growth and stability in the centuries that followed. From a strictly human standpoint, however, Paul is a less awesome figure than some adulatory devotees would have him be. In many ways he was a very ordinary man facing ordinary problems that have confronted missionaries ever since. The biblical record of Paul’s life and ministry is well known. Born into a Jewish family in Tarsus, he grew up a strict Pharisee, violently opposed to the latest threat menacing Judaism, namely, the new “cult” of Jesus.