Quotes from Lee Strobel

Real love—our love of God and our love of each other—must involve a choice. But with the granting of that choice comes the possibility that people would choose instead to hate.

Grace means there is nothing we can do to make God love us more . . . and there is nothing we can do to make God love us less. Philip Yancey1

At the time of the crucifixion, the disciples couldn't see how anything good could result; similarly, as we face struggles and trials and suffering, we sometimes can't imagine good emerging. But we've seen how it did in the case of Jesus, and we can trust it will in our case too. For instance, the greatest Christians in history seem to say that their sufferings ended up bringing them the closest to God—so this is the best thing that could happen, not the worst.

it's at least possible that God is wise enough to foresee that we need some pain for reasons which we may not understand but which he foresees as being necessary to some eventual good. Therefore, he's not being evil by allowing that pain to exist.

But I wanted someone who was more than just intelligent and educated. I was searching for an expert who wouldn't gloss over nuances or blithely dismiss challenges to the records of Christianity

moral character gets formed through hardship, through overcoming obstacles, through enduring despite difficulties. Courage, for example, would be impossible in a world without pain. The apostle Paul testified to this refining quality of suffering when he wrote that 'suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope.'13

The point of our lives in this world isn't comfort, but training and preparation for eternity. Scripture tells us that even Jesus 'learned obedience through suffering14—and if that was true for him, why wouldn't it be even more true for us?

wanted someone with integrity, someone who has grappled with the most potent critiques of the faith and who speaks authoritatively but without the kind of sweeping statements that conceal rather than deal with critical issues.

So exploring the scientific and historical evidence for God is not only a cognitive exercise, but it's an act of worship for me. It's a way of giving the Creator the credit and honor and glory that are due to him.

Hazen thought for a moment, then concluded: "You know, even if all religions were figments of our imagination, I would choose Christianity, because it says you can be assured that you're right with God. There's no need for performance anxiety or laboring through lifetime after lifetime. As the Bible says in 1 John 5:13: 'I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life.

The prophet Jeremiah said that 'from the least to the greatest, all are greedy for gain,'18 and the prophet Isaiah said, 'all of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags.'19 Our good deeds are stained with self-interest and our demands for justice are mixed with lust for vengeance. Ironically, it's the best people who most readily recognize and admit their own shortcomings and sin.

If every birth is a rebirth, and if every life pays for the previous life, then what were you paying for in your first birth?