A Review of Persuasive Preaching

R. Larry Overstreet in his work Persuasive Preaching he makes the argument that in the end all preaching is to be persuasive. I would argue that he makes his point very well in this book, while the biggest draw back has to be that it is written more like a text book than a conversation.  This book is not a short read it is over 250 pages that includes all of its appendixes. This is a good book, structured in a manner that makes sense to the reader. There are many good points to the book but one area that I have an issue with is his chapter on invitation. He tries to make an argument from Scripture that there were invitations given after certain sermons. I still do not see where that comes into play even with what he was using as supporting evidence.  One section I did appreciate was the area on the Holy Spirit in preaching. He points out several things that the preacher must do, we mustn’t quench the Spirit and we shouldn’t neglect prayer.

            This book is a good book overall, with some very hard portions to read. It is not a book that I would recommend to the casual reader on preaching. I would however, recommend this work to seminary students and the seasoned pastor who is looking for a way to re-invigorate their preaching.  If you are looking for a good introductory work on preaching check out Expository Preaching by David Helm. It is a good little book that could be read in a few short sittings. So in closing this book gets a thumbs up if you are looking for this type of work, but if you are just looking for a casual read on preaching check out my other recommendation.