This week on Real Talk with Rachael I'm talking with Atheist-turned-Christian, Lee Strobel about his documentary The Case for Heaven. Lee is the former award-winning legal editor of The Chicago Tribune and a New York Times best-selling author of more than forty books and curricula that have sold fourteen million copies in total. He currently serves as Founding Director of the Lee Strobel Center for Evangelism and Applied Apologetics at Colorado Christian University. In 2017, Lee’s spiritual journey was depicted in an award-winning motion picture, The Case for Christ, which showed in theaters around the world. Lee and his wife, Leslie, have been married for forty-eight years. Their daughter, Alison, is a novelist and homeschooling expert (www.goodschooling.net), and their son, Kyle, is a professor of spiritual theology at the Talbot School of Theology at Biola University.

Key Points from Our Conversation:

• If you're in a relationship with an unbeliever, be sure to build your relationship with God while maintaining the relationship with your spouse. It's also vital to have a good spiritual mentor to help guide you.
• Lee wrote The Case for Heaven after a near-death experience and through his research found that the evidence shows our souls live on after death.
• There are two aspects of the afterlife - the intermediate state when the soul leaves the body and lives on with the Lord or apart from Him and the second state when we are reunited with our resurrected bodies and spend eternity in physical heaven or hell.
• The research about near-death experiences shows that the commonalities are consistent with Christian theology.
• There are two common misconceptions about hell - it's not a place of fire and brimstone, that's just a metaphor to indicate it's the worst place to be. There also seems to be different degrees of hell, which would be consistent with the justice of God.
• God doesn't send people to hell, He honors their free will choice to remain separated from Him.
• There is not enough research to support loved ones being able to contact us after they pass. The Bible teaches there is a chasm between the living and the dead and it's an area we're warned not to get involved with.
• You will never regret being courageous for Christ.

Resources Mentioned:

The Case for Heaven movie The Case for Heaven book The Case for Heaven Young Readers Edition The Case for Heaven and Hell curriculum Why Believe in Heaven  The Case for Christ The Case for Grace Spiritual Mismatch American Association of Christian Counselors Counseling with Rachael

Let’s Get Real Practical:

If you’re wrestling with your faith, you’re not alone. Dig into these questions this week - What do I believe about Jesus, God, and heaven? Then take time to do the research. Get in the Word and allow yourself space to wrestle. If you need someone to talk to, get into Christian counseling.

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