Lee Strobel

Excellent.

How much time did you spend with him?

Oh, a lot of time.

I was on the management team of the church ultimately.

And he led that management team as a senior pastor.

And so I was quite involved with him.

He was instrumental in me coming to faith because my wife started taking me to that church even when I was an atheist.

When I walked into that church on January the 20th of 1980 as an atheist,

And I heard the message of Jesus for the first time that I understood it from Bill Hybels.

And that's what started me on my journey to see if I could disprove it.

And so I owe a lot to Bill.

Well, you know, you mentioned

some leadership things.

He has a leadership gift.

He was a visionary leader, but a practical leader as well.

He was able to take what started out as a bunch of teenagers, a student ministry at a little church in Park Ridge, Illinois, and ultimately build it into the second largest church in America.

It was a church in South Bend, in Hammond, Indiana.

Interesting.

Yeah, Second Baptist Church, I think, in Hammond, Indiana.

Bill stayed.