The Case for Christ Bible Study Guide Revised Edition: Investigating the Evidence for Jesus
By Lee Strobel and Garry D. Poole
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About this ebook
Is there credible evidence that Jesus--the carpenter from the ancient town of Nazareth--really is the Son of God?
In this video Bible study (DVD/digital video sold separately), based on the New York Times bestselling book The Case for Christ, participants journey with Lee Strobel on a quest for the truth about Jesus.
Skeptics dismiss the Jesus of the Gospels by claiming there is no evidence that he was God's Son. But does their claim hold weight? And, if not, what evidence is there, especially outside the Bible? Lee Strobel--a former legal journalist and one-time atheist--presents the findings of his own search for truth.
This study guide is ideal for:
- Believers who want to learn more about the hard evidence behind their faith.
- Christians who find themselves becoming uncertain or doubtful.
- Anyone investigating, curious, or even skeptical about Christianity.
Sift through historical evidence and passages from a range of theologians, thinkers, philosophers, and laypeople on the topic of Jesus as you weigh compelling expert testimony that rejects easy answers.
With discussion prompts, Bible passages, and personal reflection cues facilitated by contributor Garry Poole, Strobel invites you and your group to investigate the truth about Jesus Christ as he leads up to the facts that guided him from atheism to faith in Christ.
By the end of this six-session study, groups may very well see Jesus in a new way--and even, like Strobel, find their life transformed.
Sessions include:
- The Investigation of a Lifetime
- Eyewitness Evidence
- Evidence Outside the Bible
- Analyzing Jesus
- Evidence for the Resurrection
- Reaching Your Verdict
Designed for use with The Case for Christ Video Study 9780310698517 (sold separately).
Lee Strobel
Lee Strobel, former award-winning legal editor of the Chicago Tribune, is a New York Times bestselling author whose books have sold millions of copies worldwide. Lee earned a journalism degree at the University of Missouri and was awarded a Ford Foundation fellowship to study at Yale Law School, where he received a Master of Studies in Law degree. He was a journalist for fourteen years at the Chicago Tribune and other newspapers, winning Illinois’ top honors for investigative reporting (which he shared with a team he led) and public service journalism from United Press International. Lee also taught First Amendment Law at Roosevelt University. A former atheist, he served as a teaching pastor at three of America’s largest churches. Lee and his wife, Leslie, have been married for more than fifty years and live in Texas. Their daughter, Alison, and son, Kyle, are also authors. Website: www.leestrobel.com
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The Case for Christ Bible Study Guide Revised Edition - Lee Strobel
Resources by Lee Strobel
The Case for Christ
The Case for Christ audio
The Case for Christ Student Edition (with Jane Vogel)
The Case for Christ curriculum (with Garry Poole)
The Case for Christmas
The Case for Christmas audio
The Case for a Creator
The Case for a Creator audio
The Case for Creator Student Edition (with Jane Vogel)
The Case for a Creator curriculum (with Garry Poole)
The Case for Easter
The Case for Faith
The Case for Faith audio
The Case for Faith Student Edition (with Jane Vogel)
The Case for Faith curriculum (with Garry Poole)
The Case for the Real Jesus
The Case for the Real Jesus audio
Faith Under Fire curriculum
God’s Outrageous Claims
Inside the Mind of Unchurched Harry and Mary
Off My Case for Kids
Surviving a Spiritual Mismatch in Marriage (with Leslie Strobel)
Surviving a Spiritual Mismatch in Marriage audio
What Jesus Would Say
Other Resources by Garry Poole
The Complete Book of Questions
Seeker Small Groups
In the Tough Questions Series:
Don’t All Religions Lead to God?
How Could God Allow Suffering and Evil?
How Does Anyone Know God Exists?
Why Become a Christian?
Tough Questions Leader’s Guide (with Judson Poling)
Title Page with Zondervan logoZONDERVAN
The Case for Christ Study Guide Revised Edition
Copyright © 2008, 2013 by Lee Strobel and Garry Poole
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of Zondervan.
ePub Edition February 2021: ISBN 978-0-310-69853-1
Requests for information should be addressed to:
Zondervan, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49530
All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from The Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations marked NLT are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois. All rights reserved.
Any Internet addresses (websites, blogs, etc.) and telephone numbers in this book are offered as a resource. These are not intended in any way to be or imply an endorsement on the part of Zondervan, nor does Zondervan vouch for the content of these sites and numbers for the life of this book.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means — electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other — except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.
Cover design: Faceout Studio
Cover photography: Shutterstock®
Interior design: Beth Shagene
Ebook Instructions
In this ebook edition, please use your device’s note-taking function to record your thoughts wherever you see the bracketed instructions [Your Notes] or [Your Response]. Use your device’s highlighting function to record your response whenever you are asked to checkmark, circle, underline, or otherwise indicate your answer(s).
Contents
Ebook Instructions
Session 1
The Investigation of a Lifetime
Session 2
Eyewitness Evidence
Session 3
Evidence Outside the Bible
Session 4
Analyzing Jesus
Session 5
Evidence for the Resurrection
Session 6
Reaching Your Verdict
Small Group Leader Helps
Special thanks to
Laura Allen and Jim Poole
for their outstanding writing and editorial contributions.
Their creative insights and suggestions
took this guide to the next level.
SESSION 1
The Investigation
of a Lifetime
For much of my life I was a skeptic. In fact, I considered myself an atheist. To me, there was far too much evidence that God was merely a product of wishful thinking, of ancient mythology, of primitive superstition . . . It wasn’t a phone call from an informant that prompted me to reexamine the case for Christ. It was my wife . . . Eventually I wanted to get to the bottom of what was prompting the subtle but significant shifts in my wife’s attitudes, so I launched an all-out investigation into the facts surrounding the case for Christianity . . . I applied the training I had received at Yale Law School as well as my experience as legal affairs editor of the Chicago Tribune. And I plunged into the case with more vigor than with any story I had ever pursued.
Lee Strobel, The Case for Christ
Read This!
If possible, read the introduction, Reopening the Investigation of a Lifetime, in The Case for Christ book in preparation for this session. Otherwise, read it as follow-up.
Watch This!
Video Teaching Segment
Space is provided to take notes on anything that stands out to you.
[Your Notes]
Discuss This!
1. To what degree can you relate to the comments people made about Jesus in the video segment? What best represents your current position regarding what you believe about Jesus Christ?
[Your Response]
I don’t believe we’ll ever know if Jesus was really what everyone says he was. I think it’s a lot of folklore. I think it’s a lot of historical misrepresentation. It’s a lot of wishful thinking. But I don’t think we know. I don’t think we’ll ever know. And I don’t think there’s any way to prove what has been claimed about Jesus for all these years.
— Woman on the street
THINK ABOUT THIS!
So, then, Christ may be said to be a fiction in the four senses that (1) it is quite possible that there was no historical Jesus; (2) even if there was, he is lost to us, the result being that there is no historical Jesus available to us; (3) the Jesus who
walks with me and talks with me and tells me I am his own is an imaginative visualization and in the nature of the case can be nothing more than a fiction; and finally, (4)
Christ" as a corporate logo for this and that religious institution is a euphemistic fiction, not unlike Ronald McDonald, Mickey Mouse, or Joe Camel, the purpose of which is to get you to swallow a whole raft of beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors by an act of simple faith, short-circuiting the dangerous process of