The Case For Christ
1: THE EYEWITNESS EVIDENCE Can the Biographies of Jesus Be Trusted? When I first met shy and soft-spoken Leo Carter, he was a seventeen-year-old veteran of Chicago’s grittiest neighborhood. His testimony had put three killers in prison. And he was still carrying a .38-caliber slug in his skull-a grisly reminder of a horrific saga that began when he witnessed Elijah Baptist gun down a local grocer.
Leo and a friend, Leslie Scott, were playing basketball when they saw Elijah, then a sixteen-year-old delinquent with thirty arrests on his rap sheet, slay Sam Blue outside his grocery store. Leo had known the grocer since childhood. “When we didn’t have any food, he’d give us some, Leo explained to me in a quiet voice. “So when I went to the hospital and they said he was dead, I knew I’d have to testify about what I saw.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Strobel received a journalism degree from University of Missouri and a Master of Studies in Law degree from Yale Law School, becoming a journalist for The Chicago Tribune and other newspapers for 14 years. Formerly an avowed atheist, he began investigating the Biblical claims about Christ after his wife’s conversion. Prompted by the results of his investigation, he became a Christian.
Strobel was a teaching pastor of Willow Creek Community Church in South Barrington, Illinois, from 1987 to 2000, before shifting his focus to writing and producing his TV show. He continues to speak periodically at churches and has been a board member of the Willow Creek Association. In 2007, Strobel was awarded an honorary doctoral degree by Southern Evangelical Seminary in recognition of his contributions to Christian apologetics.
Strobel is married to Leslie and they have two children and several grandchildren. His daughter Allison is a novelist, and his son Kyle is an Assistant Professor of Spiritual Theology and Formation at the Talbot School of Theology.