It is a common belief that Paul's letters are not stories but rather theological ideas and practical advice. Ben Witherington III thinks otherwise. He is convinced that all of Paul's ideas, arguments, practical advice, and social arrangements are ultimately grounded in stories, some found in the Hebrew Scriptures and some found in the oral tradition.

Are Paul's letters undergirded and informed by key narratives, and does a heightened awareness of those narratives help us to gain a richer and more rounded understanding of Paul's theology? The last two decades of the twentieth century witnessed an increasing interest in the narrative features of Paul's thought. A variety of studies since that period have advanced "story" as an integral and generative ingredient in Paul's theological formulations. In this book, a team of leading Pauline scholars assesses the strengths and weaknesses of a narrative approach, looking in detail at its application to particular Pauline texts.

Ben Witherington III examines the various profiles of the historical Paul that have been newly discovered, revealing how a reacquaintance with the classical Roman world has filled in even more details of Paul's life and work.

In the second volume of his two-volume comprehensive overview of the theological and ethical thought world of the New Testament, Ben Witherington III focuses on the collective witness of New Testament writers--the convergences and divergences of their theological and ethical thought.

What relevance does the Apostle Paul have for the mission of the church in the twenty-first century? By investigating his socioeconomic background, examining his doxological orientation in mission, delineating how and why he shared resources in the first century, and then relating all this to what has been called the contemporary International Partnership Movement, this book demonstrates that when the church engages in cross-cultural mission and ignores Pauline orthopraxy, it places unnecessary obstacles in the path of the missio Dei. Therefore, Mission in the Way of Paul: Biblical Mission for the Church in the Twenty-First Century is pertinent for any course devoted to learning from and implementing biblical models of mission today.

God as Father in Paul explores Paul's use of the kinship term "Father" to refer to God, along with related familial terms ("children" of God and Christ-followers as "brothers and sisters"), as part of a study of the use of kinship language in the identity formation of early Christianity. Mengestu argues that these kinship terms are shared modes of identity constructions within the wider textual and cultural settings (the Roman Empire, the Roman Stoic philosophers, the Hebrew Bible, and ancient Jewish literature) from which Paul draws on as well as contests. Employing theoretical (kinship and social identity theory) as well as interpretative approaches (imperial critical and narrative approaches to Paul), he contends that Paul uses God as Father consistently, strategically, and purposefully, in both stable and crisis situations, to develop a narrative, orienting framework(s) that images the community of Christ-followers as a family that belongs to God, who, together with the Lord Jesus Christ, bestows on them equal but diverse membership in the family. The narrative so constructed forms the foundation for referring to Christ-followers as "children of God" and "brothers and sisters" of one another. It constructs boundaries and serves as nexus of transformation and negotiation.

In Biblical Theology, Ben Witherington, III, examines the theology of the Old and New Testaments as a totality. Going beyond an account of carefully crafted Old and New Testament theologies, he demonstrates the ideas that make the Bible a sacred book with a unified theology. Witherington brings a distinctive methodology to this study. Taking a constructive approach, he first examines the foundations of the writers' symbolic universe - what they thought and presupposed about God - and how they revealed those thoughts through the narratives of the Old and New Testaments. He also shows how the historical contexts and intellectual worlds of the Old and New Testaments conditioned their narratives, and, in the process, created a large coherent Biblical world view, one that progressively reveals the character and action of God. Thus, the Yahweh of the Old Testament, the Son in the Gospels, and the Father, Son, and Spirit in the New Testament writings are viewed as persons who are part of the singular divine identity. Witherington's progressive revelation approach allows each part of the canon to be read in its original context and with its original meaning.