Preaching Like Paul by James W. Thompson. (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2001) Paper, 177 pages. ISBN 0-664-22294-3

Paul's letters form the content of much Christian preaching, but can the ancient apostle himself provide a useful model for preachers in a postmodern era? In Preaching Like Paul, James Thompson makes that case.

Thompson, who is professor of New Testament and associate dean of the Graduate School of Theology at Abilene Christian University, begins his books with a useful review of and reflection on the impact of the "new homiletic" on the current generation of preachers. He offers a timely critique of the weaknesses of the new homiletic and its thoroughgoing dependence on narrative homiletical forms.

In one of his key observations, Thompson points out that "Inductive preaching functions best in a Christian culture in which listeners are well informed of the Christian heritage." He notes Fred Craddock's observation (in Overhearing the Gospel) that "induction helps people appropriate the message that is already known." But that is precisely what we do not find in today's church. Today, "people have little knowledge of biblical content." That poses challenges which the "new hermeneutic" may be ill-equipped to meet.

Indeed, Thompson observes that the new homiletic has avoided Paul because his texts don't fit "the postmodern fascination with story. Paul speaks as one with an authority that makes both preacher and congregation uncomfortable."

Thompson believes that "preaching in a post-Christian culture has much to learn from the preaching of a pre-Christian culture." Thus, his call to contemporary preachers to look to Pauline literature (and to Paul's model) as the "missing dimension" in contemporary preaching.

The next section of the book offers a lengthy and insightful study of the nature of Paul's preaching. Thompson points out that Acts and the Pauline letters offer two different portraits of this first great missionary preacher. In Acts, he is an itinerant evangelist "whose preaching results in conversions wherever he travels. In the epistles Paul nurtures churches, speaking only to the congregations that were formed as a result of his evangelistic preaching." While many observers have pointed to the epistles as the primary evidence of Paul's preaching -- and thus, his supposed irrelevance as a model for contemporary pulpits -- Thompson argues effectively that we must use the entire New Testament record to paint an accurate portrait.

He notes: "his pastoral and discursive preaching actually participates in a larger narrative. The epistles are, in fact, the continuation of a conversation. This larger story involves Paul's own story, the story of his listeners, and the story that Paul has communicated to his congregation. Paul's discursive preaching is not the only dimension to his communication, but it is the necessary sequel to his earlier evangelistic preaching. If we probe beneath the surface of the epistles, we discover a preaching ministry that involves a progression from evangelistic and narrative preaching to discursive reasoning."