Getting Started: Chapter 1

Well, we had our first session yesterday morning for the Case for Christ class at Thompson Station. There were about 15 people present. I recorded the session and have an mp3 of the discussion. If you haven't received it by e-mail and would like a copy of the mp3 and outline please let me know at roger.lightner@yahoo.com.

Here are some discussion questions for you to consider for chapter one. I'll post some explanation to these questions in a couple of days.

1. If you were on a jury, how important would eyewitness testimony be in helping you make your decision?

2. What eyewitnesses do we have for Jesus' life?

3. How do the author's names on the four Gospel accounts compare with that of apocryphal writings?

4. How do the four Gospel accounts differ from modern biographies?

5. What the heck is the Q-document?

6. What are the synoptic Gospels and what makes the Gospel of John so unique?

7. If the Gospels were not written until about 30 years after Christ then how can they be trusted? How does this compare with other ancient pieces of literature?

8. Are there any New Testament books that are older than the Gospels?

9. Dan Brown claims in the DaVinci Code that Christians did not worship Christ as God until after 325 AD. How would you respond to that after reading chapter one?

Feel free to comment here or post something at my Facebook page (Bible Study Station). Let me know if there is something in the book you do not understand and I will post an explanation. See you in a couple of days.

Case for Christ

Well, one week from tomorrow on Sunday July 12 I will be starting to teach a six week series during an 8:00am Sunday School class at my new church Thompson Station Church. I am very excited to teach this class again in a new location.

I would like to set this up so you can follow along long distance if you would like. If you send me an e-mail at roger.lightner@yahoo.com I will place you in a distribution list to receive an outline for each lesson. I will also be recording the lessons and making mp3 audio files of the discussion. I can then e-mail you a link to download the mp3 file. On the outline you will have homework/daily devotional readings with questions to respond to and then they will be discussed the following week in class. You can get as involved as you want. You could just listen to the discussion to get a general overview or you could listen, read the book, do the devotions and participate in discussions here on the blog to really delve into the study. It's up to you how much time you want to spend. One last thing is that I have created a Facebook page to use as a discussion tool where you can post comments or ask questions during the week. Do a friend search for "Bible Study Station" on Facebook and send me a friend request to see what people are saying about the book. I look forward to having you join in. God Bless and look for the first lesson next week July 12.

Day 31 Devotion – Birth of Ishmael

Then He said to Abram: “Know certainly that your descendants will be strangers in a land that is not theirs, and will serve them, and they will afflict them four hundred years. And also the nation whom they serve I will judge; afterward they shall come out with great possessions. Now as for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace; you shall be buried at a good old age. But in the fourth generation they shall return here, Genesis 15:13-16

Picture: The Islamic prophet Muhammad.

This is one of the first prophesies in the Bible. God promises Abraham many descendants even though at this point Abraham is married to a barren wife. The land that is not theirs that they will serve in is Egypt. He is told they will spend approximately 400 years in Egypt. Then he is told they will come out with great possessions. This happens following the plague of the firstborn. Lastly, we see that it will be the fourth generation that they come out. The genealogy of Exodus chapter six will show us these four generations.


And the Angel of the LORD said to her: “Behold, you are with child, And you shall bear a son. You shall call his name Ishmael, Because the LORD has heard your affliction. He shall be a wild man; His hand shall be against every man, And every man’s hand against him. And he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren.” Genesis 16:11-12


Abraham and Sarai got a little impatient waiting on a child of their own. It was customary among Mesopotamian peoples for a barren woman to have another woman serve as a surrogate. Sarai gets her maidservant to bear a child for Abraham and he is named Ishmael. This is important because the Arab peoples and therefore Islamic peoples of the Middle East trace their lineage back to Abraham through Ishmael. Hagar is told by an angel that Ishmael will give rise to a great nation that will fight with the world and the world against him. This is a perfect description of the Islamic movement. Muhammad started a campaign of taking the world by the sword and forcing the infidels to convert or be killed.

Day 30 Devotion – Lot’s Rescue

Now when Abram heard that his brother was taken captive, he armed his three hundred and eighteen trained servants who were born in his own house, and went in pursuit as far as Dan. He divided his forces against them by night, and he and his servants attacked them and pursued them as far as Hobah, which is north of Damascus. So he brought back all the goods, and also brought back his brother Lot and his goods, as well as the women and the people. Genesis 14:14-16

Picture: This map shows that Damascus is far northeast of the Sea of Galilee so Abraham pursued these forces quite a ways. Probably around 300 miles round trip.

Have you ever pictured Abraham as just an old man living in a tent with his wife Sarai by themselves? This is not the way the ancient people lived. Wealthy people had servants and the poor were the servants. A person’s wealth was determined by how many livestock and possessions and servants a man had. We see that Abraham traveled with a large group. Lot is captured by these invading kings and Abraham is able to muster up an army of 318 fighting men. If you add on men not able to fight and women and children, Abraham possibly had close to 1000 servants. This made him a very powerful man. Back in these days, an army of just a few hundred people was large because most people lived in city states. Abraham with a couple of allies is able to defeat these four kings and get people and possessions back including Lot. Damascus is far north of Israel so Abraham pursued them a few hundred miles round trip. Most people glance over this story as insignificant but it really tells us that Abraham was powerful and we can see later why the Canaanites feared him and tried to be allies with him because they viewed him as a serious threat.


Then Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine; he was the priest of God Most High… And he gave him a tithe of all. Genesis 14:18,20b

Melchizedek was king of Salem, this is Jerusalem (Jeru-Salem). He is mysterious but was a true priest of God even though Jerusalem was not yet a Jewish city. Abraham gives him a ten percent tithe and many scholars think this was Christ.

Break from the Heat

Well, we had a busy weekend. Friday I went with a friend to see the new Transformer movie and got home about 1:30am. I really liked the first one but the second one had too much stupid little humor in it. I will say the special effects of the decepticons tearing down the Great Pyramid was pretty cool.


Saturday Trish was on her way home from Florida and they hit stop and go traffic. I drove down to meet her in Decatur, AL and they were so late I had to kill about 2.5 hours. Luckily, they have a wildlife refuge that I drove around on to take up my time. We got home about 9pm and Trish and Jedi were asleep in about 5 minutes.


Sunday morning I drove a golf cart shuttle at church. Our class covers this on the 4th Sunday of the month. It was hot and humid but I had fun and got to meet some new people. We are probably going to join the church this coming Sunday because I will actually start teaching the Sunday after that. I am going to teach the "Case for Christ" book to one of the 8:00am classes.


Monday was not as hot as it has been. The humidity was way down and it only got into the mid 80s. I took Trish to some of the places I checked out while she was in Florida. We started at Winstead Hill. This is a great little park with monuments to the Civil War Battle of Franklin. They have a great walking trail that is about 1 mile long through a forest and meadow that we walked. I then drove by the Carter House and Carnton Plantation that I toured to show Trish where they are. We made our way out to the Factory. This is an old stove works factory that has been converted to a shopping mall. As I suspected, Trish really liked it and Jedi said he wanted to live there. The pictures here are of Jedi on a giant rocker at the Factory and sitting on the bench with manachin. I told Jedi the second picture is of "two dummies sitting on a bench".



We left the Factory and went to eat at PF Changs. This is one of the few Chinese restaurants Trish will eat at but I had never tried it. Sorry, but I was not impressed. I like the buffets where you can choose a variety. Their rice was too dry and hard as well. I'll have to go back to Ming Court in Dickson, I really liked it. We made a quick stop at Wal-Mart in Franklin and then went home to rest a few hours. About 6:00pm we headed to Henry Horton State Park and had a picnic supper by the Duck river and then played frisbee golf. Jedidiah loved playing frisbee and we had a hard time getting him to leave even though it was getting dark. Of course being the wonderful, well disciplined parents we are that have raised the perfectly behaved child we bribed him with ice cream and cookies to get him in the car and stop crying:) Hope your weekend was as eventful as ours. Today was start of week 5 of summer school, almost half way done already.

Day 29 Devotion – Five Cities of the Plain

And the king of Sodom, the king of Gomorrah, the king of Admah, the king of Zeboiim, and the king of Bela (that is, Zoar) went out and joined together in battle in the Valley of Siddim against Chedorlaomer king of Elam, Tidal king of nations, Amraphel king of Shinar, and Arioch king of Ellasar—four kings against five. Now the Valley of Siddim was full of asphalt pits; and the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah fled; some fell there, and the remainder fled to the mountains. Then they took all the goods of Sodom and Gomorrah, and all their provisions, and went their way. They also took Lot, Abram’s brother’s son who dwelt in Sodom, and his goods, and departed. Genesis 14:8-12

Picture: The map shows the five cities that archaeologists have uncovered on the southeast side of the Dead Sea. They are identified with the red dots.

In this story we are told that four kings from the east in Mesopotamia come west and attack the five cities in the plains on the southeastern side of the Dead Sea. At one time, scholars thought that Amraphel king of Shinar was the famous Hammurabi who wrote the famous Babylonian law code. More modern archaeological finds have shown this was not him and actually this is too early. Hammurabi is more of a contemporary with Moses. Scholars also doubted the truth of this story because they felt there was no way that there were five cities in this region. The southeast side of the Dead Sea is harsh country. The climate is extremely dry with hardly any fresh water for drinking. The area is salty and would not be good for growing crops. There was petroleum here and asphalt actually floated on top of the Dead Sea here. Geology confirms the existence of the asphalt pits that the Bible refers to here. When Alexander the Great came through here they took him to show him the flammable liquid that came out of the ground. He used it as a weapon to throw flaming balls at his enemy and it became known as Greek Fire. Archaeology has also confirmed that precisely five cities existed here exactly as the Bible says. Even today, nomads live in this area. These skeptics ignored modern evidence and came up with their conclusion without reason. As our story continues we will see that two of these five cities are Sodom and Gomorrah and that two archaeological digs match up with them quite nicely.

Yuppie Nerd

Well, the nerd is at it again. This morning I drove into Franklin for some more Civil War history. On the way I stopped at a park I have been noticing that is built like a little rest area. The other day I learned that it actually was a Civil War historical site. Winstead Hill is a beautiful little park. It was the vantage point that General Hood used to watch the Battle of Franklin. The Sons and Daughters of Confederate Veterans has erected some very nice markers here that reminded me of Gettysburg. There is also a walking trail here but it was too hot so I'll have to go back for that.



The next stop was the Carnton Plantation. This home is very close to the Carter House where the Battle of Franklin took place. Soldiers were brought in and rooms in the house were used as operating rooms. There are still blood stains on the hard wood floors. The house is amazing with colorful wall paper and Victorian furniture. Andrew Jackson was friends with the McGavock family that lived here and frequented often. The McGavoks gathered up almost 1500 dead confederate soldiers and burried them on the property. This is the largest privately owned Confederate Cemetery.

It was lunch time after the tour so I went to scout out the Factory on the north side of Franklin. This is an old stove works factory that has been converted into a shopping mall. This was such a cool idea. As you walk in it feels like you are going into an old dirty factory but as you enter it has lots of small shops and eateries. I had a chicken wrap and and iced mocha. I felt like a real yuppie. On the inside they maintained the old stained windows and some of the cracked ones. The hand rails are iron beams so it really has a factory feel to it. I know Trish will like this place.

After luch it was real hot and muggy out so I stopped and bought some new clothes at Wal-Mart in Franklin. I baddly needed some shorts for summer. Then I had an incling for a scenic drive so I checked out Henry Horton State Park about 20 miles east of Spring Hill. I can't wait to go back in cooler weather. They have great picnic areas on the Duck river with swimming and canoeing. They have a swimming pool besides the river and a disk golf course. They also have camping, cabins and a lodge.

Well, that was my day so far. Now for a quick nap and supper. Tonight I'm going to the new Transformer movie with three other yuppie nerds:)