never would have done when I was an atheist. So I didn't give a rip about people. Now I do, because they're made in the image of God. And so I see that now, and God's changed my values. And so now I do, hopefully, some good things. And does God take cognizance of that? Yeah, He does. Most scholars I interview believe that there will be rewards in heaven based on how we've lived our Christian life.

• 2:05:29Lee Strobel?

  In other words, our journey to heaven is not based on how good we are. It's based on forgiveness, this free gift of grace. But then how we live our life as Christians, how we serve others, how we do good stuff for others, God will ultimately reward us for that in heaven. How so? Well, that's a good question, because let's say we both get to heaven, and I'm looking at you and going, hey, he's getting treated better than me. He's getting rewarded, because Shawn, you know, he did a bunch of nice things, and I didn't do as many. And so now I feel bad, and here I am in heaven, and I'm pissed off. I mean, that could happen. Here's the way I think it happens.

• 2:06:11Lee Strobel?

  Let's say that I'm a... Let's say that you're a connoisseur, an expert on classical music. You studied it, you play the violin, maybe. You know all the great composers. You love to listen to classical music, it feeds your soul. I don't. I like rock and roll, I'm an average guy. I don't have that sensitivity. In heaven, where there is incredible music, I will listen to it as someone without much music taste and go, "Wow!

• 2:06:45Lee Strobel?

  That is the most beautiful sound I've ever heard." You will listen to it as a connoisseur of classical music. Your appreciation of it will be deeper because you will experience it in a deeper way. I won't know that just being next to you. We'll sit next to you, we'll go, "Isn't this music unbelievable?" You go, "Yeah, it's unbelievable." But you're experiencing on a deeper level than I am because I don't have what you have. I didn't spend my life studying classical music. You see what I'm saying? So that way, I'm not jealous of you. I mean, we're both really enjoying this music in heaven, but you're experiencing a deeper level. I think that's kind of how it's going to work. So that I don't get jealous and think that I've missed out.

• 2:07:29Lee Strobel?

  And part of it is, when you live a lifestyle of serving others, of doing good deeds, of living like Jesus,

• 2:07:39Lee Strobel?

  yes, I think God will reward you for that, but you will resonate so much more with this perfect place called heaven than maybe I will, who is maybe a pretty good guy, but, you know, I didn't quite do much with my life as a Christian. And, but I made it in because I received Christ and I did some good things, but my rewards are going to be less.

• 2:08:01Shawn Ryan?

  So you believe it will be... You believe

• 2:08:07Shawn Ryan?

  the person that ejected more good into the world may have a more enjoyable

• 2:08:11Lee Strobel?

  Yes.

• 2:08:12Shawn Ryan?

  consciousness

• 2:08:13Lee Strobel?

  I think...

• 2:08:13Shawn Ryan?

  thought process

• 2:08:15Lee Strobel?

  greater

• 2:08:15Shawn Ryan?

  than in heaven than somebody who has not?

• 2:08:18Lee Strobel?

  There's... Jesus himself said, "Blessed are those when you are persecuted, when people say all kinds of false things about you because of me, because great will your reward be in heaven." So Sean, when you step out and you do things pointing people toward Jesus through your show, and you're criticized for it, and people attack you on social media or whatever, God is saying, blessed are you when you honor me despite the persecution, the arrows of hate that you get, because great will your reward be in heaven. That's one example that He gives in Scripture of how He will reward people who have endured

• 2:09:02Lee Strobel?

  persecution and hatred and social media attacks in this world because of Him. Great will they be rewarded in heaven. So I think, yes, I think there will be rewards in heaven. I think it will be, it won't be the same exact experience for everybody. Not every theologian agrees with that, but I think the evidence is strong that that's true.

• 2:09:25Shawn Ryan?

  Have you heard any of the other theories?

• 2:09:27Lee Strobel?

  Yeah, I quote, I did a book called The Case for Heaven, and in that book I interviewed a scholar, and I think he made reference to another scholar who just doesn't believe it, doesn't believe that anybody's going to be treated any differently in heaven, that we'll all be treated exactly the same in heaven. And I'm sure we will be all treated exactly the same, but for some people, because of who they are and how they live their life, it will resonate deeper with them, in my view, and their experience, even though others will not sense it, their experience will be ever deeper than what other people might have. I think that's biblical.

• 2:10:08Shawn Ryan?

  It makes sense. It does make sense.

• 2:10:10Lee Strobel?

  Yeah, so good deeds are a good thing, and when they're done for the right purpose, when they're done trying to earn our way to God, they're useless. But when they're done out of a heart of gratitude to God, and, God, I want to serve you, I want to honor you, God, you know what I'm going to do, I know this sounds crazy, I know I'm going to get attacked for this, I'm going to bury four bibles in the cement foundation that we're building, just as a way of saying, I want to build what I'm doing on you.

• 2:10:39Lee Strobel?

  I think he'll reward that. I think that's the kind of thing he'll say, "You know what? You're gonna get attacked for that. You're gonna get made fun of for that. Blessed are you when you take those insults from me. Great will your reward be in heaven." He sees that stuff. He sees how people live for him. And I don't believe it's a wasted effort, because it comes out of a sincere heart. You're not motivated by anything, except, "I believe sincerely. I want to do this as a way to honor God." And he knows that.

• 2:11:10Shawn Ryan?

  Do those attacks bother you when they happen?

• 2:11:13Lee Strobel?

  You know, yeah, of course they do. You know, to some degree. And I always go back to that verse from Jesus saying, "Greater is your reward in heaven. Blessed are you when men persecute you and say all kinds of things falsely about you because of me." But it still hurts. You know, you're on social media, and 90% of the people I meet on social media are really nice folks. And then there's that 10% that just love to attack. And yeah, it gets you down a bit. I'm just being honest.

• 2:11:43Shawn Ryan?

  It doesn't bother me that much.

• 2:11:45Lee Strobel?

  Really?

• 2:11:46Shawn Ryan?

  What bothers me is when it's the Christian crowd. That bothers me.

• 2:11:50Lee Strobel?

  That would bother, yes.

• 2:11:51Shawn Ryan?

  That really gets to me.

• 2:11:52Lee Strobel?

  Yeah. Yeah, I get that.

• 2:11:55Shawn Ryan?

  It's like, man, I feel like I'm doing something good here. What is your problem?

• 2:12:00Lee Strobel?

  Right, right.

• 2:12:01Shawn Ryan?

  Like, is this what you do all day? You know?

• 2:12:05Lee Strobel?

  No, I get that.

• 2:12:06Shawn Ryan?

  Run around and harass other Christians for like, trying to, like, what?

• 2:12:10Lee Strobel?

  And I've had a couple scholars that have attacked me. That's why I like to interview renowned scholars in my research, so that I'm going to the best possible sources for things. But you'll get other scholars, "And I don't know, he's wrong, and here's why." And I go, "I always listen to them." But then I think, eh, this first scholar makes more sense.

• 2:12:32Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah. You know, I watched, I think, I found John, I gotta thank John too, for connecting me.

• 2:12:38Lee Strobel?

  John Burke?

• 2:12:39Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah. Thank you, John. You know, that's how, I found him in that documentary, was The Case for Heaven.

• 2:12:49Lee Strobel?

  The Case for Heaven, yeah.

• 2:12:50Shawn Ryan?

  And I think it was at the beginning of that, you guys, you were having a conversation about how...

• 2:12:58Shawn Ryan?

  People are scared of death.

• 2:12:59Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:13:00Shawn Ryan?

  And they are, everybody, it seems like a lot of people wanna leave kind of a

• 2:13:12Lee Strobel?

  Legacy.

• 2:13:12Shawn Ryan?

  A legacy behind.

• 2:13:13Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:13:14Shawn Ryan?

  And it's interesting, I remember when I watched it, I was, um, I did three and a half years of talk therapy from, from combat stress.

• 2:13:25Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:13:26Shawn Ryan?

  And for my time in service and at the agency and, and I remember my, my doc was asking me what my biggest fear was. And my biggest fear wasn't death, my biggest fear was that nobody will remember me when I die.

• 2:13:45Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:13:45Shawn Ryan?

  And then, you know, and then probably damn near 10 years later, I'm watching this documentary that you produced or, and, and you're talking about it and I'd never, I've never heard anybody else say that.

• 2:14:02Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:14:02Shawn Ryan?

  Apparently it's more common than I thought, but.

• 2:14:05Lee Strobel?

  I talked to this one professor and he said, I, I have a large class of students, I always ask this question, how many of you know the first names of your great, great grandparents? He said, all the years, nobody has known the first name of their great, great grandparents except one guy. He said, we're forgotten, we will be forgotten. And, and some people will try to write the great American novel, or they'll try to paint the most beautiful painting of the world, or they'll try to create a skyscraper so that somehow they'll be remembered. But it's a vain attempt, we're gonna be forgotten. Some people remember it a little longer than others, but the truth is, most people are forgotten, um, pretty quickly.

• 2:14:46Lee Strobel?

  And, uh, but that motivates a lot of people in a negative way, too. Sir, who's the guy that killed John Lennon? Chapman?

• 2:14:56Lee Strobel?

  He told the parole board, I killed him because I wanted a piece of his fame. He wanted to be famous, so he killed John Lennon, the Beatle. People do evil things to be known, um, to be remembered, or they do, they try to do great things. Well, it's. Neither of them work. I mean, it's a vain attempt. We'll all be forgotten. Do you think about that often? It doesn't bother me as much anymore after I did that movie and wrote that book about heaven. It's like, you know, I know where I'm going after I die.

• 2:15:28Lee Strobel?

  And I don't have to worry about that. I came close to death, we were talking at breakfast in 2011.

• 2:15:36Lee Strobel?

  And lingered between life and death for several days. And that was maybe the most clarifying experience of my life. Because all of a sudden, I'm saying, what is really important? What really matters? When you're, you know, I had the doctor look at me and say, you're one step away from a coma, two steps away from dying. I was on the verge of dying and my wife found me unconscious. And when you're in that situation, nothing is more important, nothing matters more than what happens when I close my eyes for the last time in this world.

• 2:16:18Lee Strobel?

  That's it. You don't care about a legacy. You don't care, am I going to be remembered or forgotten? Doesn't matter. What matters is, what happens when I close my eyes for the last time in this world? Where do I open them next? That's all that matters.

• 2:16:35Lee Strobel?

  What about family? Yeah, well, that's why, that's why, you know, we share Jesus with our family, with our grandkids, with our son and daughter, both Christians. And I think the highest achievement I can attain as a grandfather, as a father, is to see my children come to faith in Jesus. And my son's a PhD in theology, a professor at a seminary, written many books about prayer and so forth. And my daughter is a novelist. She writes fiction, but she always weaves the gospel into the fiction. They're both serving God and my little grandchildren are coming to faith one by one. And that becomes the most important thing to me, you know?

• 2:17:19Lee Strobel?

  People say, what are you doing in the later years of your life? You're in your 70s now. I want to see my grandkids come to faith. I want to see them, and they are, one by one. And that's thrilling.

• 2:17:33Shawn Ryan?

  Is family important to Jesus?

• 2:17:36Lee Strobel?

  Yes.

• 2:17:37Shawn Ryan?

  It seems like,

• 2:17:40Shawn Ryan?

  and I can't, I don't know if it's all or if it's almost all. It seems like in these near-death experiences, which you have your new book coming out,

• 2:17:50Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:17:51Shawn Ryan?

  that, and I, you know, I haven't dove into yours, but talking to John Burke, there's always family lineage.

• 2:18:00Shawn Ryan?

  Am I correct on that?

• 2:18:01Lee Strobel?

  What do you mean by family lineage?

• 2:18:02Shawn Ryan?

  I mean, a lot of people are seeing

• 2:18:06Lee Strobel?

  Oh, yeah, yeah.

• 2:18:06Shawn Ryan?

  Past relatives.

• 2:18:07Lee Strobel?

  Yes, absolutely. Absolutely. In fact, um, deathbed visions, I write about deathbed visions, are different than near-death experience. In near-death experience, a person is clinically dead. Um, maybe no heartbeat, no brainwaves, and yet they see things and hear things. Some of them, they couldn't see or hear if they didn't have an authentic out-of-body experience, but they're gonna come back. They're temporarily dead, so to speak. Deathbed visions happen when a person is about to die permanently. And it's a fascinating, I interviewed the world's leading expert on these, and tens of thousands of these cases have been studied. This is very common. In the Bible, Stephen, before he was stoned to death,

• 2:18:52Lee Strobel?

  saw heaven open up. He got a glimpse of what was to come. And many people, before they die, get a glimpse of what is to come.

• 2:19:03Lee Strobel?

  It's interesting, Jesus told a story about Lazarus and

• 2:19:12Lee Strobel?

  the beggar.

• 2:19:15Lee Strobel?

  The beggar, during his lifetime, ignored or was treated poorly by Lazarus. Lazarus was rich, and he treated the beggar with disdain. And yet, here we have Lazarus, now dead, but in Hades, separated from God, and the beggar is with God.

• 2:19:39Lee Strobel?

  And Jesus said something interesting. He said, "The angels carried Lazarus to God." And what's fascinating about these visions, deathbed visions, is how many people seeing angels coming for them. I mean, it is so common, at one hospice, which was a huge hospice operation in New York State, they asked people, they said, "Tell us if you have a vision or a vivid dream before you die that is astounding to you, or it gives you a glimpse of what's to come," or whatever. Eighty-eight percent had something like that.

• 2:20:22Shawn Ryan?

  Are you serious?

• 2:20:23Lee Strobel?

  Eighty-eight percent.

• 2:20:24Shawn Ryan?

  My great-grandmother had this.

• 2:20:25Lee Strobel?

  Did she really?

• 2:20:26Shawn Ryan?

  She did.

• 2:20:27Lee Strobel?

  What happened?

• 2:20:28Shawn Ryan?

  She saw, I was... I wasn't in a place where I took it seriously.

• 2:20:34Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:20:35Shawn Ryan?

  At the time, to be honest with you. But I heard my mom talk about it, and I remember, I remember going through it and seeing her in there, and she saw a lot of relatives.

• 2:20:47Lee Strobel?

  Yep.

• 2:20:48Shawn Ryan?

  And she started calling out people's names.

• 2:20:51Lee Strobel?

  Yes.

• 2:20:52Shawn Ryan?

  That nobody knew who the hell that she was talking about.

• 2:20:54Lee Strobel?

  Yeah, yeah. Very common. And here's how we know that they're authentic. Couple things tell me that these are authentic. Number one, how common they are. Here we are. What were the chances that you've had direct experience with that through a relative?

• 2:21:08Shawn Ryan?

  I just wanna, I just, sorry, I just wanna interject too. I believe, I think my great-grandma was a hundred and, she was a hundred and one or a hundred and two years old.

• 2:21:18Lee Strobel?

  Wow.

• 2:21:19Shawn Ryan?

  Sharp as a tack.

• 2:21:20Lee Strobel?

  Wow.

• 2:21:21Shawn Ryan?

  Not talking, zero dementia.

• 2:21:23Lee Strobel?

  Wow, you got good genes.

• 2:21:24Shawn Ryan?

  One side of my family. But, but...

• 2:21:30Shawn Ryan?

  But, seriously, sharp as a tack, just like me and you sitting here right now today. And, uh, not that I'm sharp as a tack, but, uh, but, but I ju- I just wanna, this isn't like some crazy old person.

• 2:21:45Lee Strobel?

  Yes, some crazy, in dementia, it's a good point.

• 2:21:47Shawn Ryan?

  This is, this is somebody that was with it all the way until the end.

• 2:21:51Lee Strobel?

  It is, I'm telling you Sean, it is so common, um, um, Billy Graham's pulpit partner, Charles Templeton, who became an atheist and later came back to faith before he died, said to his wife on his deathbed, "Madeline, can you see them? Can you hear, they're here." She said, "What are you talking about?" "The angels, you can't see them? They're here, they're right here in this room, they're coming for me. They're singing, they're so beautiful, I'm going to heaven." Um, Billy Graham's maternal grandmother, same thing. Um, and they often see people, but here's what's interesting, children who die. You would think, if this is just something in someone's imagination, subjective experience, a child, if they saw an angel before they died, would think they would have wings.

• 2:22:36Lee Strobel?

  Because children's stories always have wings on the angels. That's not what happens. So, there's a case I studied of a, of a child, she was dying, and she said to her mother, "Mommy, can you see them? Can you see the angels? They've come for me, they're so beautiful." And her mother didn't wanna deny anything, so she lied, and she said, "Oh, yeah, yeah, I see them, I see them, oh, the, the wings are so big." And her daughter said, "Mommy, they don't have wings, you don't have to lie, they don't have wings." And then she died. And, um, it's just an example of, you know, seeing something, not what she would have anticipated, but seeing angels without wings, that's very common. So...

• 2:23:20Lee Strobel?

  These deathbed visions are powerful, I think, in terms of giving us a glimpse into what's to come. The other example is a woman who was dying after childbirth in England, and great documentation of her case. And she's on her deathbed, she sees, "Can you see these beautiful, wonderful beings? I see them, I see them." And she, "Oh, here's my father." And her father's name, Ed, I can't remember his name. "It's Ed, he's beckoning to me. Yes, I'm gonna come, Ed, I'm gonna come." "Oh, there's Vida. Why is Vida there?" And then she died. Well, Vida was her sister.

• 2:24:04Lee Strobel?

  She didn't know, three weeks earlier, Vida had died. They didn't tell her because she was so sick, they didn't want to cause her to die from the shock of her sister dying. So they never told her.

• 2:24:15Shawn Ryan?

  Wow.

• 2:24:16Lee Strobel?

  And here she is, seeing her in the life to come. That's another kind of corroboration. And I always look for corroboration. How do I know it's not just in your head? And so I think that's a good example of corroboration, when people see something that they could not have anticipated, like a relative they didn't know had died.

• 2:24:34Shawn Ryan?

  Wow, that's pretty profound.

• 2:24:38Lee Strobel?

  Isn't that cool?

• 2:24:39Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah, very, very. Let's move into, "Is God Real?"

• 2:24:43Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:24:44Shawn Ryan?

  The book.

• 2:24:45Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:24:46Shawn Ryan?

  What is some of the evidence that really stood out to you?

• 2:24:49Lee Strobel?

  Well-

• 2:24:50Shawn Ryan?

  Talk about DNA-

• 2:24:51Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:24:52Shawn Ryan?

  The universe-

• 2:24:53Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:24:54Shawn Ryan?

  What is, what are some of the things that really just stood out to you?

• 2:24:56Lee Strobel?

  I think one of the most powerful discoveries of modern ages, this only goes back, what, 50 to 100 years? People used to think that the universe was eternal. It always existed. But now we know, from a series of scientific discoveries and philosophical arguments from the last century or so, that the universe had a beginning in the past. At some point in the past, the universe began to exist. In fact, the great cosmologist, Alexander Velikin, him and two other cosmologists, cosmology just means the study of the origin of the universe, came up with a theorem that says that even if our universe turns out to be one small part of a multiverse, the multiverse itself must have had a beginning.

• 2:25:40Lee Strobel?

  ¿Entonces, ¿qué significa que el universo tiene un principio? Bueno, se remonta a un argumento por la existencia de Dios que ha sido popularizado por mi amigo, un filósofo, Dr. William Lane Craig. Va así: "Todo que comienza a existir tiene una causa." Ahora sabemos que el universo comenzó a existir. Por lo tanto, el universo tiene una causa detrás de ello. ¿Qué clase de causa puede traer al existir un universo? Bueno, debe ser trascendente, lo que significa aparte de la creación. Debe ser inmaterial o espíritu, porque existió antes del mundo físico. Debe ser inesperado o eterno, porque existió antes de que el tiempo físico llegara a existir. Debe ser poderoso, dada la inmensidad del evento de la creación.

• 2:26:25Lee Strobel?

  Debe ser inteligente, dada la increíble precisión del evento de la creación. Debe ser personal, porque tuvo que tomar la decisión de crear. Debe ser cuidadoso, porque se creó un hábitat que podemos existir. Y el principio científico de Occam's razor nos dice que solo habría un creador. Así que esa es una descripción del Dios de la Biblia, justo allí. Trascendente, inmaterial o espíritu, eterno, poderoso, inteligente, personal, cuidadoso. Es una descripción del Dios de la Biblia. Esa descubrimiento de que el universo tiene un principio, creo que es probablemente el argumento más fuerte de la ciencia de que Dios debe existir.

• 2:27:08Lee Strobel?

  El segundo área es la física, la fine tuning del universo. El universo está finamente ajustado a la borda de un rayo para que la vida pueda existir. En otras palabras, los números que gobernaban la operación del universo. Si cambiabas ellos un poco, la vida sería imposible. Así que, en otras palabras, si sales una noche verano y miras hacia el cielo, y en lugar de ver un cielo lleno de estrellas, ves 50 a 100 gigantes de anillos en el cielo. Y cada anillo podría calibrarse a uno de los trilhões de posibles entornos. Esa es una imagen de lo que la física moderna nos dice que nuestro universo es como. 50 a 100 de estas dimensiones de física tendrían que ser perfectamente calibradas para que la vida...

• 2:27:52Lee Strobel?

  Te daré algunos ejemplos. Todos sabemos qué es la gravedad, ¿verdad? Si dejo mi teléfono celular por el milésimo vez, si dejo este teléfono celular, va a impactar el suelo debido a la gravedad.

• 2:28:04Lee Strobel?

  But gravity is finely tuned, so that life can exist. How finely tuned? Picture a ruler across the entire known universe, 15 billion light-years, and it's broken down in one-inch increments. That ruler represents the range along which the force of gravity could have been calibrated anywhere along that ruler, but it happens to be at the exact right place, so that life can exist. What if we changed it? Let's change the force of gravity one inch compared to 15 billion light-year width of the universe? Intelligent life is impossible anywhere in the universe, just with that single change.

• 2:28:47Lee Strobel?

  My favorite example is the ratio between the electromagnetic force and the gravitational force. It has to be finely tuned to one part in 10,000 trillion trillion trillion. So how do we visualize that? That would be like taking a continent the size of North America and piling it with dimes to the moon, 238,000 miles of dimes, and then taking a billion continents, the size of North America, and piling them with dimes up to the moon. And then taking one dime and spray painting it red, and then mixing it among all the

• 2:29:28Lee Strobel?

  dimes and the billion continents going up 238,000 miles, and then I blindfold you. And I say, "You can dig in among all these billion continents, the dimes all the way to the moon, but you can only reach in one time and pick out one dime. What are the odds you'd get the dime spray painted red? One chance in 10,000 trillion trillion trillion." So that shows you how astronomical the odds are against this. It cannot happen by chance. I interviewed one physicist, and I said, "What are the odds? These numbers are astronomical. What are the odds this could have just happened by chance?" He said, "Oh, we physicists have a term for that." I said, "Oh, what is it?"

• 2:30:12Lee Strobel?

  He said, "Ain't gonna happen." The other area of science, and again, this is discoveries just within the last century, for sure, maybe within the last 50, 80 years, is DNA.

• 2:30:24Lee Strobel?

  Your body has, what, 100 trillion cells in it? Open up any cell, and if you were to unravel the double helix of DNA, from one cell, it would be six feet tall. Embedded in that DNA is a four-letter chemical alphabet that spells out the precise assembly instructions for every protein out of which you're made. Just like English uses a 26-letter alphabet to spell out words, DNA uses this four-letter chemical alphabet to spell out how to build you, how to build the proteins that make you. There are more words in one cell in your body

• 2:31:06Lee Strobel?

  than you would find in 200 years of the Sunday New York Times. Where does that come from? Nature cannot produce information. It can produce patterns. I live in Houston. If I go down to Galveston and the beach, and the sand is wet from overnight, and there's ripple marks in the sand, it would be logical for me to say the waves made those ripple marks in the sand, because nature can make patterns. But if I'm walking down the beach, and in the wet sand I see "John Loves Mary" with a heart around it and an arrow through it, I wouldn't say, "Oh, the waves made that." Why? Because that's information. And without an exception, whenever we see information, whether it's a painting on a cave wall, whether it's a computer code,

• 2:31:51Lee Strobel?

  whether it's a novel, whenever we see information, there is always an intelligence behind it. Stephen Meyer, with a PhD from Cambridge University on the origin of life, interviewed him for my book, "Is God Real?" And he looks at every alternative explanation, none of them hold water. The only explanation is there must be a Creator who, in a sense, signed every cell in our body. He left behind instructions, written instructions, four-letter chemical alphabet, on how to build you. And I think you take those three areas of science together, cosmology, physics, biochemistry, they make a really strong case that God is real.

• 2:32:38Lee Strobel?

  Isn't that mind-blowing?

• 2:32:39Shawn Ryan?

  It is.

• 2:32:40Lee Strobel?

  Six feet of DNA in one cell in your body, and you have, what, 100 trillion cells or something like that? It's just, it's just mind-boggling. And to spell it out with precision. I mean, it's, it's just... I mean, the more we study in science, when we learn the universe has an origin, when we learn about the fine-tuning of the... It's only in the last 50 years or so we've understood the fine-tuning of the universe. And now, we're understanding DNA more and more. We look at all that, and we go, "How can anybody today deny that there is a supernatural creator?" "I don't know."

• 2:33:18Lee Strobel?

  And then, when you pair it with the resurrection of Jesus, you go, "Well, which God are we talking about?" Now, we have Jesus demonstrated through his resurrection that he is who he claims to be, the unique Son of God. And now, we have a really strong case for not just the existence of God, but for the truth of Christianity.

• 2:33:37Shawn Ryan?

  That is mind-blowing.

• 2:33:38Lee Strobel?

  It's fun stuff, isn't it?

• 2:33:39Shawn Ryan?

  It is.

• 2:33:39Lee Strobel?

  I mean, one of the joys of my life, I get to sit down with all these great scholars and just sit there for hours, sometimes days, and just riddle them with questions like you do with folks. And, and, and, you know, every once in a while, they just blow my mind.

• 2:33:56Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah. It, um... Wow. Well, Lee, let's take, uh, let's take a break real quick.

• 2:34:03Lee Strobel?

  Sure.

• 2:34:03Shawn Ryan?

  When we come back, we'll dig in a little bit on your new book.

• 2:34:06Lee Strobel?

  Great.

• 2:34:10Shawn Ryan?

  I know everybody out there has to be just as frustrated as I am when it comes to the BS and the rhetoric that the mainstream media continuously tries to force-feed us. And I also know how frustrating it can be to try to find some type of a reliable news source. It's getting really hard to find the truth in what's going on in the country and in the world. And so, one thing we've done here at Sean Ryan Show is we are developing our newsletter.

• 2:34:40Shawn Ryan?

  And the first contributor to the newsletter that we have is a woman, former CIA targeter. Some of you may know her as Sarah Adams, call sign Superbad. She's made two different appearances here on the Sean Ryan Show, and some of the stuff that she has uncovered and broke on this show is just absolutely mind blowing. And so I've asked her if she would contribute to the newsletter and give us a weekly intelligence brief. So it's gonna be all things terrorists, how terrorists are coming up through the southern border, how they're entering the country, how they're traveling, what these different terrorist organizations throughout the world are up to. And here's the best part, the newsletter is actually

• 2:35:23Shawn Ryan?

  free. We're not gonna spam you. It's about one newsletter a week, maybe two, if we release two shows. The only other thing that's gonna be in there besides the intel brief is if we have a new product or something like that. But, like I said, it's a free CIA intelligence brief. Sign up, link's in the description or in the comments. We'll see you in the newsletter. Thank you for listening to the Sean Ryan Show. If you haven't already, please take a minute, head over to iTunes and leave the Sean Ryan Show a review. We read every review that comes

• 2:36:04Shawn Ryan?

  through, and we really appreciate the support. Thank you. Let's get back to the show. All right, Lee, we're back from the break. We're getting ready to dive into your new book.

• 2:36:18Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:36:19Shawn Ryan?

  And we're gonna talk about miracles, but we were just having a little side conversation about Hugh Hefner.

• 2:36:24Lee Strobel?

  Well, yeah, it came up because I saw on your water bottle you gave me, it says The Sean Ryan Show, which is really cool. And I was saying, I used to have a national TV show called Faith Under Fire, and I got an opportunity to interview Hugh Hefner about his faith. And so we go to the Playboy Mansion, and we're sitting there, of course, he's in his silk pajamas and, you know, usual outfit. And he had the same kind of water bottle, except it had the Playboy symbol on it. And so I'm drinking from this, and I said, "This isn't from the grotto, is it, this water?"

• 2:37:02Shawn Ryan?

  You are definitely not the typical guest I would say is hanging out at the Playboy Mansion. How was that experience?

• 2:37:09Lee Strobel?

  He said, "You want a tour?" "No, no, that's all right. I'm fine. I'll just stay here in the living room. That's fine."

• 2:37:14Shawn Ryan?

  What did he say about his faith?

• 2:37:16Lee Strobel?

  It was very interesting. He had kind of a deistic faith. In other words, faith about a vague, all-powerful something kind of a deal. But not Jesus and not Christianity. He said, "It's a little too childlike for me."

• 2:37:33Shawn Ryan?

  Little too childlike?

• 2:37:34Lee Strobel?

  Yeah, yeah. It's obvious why, because he was living a very immoral life. And if he were to put his trust in Jesus, all of a sudden, that would be out the window. So it's easier to put your trust in a deistic, general idea of a God who has no demands on you, who has no moral authority in your life. But then after the cameras turned off, I said, "I'd like to give you a gift." And I gave him a copy of my book, "The Case for Christ." And he was fascinated. He said, "Oh!" And he opened it up and he said, "Is there ever any real evidence for Christianity?" I said, "Yeah." I said, "Have you ever looked in the resurrection?" He said, "No." I said, "Actually, there's really good evidence of resurrection." "Really?"

• 2:38:16Lee Strobel?

  And he was very interested and we had a great conversation. I showed him the evidence. I went through it with him and gave it to him. He sent me Christmas cards and I tried to follow up with him a few times, but I don't think I had much impact.

• 2:38:28Shawn Ryan?

  What does a Christmas card from Hugh Hefner look like?

• 2:38:34Lee Strobel?

  It was not pop-up, so...

• 2:38:38Shawn Ryan?

  I mean, I'm just envisioning the big family photo, you know?

• 2:38:42Lee Strobel?

  Let's put it this way. I think I got the G-rated version.

• 2:38:44Shawn Ryan?

  Nice.

• 2:38:45Lee Strobel?

  I'm sure there were other ones that went out.

• 2:38:46Shawn Ryan?

  I'm surprised they have one.

• 2:38:48Lee Strobel?

  Yeah, yeah, well, that's true. So anyway, that was a bizarre experience.

• 2:38:53Shawn Ryan?

  That's pretty interesting that you went there to interview him about things.

• 2:38:56Lee Strobel?

  But it shows that so many people don't take the time to really ask the kind of questions you've been asking, which is, "How do you know this stuff? What evidence is there?" And, you know, so many people just kind of go through life and never scratch below the surface to try to determine, "Could this be true?"

• 2:39:09Shawn Ryan?

  I think people are scared to ask questions.

• 2:39:11Lee Strobel?

  Maybe that's true, yeah.

• 2:39:13Shawn Ryan?

  You know, or embarrassed.

• 2:39:14Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:39:14Shawn Ryan?

  But, and I think a lot of people are conditioned to think that questioning can be...

• 2:39:22Shawn Ryan?

  Can be rude.

• 2:39:23Lee Strobel?

  Hmm.

• 2:39:23Shawn Ryan?

  And um, or, or not welcomed and.

• 2:39:27Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:39:27Shawn Ryan?

  I thought, I mean, I just think that you should, you should be able to.

• 2:39:32Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:39:32Shawn Ryan?

  Question everything.

• 2:39:33Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:39:34Shawn Ryan?

  I feel like we've been conditioned to, I don't know, we kinda, you know, we've seen it a lot the past couple of years, like, why are you asking questions?

• 2:39:43Lee Strobel?

  That's true.

• 2:39:43Shawn Ryan?

  You know, and it's like, it's just a question.

• 2:39:45Lee Strobel?

  Right, right.

• 2:39:46Shawn Ryan?

  Getting pissed off that I'm asking a question. And uh, but.

• 2:39:50Lee Strobel?

  You know, interestingly, uh, John the Baptist, when he got thrown in prison, started to ask questions about God. He, he, he wanted to know, is Jesus really the one we've been waiting for? We to wait for some other Messiah? And um, this was a guy that should have known for sure that Jesus was who he claimed to be. But he had questions, but what did he do? He investigated. He got a couple of friends together, said, go track down Jesus and ask him point blank, are you the one we've been waiting for? We to wait for somebody else? So they tracked down Jesus, they asked him, here's the deal, did Jesus get mad? No. He didn't say, how dare John of all people have the temerity to express a hesitation about my identity? No, he said, look, go back to John and tell him what you have seen and heard.

• 2:40:33Lee Strobel?

  The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cured, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is preached to the poor. Now, let's go tell him about the evidence that you've seen that convinces you that I am who I claim to be. So, like you said, there's nothing wrong with questions. Jesus didn't get mad when you ask questions. It's not like you surprise God and he says, I can't believe he asked that question. You know, God knows.

• 2:40:57Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 2:40:57Lee Strobel?

  And, but isn't it true though? Is a lot of people hesitate to engage, ask questions, they don't wanna look dumb maybe, or they don't wanna, I don't know what it is, but uh, they think they're gonna offend God in some way. But Jesus didn't get mad at John. It was after this incident that Jesus got up and said, among those born of women, there's no one greater than John. John, the guy who asked a question.

• 2:41:17Shawn Ryan?

  You know, I had a, I do, I wanted to ask you a question, but sometimes I can't figure out the right, I can't figure out how to articulate it.

• 2:41:25Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:41:25Shawn Ryan?

  I asked, we have um, we have, I don't go to church anymore. Um, actually, I did go to, I went to mass after I interviewed uh, Father Rehale for the first time in a really long time, but um, decades. And um, actually not decades, but um, so in this.

• 2:41:49Shawn Ryan?

  In this Bible study that we had, I, and I could tell it got people a little on edge.

• 2:41:54Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:41:54Shawn Ryan?

  Probably I maybe articulated it wrong, but I was talking about,

• 2:41:59Shawn Ryan?

  why doesn't God make himself more visible?

• 2:42:03Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:42:03Shawn Ryan?

  And, and I'll probably butcher this, and I'm sure I'll get, I'll get all kinds of shit from, from the internet people for asking this, but you know, I, basically what I was, what I was trying to get at is, God can be hard to find.

• 2:42:25Shawn Ryan?

  I don't, I, I, I think that God-

• 2:42:27Lee Strobel?

  The hiddenness of God.

• 2:42:28Shawn Ryan?

  Can be hard to find. He's, he, I don't know if elusive is the right word, but it's not like I can call his name and he shows up and helps me immediately.

• 2:42:37Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:42:38Shawn Ryan?

  And he is the Father.

• 2:42:40Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:42:42Shawn Ryan?

  Well, I'm a Father.

• 2:42:42Lee Strobel?

  Hmm.

• 2:42:44Shawn Ryan?

  And if my son is calling my name and needs help and he's hurt, or he needs direction, or he needs guidance, advice, anything, comforting, protection.

• 2:42:56Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:42:57Shawn Ryan?

  And I don't show up, I'm labeled a shit Father.

• 2:43:00Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:43:01Shawn Ryan?

  Right?

• 2:43:02Lee Strobel?

  Yep.

• 2:43:02Shawn Ryan?

  And so, why is God so hard to find at times? But he is considered the, the, the-

• 2:43:15Lee Strobel?

  Perfect Father.

• 2:43:15Shawn Ryan?

  Father of all Fathers.

• 2:43:16Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:43:17Shawn Ryan?

  But sometimes he's nowhere to be found, or at least it appears that he's nowhere to be found.

• 2:43:22Lee Strobel?

  It's a great question. I have a whole chapter of that in my book, Is God Real? So I, I think the two biggest questions that people ask these days are, number one, why would loving God allow suffering? And number two, why is God so hidden? And so I did a whole chapter in that book, Is God Real?, addressing that question. And there's several elements to that. Um, I interviewed a guy who had been a, um, aspired to be a baseball player, professional baseball player, he's a theologian now, and he was a catcher. And he said, "I picture this question like a pitcher and a catcher." He said, "Jesus is the pitcher, we're the catcher. Where does the problem lie in Jesus

• 2:44:04Lee Strobel?

  being quote unquote hidden, or God being so hidden? Where's, does the problem lie in the pitcher or the catcher?" And he said, "Theologically, based on what the Bible teaches, the problem lies with the catcher, lies with us." It says in Romans 1, verse 20, that "based on what we see in nature, that the existence of God is indisputable." That anyone who honestly looks at nature would walk away saying, without excuse, you know, they would have no excuse for saying, you know, not finding God. So, his first point was, "The real problem lies with us."

• 2:44:48Lee Strobel?

  What the Bible says is that we tend to suppress the evidence. Why? Because we want to be gods. We want to live our own lives. We don't want to be told how to live. We want to do what we want to do and live like we want to live. And doggone it, I like getting drunk. And doggone it, if God's going to tell me not to do that, I'm not so sure I want to know much about Him.

• 2:45:06Lee Strobel?

  The Greek language uses the imagery of a pedal. It's like when the evidence of God begins to become apparent to you, sometimes we push down the pedal, we suppress it. We suppress the evidence and we turn the other way. So, part of the problem is on us, that we, we're not looking for God. We don't really want to find God. We want to live the way we want to live. But secondly, there have been times in history where God has been especially evident. For instance, the parting of the Red Sea. The manna that comes down from heaven that sustained the Israelites in the desert. God's actions in the world were so obvious back then.

• 2:45:51Lee Strobel?

  What happened? Did they become more devout? No, they fell into apostasy again. What is apostasy? Rebellion against God. You know, they're worshiping golden calves and things like that. They turned their back against God, even though He had made His existence obvious to anyone. "I'm parting the Red Sea, for goodness sake. I'm providing manna from heaven so you can live, for goodness sake." And yet, their response is...

• 2:46:22Lee Strobel?

  To turn their back and go the other way. So, there's no guarantee that if God were to write in the sky, "I'm here," that we would respond. Because based on the track record of humans, last time he made himself so obvious, we walked the other way. And if he did do that, if he did in the sky, "I'm here," I could imagine all the atheist websites talking about, "Yeah, it's a natural phenomenon that is precipitated by too much moisture in the atmosphere." And it's, you know, I mean, they would come up with any explanation other than "God is real and God is here." They have a, they have an interest in not finding him.

• 2:47:03Lee Strobel?

  So, you know, and the other thing I would say is, you know, the Bible says, "Knock and you'll find." The Bible says, "Seek and you'll find." In the New Testament, Hebrews, it says, "Those who sincerely seek God will find him." In the Old Testament, Jeremiah, it says that those who seek God will find him. So, the fact that someone hasn't found God yet does not mean they won't find him. In fact, the Bible suggests, "Keep knocking, keep seeking." And there might be some lessons along the way that God wants to teach you before you come to meet him. Lessons about perseverance, lessons about whatever.

• 2:47:46Lee Strobel?

  That could be a possibility. But the fact that someone has not yet found God does not mean they will not find God. And as I said before, I think anyone, anywhere in any culture who calls out to the one true God and seeks him, God will provide a way of making himself known to them and his message known to them. I believe that. And I've seen miraculous ways in which he's done that.

• 2:48:13Shawn Ryan?

  What are some of those ways?

• 2:48:15Lee Strobel?

  Oh, um...

• 2:48:16Shawn Ryan?

  You personally?

• 2:48:16Lee Strobel?

  Yeah, I mean, I mentioned one earlier about the guy in, um, um, India, who was brought up by gurus, who's realized that Hinduism had too many contradictions to be true. And at age seventeen, he called out, "God, if you're real, I want to know you. I, I, I, I don't understand. This is not making sense. Um, I know I've messed up. I want to be forgiven. I want to, you know..." Uh, and God brings against the laws of the land missionaries to him, who shared the gospel with him. He became a Christian, later immigrated to the United States, and we became friends. Um, so there's an example. Or we talked earlier about dreams that God would bring to enclosed countries in the Muslim world, uh, to people, Jesus' dreams.

• 2:49:00Lee Strobel?

  So, there are ways in which Jesus, I believe, makes himself more known at certain times. Um, but I think for some, for most people who say, "Why doesn't God make himself more known?" What else do you want to know? You know, the, you know, I've got an 800,000-word book called the Bible that lays out just about everything you need to know. Have you looked at it? That kind of thing, you know?

• 2:49:22Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah, I mean...

• 2:49:24Lee Strobel?

  Obviously, we'd like him all to sit here and spend time with it, wouldn't we? And we could ask him all these questions, and he'd have much better answers than I would. Um, and we can do that in heaven. But, um, but he has given us enough. He's given us enough to act on. And, uh, and when we do act on that, what's interesting, when we do take a step of faith in the same direction the evidence is pointing, which is logical and rational to do, if the evidence for the resurrection, for the existence of God, from cosmology, from physics, from biochemistry, of these streams of evidence that are flowing in a direction, if we respond to that by taking a step of faith in the same direction the evidence is pointing, and receive this free gift of forgiveness through Christ, and become a follower of his...

• 2:50:11Lee Strobel?

  He becomes more apparent to us. Because now as we read the Bible as believers, it takes on a whole new dimension, a whole new aspect to it that brings it home more vividly to us than when we were not a believer. So, I think the Holy Spirit, as He takes residence in us as followers of Christ, you know, when I pray to God, I sense His presence in my life stronger today than I did 20 years ago. Doesn't mean I can have lunch with Him, but it means that there are times in my life where He has guided me, where He has closed doors that, thank God, I didn't go through, but He closed those doors,

• 2:50:55Lee Strobel?

  and I didn't know it at the time why, but I look back and say, "Thank you, Lord, for not letting me go down that path, because that would have been a wrong path." And I see His evidence in my life of the guidings of the Holy Spirit, the leadings that He gives. So, I mean, you know, there's a whole chapter in my book for those that are really interested, but it is a legitimate question, and a lot of people are asking it these days, especially among young people.

• 2:51:22Shawn Ryan?

  Which book is that in, out of the 40-plus that you've written?

• 2:51:25Lee Strobel?

  It's God Real. Tim, it's God Real.

• 2:51:28Shawn Ryan?

  Okay. I will definitely check that out. Thank you. Yeah, that's just, you know, it's, I could, when I first asked the question, I could see, and this is a group of very trusted, open-minded people. And that one, I could definitely see, sparked a little something.

• 2:51:50Lee Strobel?

  It's a profound question.

• 2:51:51Shawn Ryan?

  And it was, you know, it kind of began with, you know, "Yeah, He is, He's always," and I'm like, "I get that. I totally get that." But when I'm 12 years old, it's not working like that. You know, and it's just, but that makes sense. Thank you.

• 2:52:11Lee Strobel?

  Sure.

• 2:52:12Shawn Ryan?

  So, we want to get into...

• 2:52:16Shawn Ryan?

  I really want to go into spiritual warfare with you.

• 2:52:19Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:52:19Shawn Ryan?

  But this is, this is Christmas, so.

• 2:52:22Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:52:22Shawn Ryan?

  Seeing the supernatural.

• 2:52:24Lee Strobel?

  Right.

• 2:52:25Shawn Ryan?

  And there's a section in here that you had, that you had talked about miracles.

• 2:52:30Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 2:52:31Shawn Ryan?

  And so, let's keep it.

• 2:52:34Lee Strobel?

  Miracles are, I mean, to me, it's one of the most fascinating topics.

• 2:52:39Shawn Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 2:52:39Lee Strobel?

  Um, where God will intervene in our world in a way that is unmistakably Him. Um, a miracle is an event brought about by the power of God that is a temporary exception to the ordinary course of nature for the purpose of showing that God has acted in history. So He's intervening. You know, a lot of people said, "Well, miracles are not possible." This is what I used to think when I was an atheist. Miracles can't happen. Why? Because they violate the laws of nature. You can't violate the laws of nature. Um, David Hume, the famous atheist from Scotland, that was his argument. Well, you're misunderstanding what a miracle is. Um, if I take this cellphone and I drop it, the law of gravity says it's gonna hit the

• 2:53:24Lee Strobel?

  ground. But if I drop this cellphone and you reach in and grab it before it hits the ground, I'm not violating, you're not violating the law of gravity. You're not overturning the law of gravity. You're intervening. And if God did create the universe, then of course He can intervene at His will in those laws that He Himself created. It's an intervention. He's not overturning anything. It's just an intervention. So, I began to look at a couple of questions. How common are miracle claims, really? So I hired a public opinions company to do a scientific poll of American adults. And I asked the question, "Have you ever had one, at least one experience in your

• 2:54:09Lee Strobel?

  life that you can only explain as a miracle of God?" And 38% of American adults said yes.

• 2:54:18Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 2:54:18Lee Strobel?

  So four out of 10 said yes. Now, let's say hypothetically that 99% of them are wrong. They think it was a miracle, it was just a big coincidence. Let's wipe out 99%. That would still mean a million miracles just in the United States. So miracles, I think, are more common than we think. And what's interesting is... They cluster. They're not evenly distributed around the planet. Where the gospel is just breaking in, places like Mozambique, China, Brazil, that's where we see the miraculous taking place. One scholar said to me, 90% of the growth of the church in China is because someone

• 2:55:00Lee Strobel?

  themselves has had a miracle take place, a healing, or they know someone who it's happened to. 90% of that is the church growth in China. So, God tends to intervene in those places where the gospel, and often there are societies that don't have bibles or anything, but they'll respond to the supernatural that way. So, how do we know that it's real? I began looking into this, and Sean, I found case studies published in medical journals. I'll describe one of them for you. A woman, blind, blind for 12 years. She had juvenile macular degeneration, which is an incurable condition. She learned, she went to a school for the blind. She learned how to read Braille.

• 2:55:45Lee Strobel?

  She walked with a white cane. She married a pastor, Baptist pastor. One night, they're getting ready for bed. And he comes up to her with tears in his eyes, and he puts his hand on her shoulder. And he begins to pray, and he says, "God, I know you could heal her. I know you could heal her right now. God, I pray, I ask for right now, tonight, that you would heal my wife of her blindness." And she opened her eyes to perfect eyesight, saw her husband for the first time. She said, "I was blind, and now I see." It's a miracle. She has been now, she has had perfect eyesight for 47 years. That happened 47 years ago.

• 2:56:25Lee Strobel?

  Been published in a, four researchers researched it, published it as a case study in a secular medical journal. Wow. So, you know, so there's a PhD from Harvard. She's a professor at Indiana University, secular university. She's hearing stuff like this. She says, "Wait a minute. I'm gonna test it."

• 2:56:51Lee Strobel?

  Let's go to Mozambique, where there's supposedly an outbreak of miracles. And she brings a team in. They go into the villages. And they say, "Bring us all your deaf and all your blind." So they bring people who are deaf, blind, or severely handicapped in those areas. And they tested them scientifically. What is your level of vision? What is your level of hearing? They did testing. And they determined, "Could you see at all?" They got it down. Then they were immediately prayed for, in the name of Jesus, by people who tend to have a track record of God using them in healings. And then, immediately after that, they were tested again scientifically. "Has your vision changed? Has your hearing level changed?" And guess what they found?

• 2:57:34Lee Strobel?

  Virtually everyone improved to one degree or the other. In fact, the average improvement in visual acuity was tenfold. One woman named Martine, when they first met her, could not hear the equivalent of a jackhammer next to her. After 10 minutes of prayer in the name of Jesus, she could hear normal conversations. So they're thinking, "Something's going on here." So they said, "Let's test it somewhere else." So they went to Brazil, where the gospel is breaking in. They did the same test. They got the same results. This was a scientific study, published in a peer-reviewed, secular, scientific medical journal, the Southern Medical Journal, highly respected medical journal. And I interviewed, for my book, Seeing the Supernatural, the woman, PhD, that did this.

• 2:58:19Lee Strobel?

  I said, "What do you make of this?" And she said, "Well..." She said, "This is not some televangelist going in and trying to create an atmosphere of emotion and tricking people into thinking they're feeling better. This isn't trickery. It isn't fraud." She said, "All I can say is, something's going on." And she's right, I think it's something miraculous. Wow. I interviewed a woman, I do the interview in the book. Her name was Barbara. Barbara was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis as a teenager at the Mayo Clinic. Have all their medical records, have multiple witnesses to this. So, she goes to Mayo Clinic, she's multiple sclerosis.

• 2:59:02Lee Strobel?

  She began deteriorating rapidly, over sixteen years, worse and worse and worse and worse. Hospitalized repeatedly with lung collapses and things. Finally, her doctors and her parents got together and said, you know what? Next time she gets pneumonia, let's just let her die. I mean, this is ridiculous, she's just gonna suffer this way the rest, you know, let's just let her die. So she's in hospice. One lung is collapsed, one lung is at fifty percent. She's blind, all she can see are shapes, gray shapes. She has a tube in her throat so she can breathe, it goes to oxygen canisters in her garage, so she could be kept alive, because she couldn't breathe on her own.

• 2:59:45Lee Strobel?

  She had lost all her muscle tone, hadn't walked in seven years. She'd lost all her muscle tone. Her fingers were so curled up, that her fingers were touching her wrists. And her toes were extended like this, she couldn't wear slippers. And, she'd lost control of her bowel and her urination. So she's dying. She's in her bed at home. And, somebody called in WMBI, which is the Christian radio station in Chicago. And said, hey, Barbara's dying, this woman, could someone pray for her? Just ask your audience, pray for her. Well, we documented, the four hundred and fifty people began praying for Barbara. Because we know, because they wrote letters to Barbara, saying, "I'm praying for you."

• 3:00:30Lee Strobel?

  Pentecost Sunday comes. She's got three of her, two or three of her friends there, who are reading these letters, and people are praying for her, reading them to Barbara. And out of nowhere, from the corner of the room, where there's nobody sitting, she hears the voice of God, saying, "Get up, my child, and walk."

• 3:00:51Lee Strobel?

  So she's stunned, her friends didn't hear. She said, "Go get my parents." And she rips the tube from her throat, and she jumps out of bed. So when I'm interviewing, I said, "What's the first thing you noticed?" She said, "Lee, I jumped out of bed. The first thing I noticed, my feet were flat on the ground. They'd been curled, they'd been extended for a couple of years. And then I looked, and my hands had opened up." And then she said, "The third thing I noticed, I could see." She said, "You think that'd be the first thing I'd noticed? It was actually the third thing I noticed." And she, her mother comes running in and grabs her calves, and said, "Your muscle tone has returned."

• 3:01:34Lee Strobel?

  Her muscles tone returned to her legs. Her father came in and started waltzing around the room with her. It was Sunday night, Pentecost Sunday, and they went to a Wesleyan church in Wheaton, Illinois. And they said, "Let's go to church and tell people there's a service that night." So they came to the service, and as they came in, the pastor was up front, and he said, "Does anybody have any announcements?" Barbara comes walking down the main aisle. Well, nobody had seen Barbara walk in seven years. They all knew she was on the verge of dying. And the whole place exploded with people singing, "Amazing grace, I once was blind and now I see." She was instantaneously, completely, totally healed of multiple sclerosis in that instant by God.

• 3:02:19Lee Strobel?

  Wow. Totally healed. She had two main doctors. One doctor, she went to see him that Monday. She went to see her doctor. And he said later, he said, "When I saw her walking down the corridor, I thought, this must be a ghost. She must have died." Because this is impossible. This is medically impossible. Two of her doctors wrote books about it. Because they said, "There is no medical explanation for this." I got to know Barbara. We have multiple eyewitnesses. We've got the doctors who knew her and treated her and wrote books about it. We've got records from the Mayo Clinic. She ended up marrying a pastor and had a little church in Fredericksburg, Virginia. And so you go, "What do you do with something like that?

• 3:03:02Lee Strobel?

  What do you do with the guy who was born with gastroparesis, which is a paralysis of his stomach muscles? And as an infant, he's vomiting, he can't keep down food, and they realize this is an incurable condition. We have to insert tubes into him, so the food can go from his stomach to his intestine. And he had to live with that for 16 years, until one day, his parents brought him to a church. And the pastor came up and put his hand on his shoulder and prayed for his healing. And the guy said later, "It was like an electric shock. Went from my shoulder to my stomach." And he was instantaneously healed of an incurable condition.

• 3:03:43Lee Strobel?

  The only case of gastroparesis that's been recorded as being healed. Four researchers investigated that case and published it as a case study in a peer-reviewed medical journal. Something's going on, Sean. And I think what something is, is God, from time to time, chooses to intervene and to show His power and to show His love and to show His grace in ways that capture the attention of the world.

• 3:04:10Shawn Ryan?

  Wow, that's...

• 3:04:13Lee Strobel?

  That awesome?

• 3:04:14Shawn Ryan?

  That's amazing.

• 3:04:16Lee Strobel?

  I mean, Barbara was the sweetest person you know. When I interview people, because I interview people for books and are scholars, and I'm tapping into their expertise, and so I always pay them, because it's only right for me to compensate them for the time. And so, at the end of my interview, I went to Virginia to interview Barbara on camera. I have her whole interview on camera, I'll show it to you. And she... So I offered her payment for her time. And so, "I can't take any, I can't take anything for this. God did this. This is a testimony to Him and His power and His grace. I couldn't, I couldn't take anything." That's very sweet. You're a very sweet woman.

• 3:04:58Lee Strobel?

  So I love stories like that. Me too. I really do. And I love stories where, and this is a form of miracle, where God touches someone directly.

• 3:05:12Lee Strobel?

  And I have a whole chapter of that in my book, about people through history and contemporaneously, in contemporary world, who are touched by God in a supernatural way. I'll give you a quick story. A guy named Robert. Robert lived an immoral life. He was a drunk, he was a gambler, he was a womanizer. He once got in a dispute with a business partner and beat him up with a baseball bat, got sent to prison for it, took his limo to prison, took a limo home. Had a lot of money, very wealthy. He's standing on the beach in Florida. And he said, "God spoke to me, not through my ears, but I heard it inside me." And God said, "Robert, I've saved you more times than you'll ever know.

• 3:05:57Lee Strobel?

  Now you need to come to me through my son, Jesus."

• 3:06:01Lee Strobel?

  And this guy's an atheist. He's, "I don't even know who Jesus, I thought Jesus was a swear word. I don't even know who he is," you know? So the only Christian he knew was Frank Gifford, remember the sportscaster Frank Gifford? And so he called up Frank, said, "Frank, you're a Christian? I just had this experience. God talked to me. I heard him." He said, "Who is Jesus?" And Frank said, "Um, get that book, The Case for Christ, at least over a world. That'll, that'll explain everything." So Robert gets my book, he reads. Anyway, Robert has a 180-degree radical transformation. 180 degrees. He becomes a devout follower of Jesus. He, when he is baptized, he gets baptized

• 3:06:45Lee Strobel?

  at the Crystal Cathedral, famous church back then in California. And, um... He tells a story about how God intervened, talked to him, and how he came to faith. And he began talking to people, "Do you know God? Have you met him? Have you experienced him?" And the pastor rips up his sermon and said, "Y'all have heard the gospel. Anybody who wants to come up right now, receive Jesus as their forgiving leader, and be baptized on the spot, come on up." Seven hundred people came up in two services. When he was buried, he died a few years later, when he was buried up in Montana, where he was from, at his request, on his tombstone, it just says, "Believe in Jesus."

• 3:07:27Lee Strobel?

  Now, and thousands of people came to his funeral, and you wonder, "Well, why? Who was this guy?" Well, people didn't know him by Robert, that was his given name. He was known by his stage name, Evel Knievel. So Evel Knievel, the famous motorcycle daredevil writer, who is in the Guinness Book of World Records for more broken bones than any human being, Evel Knievel, had God speak to him, transform him. We became friends. I remember he called me for the first time. I answered my phone, I said, "Hello?" And the voice said, "Is this Lee Strobel?" I said, "Yeah." He said, "This is Evel." And I thought, "Satan has got my phone number. Can he do that? Can Satan do this? What the heck?" And he said, "No, no, Evel Knievel."

• 3:08:11Lee Strobel?

  Oh, okay, so we became friends. And God radically changed that guy's life. And I go, "That's a miracle. That's a miracle." When God reaches down and just grabs somebody like that, like Saul of Tarsus becomes Paul the Apostle.

• 3:08:28Shawn Ryan?

  Man, I love hearing stuff like that.

• 3:08:32Lee Strobel?

  I do too. It's encouraging, isn't it? You know, I know you asked earlier, you know, "What do you view the state of the world?" And yeah, there's a lot of bad stuff going on, but golly, God's still in control, he's still alive, he's still doing stuff like this. And when I hear stories about his, how he intervenes, and through dreams, through visions, through near-death experiences, through deathbed visions, through direct experiences, all these things, it brings me hope. I don't base my theology on it, but it tends to bolster my theology, because it's consistent with the teachings of the Bible.

• 3:09:07Shawn Ryan?

  You know, we're talking about these miracles that you've interviewed people on, and it sounds like some of it stems from prayer. And so what I want to ask you is, how do you pray? And who do you pray to? Do you pray to Jesus? Do you pray to God? Do you pray to the Holy Spirit? Do you pray to all three?

• 3:09:30Lee Strobel?

  I kind of follow what Jesus did when He gave the Lord's Prayer as kind of a model. And He prayed to the Father, my Father, who art in heaven. So I tend to pray to the Father. I don't think it's wrong to pray to Jesus. I don't think it's wrong to pray to the Holy Spirit. I think that's, you can do that. But I pray to the Father, and...

• 3:09:53Shawn Ryan?

  Why do you do that? I'm just curious. If you have, if Jesus is the way to the Father...

• 3:09:58Lee Strobel?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 3:09:59Shawn Ryan?

  Because I've always prayed to the Father as well.

• 3:10:01Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 3:10:01Shawn Ryan?

  And then I've started kind of switching it.

• 3:10:03Lee Strobel?

  Well, and that's fine. To pray to Jesus is fine, or pray to the Holy Spirit is fine. But because that's how Jesus modeled it. You know, Jesus, when He gave us the Lord's Prayer, said, "Our Father, who art in heaven." So I thought, okay, then that's a good thing to model my own prayer after. If Jesus is praying to the Father, then I'll pray to the Father. But to pray, I think to Jesus is fine. Pray to the Holy Spirit is fine. What is a little dangerous is some people pray to angels. And, you know, Paul, was it Paul or Peter?

• 3:10:44Lee Strobel?

  There's an incident in Scripture where one of the apostles starts to bow down to worship an angel. And angel, "No, no, no, I'm like you. I'm not, you know, you don't worship me." And I think there's, I think the danger of praying to an angel would be, number one, he's not God. Number two, there's a slippery slope that, do we start worshiping angels? And no, I mean, that's not appropriate. But I mean, my son actually wrote a great book on prayer. My son's a theologian. He and John Coe, who's a well-known theologian, wrote a book called, "When Prayer Gets Real." And it's something cool about your son writing a book on prayer. I mean, I'm so proud of him, and it's such a profound book.

• 3:11:29Lee Strobel?

  I'd encourage anyone who wants to know, how do I pray with authenticity? How do I pray with power and so forth? That's a really good book to read, "When Prayer Gets Real," by my son.

• 3:11:42Shawn Ryan?

  Do you ask for things?

• 3:11:44Lee Strobel?

  I do. First of all, I want to spend a time in adoration and worship. So I have a worship time in my prayer where I worship God for who He is and what He's done in my life and others. And so I spend time worshiping Him. I spend a time of confession. God, I know I shouldn't have done what I did yesterday. I cut that guy off, and he just wanted to talk to me, and I was rude. And I'm sorry. Help me to be more attuned to other people sometimes that maybe sometimes I'm not. So I confess my sins. Now, they've already been forgiven. But sometimes, when we have a pattern of sin in our life, even though we're Christian, it kind of creates a bit of static in our line in talking to God.

• 3:12:29Lee Strobel?

  You know, it's a little bit of a static. And you want to clear that up. So I think it's good to confess, to spend a time of confession and to say, "God, I'm sorry for this and this that I did yesterday. I knew before I did it I shouldn't, and I did it anyway. And I just want to say I'm sorry." So I do a time of confession. Then I do a time of thanksgiving. "Thank you, God, for..." I prayed this just the other day. I said, "God, I'm 70, almost 73 years old. I've been driving since I was 16, and I've never hurt anybody driving. Thank you, God, for protecting me from that horrible experience it would be to be in a traffic accident to hurt somebody.

• 3:13:13Lee Strobel?

  And I've never had that, and I just want to say thank you for protecting me for all these years, not just from being hurt myself, but from hurting somebody else." So I want to thank Him for what He's provided for my family, for ways that He has guided me or opened my eyes to something I needed to see. I just spend a time in thanksgiving. And then I spend a time in... It's called supplication, which is asking God, "God, you know, I really, I really need your help in this area." And of course, he already knows I do. He's omniscient, but the fact that I come to him with it and am vulnerable and honest about the things I need in my life.

• 3:13:57Lee Strobel?

  You know, we don't have the income to get through next month, and I know you're the great provider. And this happened a lot when I took, I left journalism to go into the church world at a 60% pay cut. And so, we lived on nothing for many years, and there were many times when we would pray, "God, we don't have the mortgage money this month, and we need your help." And he always came through one way or the other. But, but just to be vulnerable and honest about the things that we need in our life. So, that's a simple way to remember. It's the acrostic acts, to adore God, spend a time in worship, to confess our sins, to thank him, and then supplication, to ask for those things that we need from him.

• 3:14:42Shawn Ryan?

  Is it, do you, is it ceremonial, or, or is it just, are you just talking?

• 3:14:50Lee Strobel?

  Yeah, I'm just talking.

• 3:14:52Shawn Ryan?

  So, it could be when you're driving?

• 3:14:54Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 3:14:55Shawn Ryan?

  It could be when you're walking around?

• 3:14:56Lee Strobel?

  I have a time of prayer that's a little more like built around that ACTS structure.

• 3:15:02Shawn Ryan?

  What's ACTS?

• 3:15:04Lee Strobel?

  The Adoration, Confession, that kind of thing, like I just described. So, I want to take time out from my day to do that, but I'm constantly praying to God. I mean, when I'm driving, when I'm, you know, "God, I need your help." And sometimes we spiritualize things, you know, like I was in downtown Houston, and I needed to find a parking place, and I thought, "God, I know this is ridiculous, but I gotta, I gotta be in this meeting in 10 minutes, and there's no parking anywhere." Would you just, "Oh, there's a parking place." And you know, I mean, I'm probably just spiritualizing it, but doggone it, it happened. So, you know, I think there's an ongoing conversation we have with God. Have you?

• 3:15:49Shawn Ryan?

  When you ask for something, or you need something, do you, have you ever prayed as if it's already happened?

• 3:15:56Lee Strobel?

  Oh, in anticipation of Him already granting it?

• 3:15:59Shawn Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 3:16:00Lee Strobel?

  I know that's common in some churches. I don't generally do that. Um, I thank Him because I know whatever He does for me is gonna be for my best interest. Um, and so if, if I pray for X, and He gives me Y, um, I think there's gonna be a reason for it. And so I would rather have Y in the end than X. So, um, I, I know there's some in the Pentecostal realm who will pray, um, as if God has already granted it. Um, I don't think we have the power to manifest things that way, but, um, my approach is just to be like a father with his child. And I know when your child, you got a little kid, when he's older, he's gonna come to you and say,

• 3:16:45Lee Strobel?

  "Dad, can you buy me a Corvette?" And, and you're gonna say, "I love you, son, but there's no way I'm gonna buy you a Corvette, but you need to understand why. It's because I love you." And sometimes I come to God and I say, "God, I really need this." And He, He says, "No." I mean, there's an old saying, "The biggest curse is getting everything you pray for."

• 3:17:07Shawn Ryan?

  Really?

• 3:17:07Lee Strobel?

  Yep. Because if you pray, you, you think of the things through your life that you've prayed for, and you think, "Thank God, He didn't grant that prayer, because it would've been a disaster."

• 3:17:16Shawn Ryan?

  Hmm.

• 3:17:17Lee Strobel?

  You know, we pray for all kinds of stuff. Well, thank goodness He knows best.

• 3:17:21Shawn Ryan?

  That's a good point I've not heard of.

• 3:17:23Lee Strobel?

  And sometimes when we don't get what we want, and then we find out five years later, "Oh, man, I'm so much better off now than I would've been if, if God..." So God answers every prayer with either a yes, or a no, or a wait. Um, but sometimes a no is a blessing.

• 3:17:39Shawn Ryan?

  Man, you know, I...

• 3:17:43Shawn Ryan?

  That's an interesting perspective that I've not thought of because I started praying

• 3:17:47Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 3:17:48Shawn Ryan?

  As if things have already happened.

• 3:17:50Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 3:17:51Shawn Ryan?

  And I, um, have you ever heard of Greg Braden by chance?

• 3:17:55Lee Strobel?

  No.

• 3:17:56Shawn Ryan?

  Listen to Greg. I, I, I went on a Greg Braden kick for a while.

• 3:18:00Lee Strobel?

  Okay.

• 3:18:00Shawn Ryan?

  But, um, and through some of my other interviews and, and I've talked about manifest, manifestation and, and things like that. And I always get a ton of hate when I talk about that. But, you know, but, and I gave a specific example, um, by the time this releases, it will have been a couple of months ago. But I talked about this time that me and my wife got engaged under the Northern Lights and, and I think I, I think I prayed that into existence because it happened in, in Alaska in August, which is almost impossible. But it's actually the interview that's running right now.

• 3:18:43Shawn Ryan?

  And, uh, the, the name of the woman that I interviewed is Angela Ford and I talk about this. Got a ton of hate about it and, um, and, um,

• 3:18:57Shawn Ryan?

  you know, sometimes in the morning I'll, I'll get up and I will just flip to any random page in the Bible. Just to see what's, I like to randomize it because I feel like, I feel like he's going to tell me something rather than if I just read it straight through and, um, opened it up yesterday morning, Sunday morning. And, um, it was a passage. I don't have any scripture memorized. Like I said, I'm new at this. But, um, in fact, you know what? I texted it to somebody. I'm going to run down and grab my phone. I'll be right back. Cause I want to read this to you. Cause I would love to hear your perspective.

• 3:19:41Lee Strobel?

  Yeah. It was a great line. I was saying, I used to be able to run downstairs like that. There's a, there's a great quote that said, um, uh, how to fall asleep in a chair. Number one, be old. Number two, sit in a chair.

• 3:19:56Lee Strobel?

  I got in the airplane yesterday, I was asleep before takeoff. And, and Leslie said, "How do you do that?" And I said, "I'm old and I sit in a chair. That's all I need."

• 3:20:05Shawn Ryan?

  Man, I wish I could pull that off.

• 3:20:08Lee Strobel?

  Oh.

• 3:20:10Shawn Ryan?

  So here it is.

• 3:20:11Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 3:20:11Shawn Ryan?

  Here's the scripture.

• 3:20:14Shawn Ryan?

  It's Mark 11:24. "Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours."

• 3:20:24Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 3:20:25Shawn Ryan?

  So, to me, that kinda goes along with what I was just saying.

• 3:20:34Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 3:20:34Shawn Ryan?

  It's 4:44 right now. But, um, but, uh, I mean, how do you, how do you take that?

• 3:20:40Lee Strobel?

  Well, I, I have to read it in context with other, other verses and other teachings of Jesus about prayer, I think, um, to put it into context. But there's, there's nothing wrong with a, a sense of anticipation in saying, "God, you know, I, I need this in my life, and I know you love me, and I know it's, this is, um, something that you want me to have, and so I'm, I'm gonna, I'm gonna receive it as if you've already given it." I, I guess there's nothing wrong with that, but it's not the posture I generally take.

• 3:21:09Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 3:21:10Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 3:21:10Shawn Ryan?

  Okay. Yeah, I don't, I just love hearing how people do it.

• 3:21:15Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 3:21:16Shawn Ryan?

  You know?

• 3:21:16Lee Strobel?

  There's a variety, and you know, it's interesting, the word denomination comes from the same root as the word denominator. And yeah, there's a hundred and some odd denominations in Christianity, but we all have a common denominator, and that is the gospel. That's the core teachings of Jesus. And, and then we agree to disagree on some peripheral issues. How to, how to pray, how to, how to do this, do you tie, do you not? And, and you know what? It's okay that, um, we have some differences among us, as long as we hold tight to the core. So- Denominator, common denominator, we have a common denominator, all these denominations, but we have some different practices, and we have some different emphases. And every church is not the same.

• 3:22:00Lee Strobel?

  But as long as they're a denomination, as long as they agree that Jesus is who we claim to be, the unique Son of God who proved to my returning from the dead, and so forth, and certain non-negotiables, then it's okay that we view prayer a little differently from one church to another. That's okay. When we get to heaven, we can raise our hands and say, "Jesus, would you just clarify this once and for all? Would you just, you know, lay this out in a way we can understand it? I'm gonna have my hand in the air. Jesus, how does this Calvinism and Arminian thing fit together? I'm just curious about that. I can't wait to hear what he says.

• 3:22:36Shawn Ryan?

  Me neither, me neither. Well, Lee, we're wrapping up the interview here. I wanna, um, I wanna kinda close it out with, um, why do they call Jesus the way, the truth, and the life?

• 3:22:51Lee Strobel?

  They call him that because that was the way he described himself. "I am," he said. Interestingly, he would take the words "I am" and apply them to himself. And you think back in the Old Testament, when Moses encountered God in the form of a burning bush, and asked for his name, God identified himself as "I am." And so we have Jesus using these "I am" statements, I think seven of them. And one of those "I am" statements is, "I am the way, the truth, and the life." And then the important part comes next. "No one comes to the Father except through me." So in other words, it's only through the atoning death of Jesus and the cross, it's only through

• 3:23:32Lee Strobel?

  his resurrection, that anybody, anywhere, has any hope of making it out of this thing and getting to heaven.

• 3:23:42Lee Strobel?

  That's not to say there might be some people in the world who don't hear the name of Jesus, but who reach out to the one true God and in some way remarkably saved. That could happen, but they're not saved apart from Jesus. It is because of what He did. And you know, I know this is Christmas season and so forth, and it's just a reminder of God's love for us. He made us in His image, loves us so much that He sent His Son into the world to suffer horrible death on the cross. I mean, I've talked to medical doctors about what happens to you during crucifixion. It is a horrific, horrific death. So bad that the Romans would not even crucify their own citizens. They exempted them because it was too horrific.

• 3:24:26Lee Strobel?

  And yet, Jesus, the Bible says in Philippians in the first Christmas carol, that He gave up the perks of heaven.

• 3:24:36Lee Strobel?

  And He came into this world. And He lived a life of a servant, even to the point of going to the cross. So He willingly gave up the perks of heaven, entered into this world on Christmas, and then ultimately on Easter, He is resurrected from the dead after having paid for our sins on the cross. I mean, that, He is the way, the truth, and the life. There is no other path. We're all sinners. The only way we can be forgiven is through receiving the payment He made on our behalf when He died as our substitute to pay for the sins that we've committed. And we receive that, we become a child of God forever.

• 3:25:23Shawn Ryan?

  Thank you for sharing that.

• 3:25:24Lee Strobel?

  My pleasure.

• 3:25:25Shawn Ryan?

  Well, Lee, we kicked this off with a prayer.

• 3:25:29Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 3:25:29Shawn Ryan?

  I think we should end it with a prayer.

• 3:25:31Lee Strobel?

  That'd be awesome. Yeah. Can I start?

• 3:25:33Shawn Ryan?

  Absolutely.

• 3:25:34Lee Strobel?

  Lord, thanks for this opportunity to talk about You, to talk about the hope that You provide through Your Son, Jesus Christ. The fact that there is redemption, there is eternal life. There are, there is forgiveness. And it is only through the provision that He made on the cross.

• 3:25:57Lee Strobel?

  And when we receive that, we become your child forever. So we thank you for that. We thank you for your great love, for your provision for us. You could have walked the other way. You could have, you could have just snapped your fingers and turned this whole planet into a cinder. But you love us, you want to spend eternity with us, and I do pray that those who are watching, who don't know you personally, will make today the day that they say, "I believe that Jesus is the unique Son of God. He proved it by returning from the dead. I am a sinner. I've fallen short of how God wants me to live. I confess that. I want to turn from that. In an attitude of repentance and faith, I want to receive this free gift

• 3:26:42Lee Strobel?

  of forgiveness and eternal life that Jesus purchased for me on the cross." I pray many people will make today the day that they take that step, and that we can then reconvene someday in heaven, where we won't be constrained by time, and we can just extol your grace and your love and tell story after story about how you have made yourself and your ways known in this world in magnificent and miraculous ways. We pray all this in Jesus' name.

• 3:27:19Shawn Ryan?

  And I'd just like to add that, you know, we are, we are seeing this massive wave of people coming to you, Lord, and to Jesus and the Holy Spirit, and we just pray that that continues to happen. It's, it is awesome to see that happening, and, and we just hope that you use this, this conversation that I just had with Lee to, to help be a part of that and to bring more people to you, and... Last but not least, happy birthday Jesus and Merry Christmas.

• 3:28:03Lee Strobel?

  Yeah.

• 3:28:03Shawn Ryan?

  Amen.

• 3:28:04Lee Strobel?

  Amen.

• 3:28:05Shawn Ryan?

  Lee?

• 3:28:06Lee Strobel?

  Thanks, Sean. I really enjoyed it.

• 3:28:07Shawn Ryan?

  Thank you.

• 3:28:08Lee Strobel?

  It's a lot of fun.

• 3:28:09Shawn Ryan?

  It was an honor. I hope to see you again.

• 3:28:11Lee Strobel?

  I hope so, yeah.

• 3:28:12Shawn Ryan?

  I had a lot of fun and I learned, I learned a tremendous amount of

• 3:28:18Lee Strobel?

  Well, thanks.

• 3:28:19Shawn Ryan?

  Just everything that you're talking about. So, thank you. Thank you so much for being here and Merry Christmas.

• 3:28:24Lee Strobel?

  Thank you. You too. God bless you, my friend.