Daniel P Warner

The Apostle Paul is brought to life through the eyes of his friend and physician Luke. Also brought to life is the Pharisee Saul, the same man, but the persecutor of Christians before his conversion on the road to Damascus.

I loved the story of Paul’s childhood and ascension to power in Jerusalem, before his miraculous conversion, as told through Paul’s memoirs (fictional). This story-line described how Paul’s devotion to the law, ever conflicting with his desire to know God on a personal level, fashioned the man who would so vigorously hunt down members of The Way.

All of this is tied together by the thrilling life and death quest of a modern day historian to acquire and protect those memoirs against the greedy ambitions of the dangerous Tombaroli, all while trying to protect his fiance who he begrudgingly allows to become involved in this dangerous game.

Jerry B. Jenkins takes one obscure, unexplained line from scripture, and creates an entire novel with his interpretation of what Paul might have been talking about. He creates an entirely plausible and engaging novel makes you wonder if those manuscripts might actually exist somewhere, waiting to be uncovered.

When I finished this book, I felt it was one of the best novels I’d read in a long time. I felt I knew both Luke and Paul more deeply than ever before. I wanted more. And Jenkins delivered more, in Empire’s End, which I will also be reviewing.