Quote by Lee Strobel
“The contrast between the biblical and Gnostic Jesus is stark when the gospels of John and Thomas are compared. “John says that we can experience God only through the divine light embodied in Jesus,” said Princeton religion professor Elaine Pagels. “But certain passages in Thomas’ gospel draw a quite different conclusion: that the divine light Jesus embodied is shared by humanity, since we are all made in the image of God.”3 While John stresses the resurrection as evidence of Jesus’ divinity, “Gnostic writers tend to view . . . the resurrection and other elements of the Jesus story not as literal, historical events but as symbolic keys to a ‘higher’ understanding,” said religion writer Jay Tolson.4”
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Atheist-turned-Christian Lee Strobel, the former award-winning legal editor of The Chicago Tribune, is a New York Times best-selling author of nearly twenty books and has been interviewed on numerous national television programs, including ABC's 20/20, Fox News, and CNN.
After a nearly two-year investigation of the evidence for Jesus, Lee received Christ as his forgiver and leader in 1981. He joined the staff of Willow Creek Community Church in South Barrington, IL, in 1987, and later became a teaching pastor there. He joined Saddleback Valley Community Church in Lake Forest, CA, as a teaching pastor in 2000. He left Saddleback's staff in mid-2002 to focus on writing. He is also a contributing editor and columnist for Outreach magazine.
Lee shared the prestigious Charles "Kip" Jordon Christian Book of the Year award in 2005 for a curriculum he co-authored about the movie The Passion of the Christ. He also has won awards for his books The Case for Christ, The Case for Faith, The Case for a Creator, and Inside the Mind of Unchurched Harry and Mary.