Lee Strobel has a law degree from Yale University and worked as an investigative reporter for one of America's largest newspapers, the Chicago Tribune. He was an atheist. After his wife became a Christian in 1979, he was upset at her decision and determined to prove that the Bible is not true and that Jesus Christ is not the Son of God. As an atheist he decided to take his legal training and see if there is any credibility to Christianity or any other world religion. He launched a two year investigation of the evidence. One thing that became very true and that is this, if you want to determine if Christianity is true and therefore every other contrary faith system in the world false, all you have to answer is the one question, "Did Jesus rise from the dead?" Here is some of the evidence that he found. It can be summed up with four E's.
1) Execution: There is no dispute in history that Jesus was executed. It is indisputable. In history we have early accounts that Jesus rose from the dead. We have preserved for us a creed of the earliest church based on facts that they knew that were true. The creed says, "That Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures that he was buried and that he was raised from the dead on the third day and appeared to Peter and then to the twelve." After that the creed says that Jesus appeared to more than 500 people. Now this creed contains the essence of Christianity. The apostle Paul wrote down this creed in 54 - 55 A.D in 1 Corinthians and the creed had been around for a mumber of years before the apostle Paul came on the scene. In fact according to James D. G. Dunn one of the most eminent scholars in the field says this, "This creed was formulted as tradition within months of the resurrection." This means that if it wasn't true there were so many living people that would be able to dispute it. But that didn't happen. This time is pretty impressive. Especially when you consider that the first two biographies of Alexander the Great were written 400 years after the fact and they are considered reliable.
2) Empty: We have an empty tomb. The tomb was sealed and guarded and yet it was discovered empty on that first Easter morning. Here are some facts about this. The first is called the Jerusalem Factor. The site of Jesus tomb was known to Christians and non-Christians alike. If it were not empty it would have been impossible for a movement founded on the idea of the resurrection to explode into existence in the very same city where Jesus had been executed. We also have what has been called the criterion of embarrassment which says that if the writer is saying something that is embarrassing to himself they are probably telling the truth. Who discovered the empty tomb? It was women. We know that in 1st century Judaism the testimony of women were not considered credible witnesses. There was no way they would have reported this if they were merely making it up.
3) Enemy Attestation: Even the opponents of Jesus admitted the tomb was empty. The Jews say the disciples stole the body. But the disciples didn't have the means or the opportunity. Don't forget that it was guarded by Roman soldiers. If a Roman soldier was found asleep on guard they were put to death.
4) Eyewitnesses: Over a period of time Jesus appears alive in a dozen different instances to at least 515 different eye witnesses. There are nine ancient sources inside and outside the New Testament confirming that the risen Christ appeared to them.
All the evidence from history shows that Jesus Christ literally rose from the dead proving Himself to be God. For myself in 1973 at the age nineteen I believed this myself and I have decided to follow him for the rest of my life.