Tré Goins-Phillips | Faithwire.com | May 12 2020

Christian recording artist Lecrae, once an atheist, is crediting beloved apologist and speaker Ravi Zacharias with giving him the tools to navigate “hard questions.”

In a Facebook post published Monday night, the rapper asked, “What in the world ties a black kid from hip hop culture to a scholar from Delhi, India?”

Lecrae revealed he would often finish his concerts and head back to his tour bus, where he’d spend hours poring over Zacharias’ videos and lectures. 

“As a former atheist and skeptic, now believer, I wanted my peers in the culture who didn’t believe to have answers to hard questions,” Lecrae wrote. “‘Why is there evil in the world?’ ‘Where is God in the midst of suffering and injustice?’ I would digest his lectures in front of prestigious universities and craft the insight into my own language.”

“Because of Ravi Zacharias, I had answers to hard questions,” he continued. “Who would’ve thought a tour bus full of young rappin’ city kids would go in between watching hip hop awards shows to theological debates and lectures? I just want to give this man his roses while he’s still here. I know God is likely taking him home soon, but I’m glad he was here during my lifetime.”

Lecrae’s post about Zacharias follows news that the well-known itinerant speaker had been sent home with a dire prognosis after surgeons discovered a rare form of cancer in his spine — sarcoma — during a procedure in March to repair his back.

Zacharias’ daughter, Sarah Davis, who serves as CEO of Ravi Zacharias International Ministries, shared the update about her father this week.

“We have just learned that, while the tumor in my dad’s sacrum has been responding to the chemotherapy, the area where the cancer metastasized has actually worsened,” she wrote in a statement. “His oncologist informed us that this cancer is very rare in its aggression and that no options for further treatment remain. Medically speaking, they have done all they are able.”

Zacharias, 73, and his family are returning to his hometown of Atlanta after undergoing cancer treatments in Houston.

“After many weeks of separation, our family is anxious to spend time together,” Davis said.