Customer Reviews

The Case for Faith Miniature Edition

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

This is a miniature book that contains a stripped down version of the main points of the full length book of the same title. I thought I was getting an incredible bargain on the book. The little book is still a decent value, and is a helpful tool in grasping the main points of the book. However, when I bought it I thought it was the full book, and so was very disappointed, although it was kind of funny. The miniature book contains shortened interviews with Christian intellectuals, such as William Lane Craig, about issues that challenge the intellectual viability of Christian faith. The answers are solid and helpful, although not incredibly substantive in such a short version.

Like many American Christians, I was brought to church most Sundays and endured countless sermons and lessons. Despite this seemingly rich education on Christian principles, I never was exposed to a lesson or class on the existence of God; God's existence was assumed as fact. As I matured into my twenties and went to college, the existance of God was no longer taken for granted. I encountered many agnostics and atheists among my many college professors. The net result of their influence was to question my faith. I never lost my faith, but I found it was a faith that could not withstand scrutiny.

Reading Lee Stobel's "The Case For Faith" continued in me my search for the certainty of my faith. Strobel's book is an excellent place to start investigating the issues that question one's faith. Like in his previous book, "The Case for Christ", Strobel presents interviews with several Christian apologetics that involve issues related to the veracity of the Christian faith.

The issues are as follows:

Can a real living caring God exist in a world filled with evil?
Are the Biblical miracles really true?
Is evolutionary theory enough to explain life on earth?
Is there only one way to GOd - through Jesus?
How can a loving God throw his created people in hell?
Is the church's history, with it's abuses, crusades, and inquistions, a reason not to believe in Christianity?
If I am filled with doubts, can I still be a believer?

Mr. Strobel investigates each issue thoroughly. He approaches the issues as a skeptic who wants to be convinced of the truth. Strobel was once a skeptic himself and his investigative journalism convinced him of the truth of his Christian faith.

If you have questions about your faith, then this is a good starting point for your investigation. There are other books that go into more detail on all the issues raised here, and you may want to purchase these as well for further study. But this is a very good starting point for answering those nagging doubts about your faith in Christianity and one's faith in the person of Jesus.

Most highly recommended.

Jim "Konedog" Koenig

I bought this item thinking it was the full book, but it's really a miniature version, which was pretty disappointing to me when I realized it. I think the website should indicate that this is a miniature (abridged) version.

Very informative book. A journalist becomes curious about the toughest objections to Christianity and sets out on a journey to discuss and investigate them. He travels around to various Historians, Scientists, Agnostics, Philosophers, and examines the toughest objections and questions in Christianity, and shows how, through study and reasoning, they can be proved true.

I never truly believed the Bible to be a true accounting. I am the type of person who tends to need proof. Blind faith never made sense to me. This book was so well written and logical that I actually felt God while I was reading it! This book had a profound effect on me and my life. I have no problem believing or debating the truth of the Bible now. I can answer questions and argue with conviction. Excellent book!

I bought this book to read as a sequel to The Case for the Creator and The Case for Christ. The picture of the book I purchased is shown as a full size hardback approximately 300-350 pages but...what I received was a book about the size of a matchbook of thirty pages with print so small a magnifying glass needed to be used to read. The book was a terrible overview of the full size book. So before ordering, you may want to think twice because the book that is being advertised is not what is sent. And it is too bad because The Case for the Creator and The Case for Christ are both superbly written books.

I know I'm only fourteen, but this book really opened up my eyes. It shows us that there is an overwhelming avalanche of evidence pointing to God and his existence if only we look for it.

Each interview provided the reader with important insights to misunderstandings and fake claims. It helps us climb over our intellectual barriers to finding faith and God and also talks about what to do if you are still having doubts or are trying to explain things away, which is something I find myself doing a lot. If you are skeptical or have strong faith I would encourage you to read this book.

I also think some reviews for this book posted are unfair. Hell is not a place where you get whatever you want, but it is the lonliness and separation from God because we chose to not follow him in spite of all the evidence provided. The interview pointed out that worms, gnashing teeth and fire were merely symbolism, because of course you can't feel fire if you're dead! It is the separation from God that we feel, and that is the worst thing of all.

Overall, fantastic book that will increase your faith if you are not close-minded.

"The Case for Faith" wasn't my favorite Christian apologetic, but it was definately a good one. It discussed many issues that keep people from having faith and I think it has and will continue to help people with those problems. I noticed that the reviewer below me either forgot what they read three years ago or they skimmed through one chapter very quickly and missed the majority of what was said in it. Since you obviously are suffering either from forgetfullness or something of that sort I'll explain a little about what they said hell was. You obviously don't remember the parts that repeatedly say that hell is complete and total isolation from God and from anyone or anything else. Hell is explained as complete loneliness. Therefore it is pretty silly to feel like the author made it seem like hell included cheerleaders and beers. That was a weak attempt to bash the author. It isn't his fault you didn't read the book. He never said that hell wasn't a place of weeping and gnashing (as Jesus said), you completely threw that in on your own. He said it was a place of weeping and gnashing of teeth because those who are there will be sad and angry at themselves for choosing this loneliness. He said that the fire was clearly figurative because the bible calls hell a place of complete darkness, but it also says that it is a fiery pit. Have you ever seen a fire that did lighten up some darkness? There can't be total darkness and fire at the same time. Given the amount of figurative images used in the bible, it makes sense. I certainly don't know if he was right on this issue, but he has a fairly good argument to back up his assertions. It's not fair to misquote a book in it's review because you don't like the answers that he gave. Hell can be a tough concept to grasp. This chapter simply tries to make it easier for the reader to understand. It seems odd to me that people won't believe in God because the don't understand this. Scientists are finding out that everything in the universe is infinately more complex than anyone a few hundred years ago could have possibly imagined and are getting more and more confused about this complexity as they go (read darwin's black box). If the smartest of us humans can't even understand the things in this world, what makes us think that our little finite minds could even could come close to comprehending the mind of the infinite God who created all of this complexity. That doesn't mean we should give up and not listen to what God says and certain things. It means that we need to trust that he knows what he is talking about. That is what faith is.

Anyway, this book is a good read and I recommend it.

Like several others, I did not realize that this was not a full version of the book.

Beyond that, I really did not find the book valuable at all. I thought he created the illusion of exploring these topics open-mindedly, but once a cursory introduction of the "problem" was introduced, he seemed to race down the evangelical Christian explanation with little or no attention to major counterarguments or exceptions. Many times I felt I was led down a slippery slope, where each point led to the next, but none were well established and the topic was very one-sided.

For many, you will love this book and find my review completely off base. But I approached this book as a philosopher who is a Christian, not as a Christian who wants to be aware of a little philosophy but has no real willingness to challenge core beliefs.

Until this order, I have been very pleased with Amazon and your service. This time, however, was very poor. It took over a month, and at the conclusion I still had not received the correct book. I recieved a "mini" edition of the book which did not include the full book; it measured about 3"X3". When I called to explain the wrong book arrived, the 2nd time I asked to order the version I wanted over the phone in order to avoid the same mistake a 3rd time. Unable to do that I reordered the book and again recieved a "mini" book. The person I spoke to on the phone told me the description of the book I odered said it was I small book; I checked your site 3 times to insure that I was correct in saying there was NO SUCH DESCRIPTION. I there fore had to do without the book as the class I needed it for had progressed too far for me to take part, along with the other two people I was ordering for.