Defending God in a world that makes no sense
This story is about a young lady named Laura. What makes her story so captivating is that in many ways it’s your story and my story. It is the story of humanity and its efforts to discover the answer to the most penetrating questions of our lives. Her questions are universal to all people and cultures. The questions raised around this table bring the issues to light and illuminate the path to a happy, successful, productive, and ultimately fulfilling life.
“Jeff Vines marries compelling storytelling with vital substance. You won’t be able to put this book down. If you are asking difficult spiritual questions or you know someone who is, you need this book now.”
– Gene Appel, Senior Pastor of Eastside Christian Church in Fullerton, CA
“Dinner with Skeptics is a ‘feast’ of information for anyone who wants answers, it should not be read unless you really want to discover the answers to life’s most intriguing questions as it has the potential to turn every ‘Doubting Thomas’ into a fully trusting believer. It’s the best book on the market to extinguish doubt and resurrect a skeptics faith.”
– Dudley Rutherford, Senior Pastor of Shepherd of the Hills Church in Porter Ranch, CA
JEFF VINES spent twenty years on the mission field in Zimbabwe and New Zealand, planting churches and training leaders. From 1998-2005 he was the featured speaker on the weekly television broadcast, “Questions of Life,” and frequently debated agnostic and atheist alike on national radio. Then Jeff served as the Teaching Pastor at Savannah Christian Church in Savannah, Georgia, before becoming the Senior Pastor at Christ’s Church of the Valley in San Dimas, California in 2007. Jeff and his wife Robin have two children, Delaney and Sian.
Excerpts “This book is about recovering something that is lost. Something we lost that unless recovered yields perhaps the worst possible ramifications known to the human experience. Such loss inevitably leads to meaninglessness and depression, dejection and hopelessness, despondency and despair. In fact, unless that which is lost is recovered, nothing that is found matters. A life of joy, peace, and prosperity will remain elusive, and any sort of satisfaction will be temporary at best. Indeed, can God make a comeback? Although God has never moved, our accusations against Him have convinced many that He has ridden off into the sunset never to return. Even those who acknowledge his existence expect very little from Him and live pragmatically as atheists. ‘God may exist,’ they say, ‘but His existence makes little difference to my life.’ This book is about a woman who believed that God’s recovery was about as likely as a tornado sweeping through a junkyard and assembling a fully functioning Boeing 747. Harmonizing what we know about this world with the existence of God, in her mind, was just not possible. God was just too far gone. He could not recover. My desire is that through the words on these pages, I can transport you back to the events that led to Laura’s rediscovering or recovering God. Her story has as much tension and intrigue as any novel I have read.” (pp. 10-11)
