Paul was highly educated, and God used that education to reach out with the Gospel. Our cultural upbringing and personal experiences can help us to reach people with the understanding we have of their circumstances. To speak their language we have to know it.
Furthermore, the Scriptures are themselves designed to teach, to educate. To ignore that is to fall into error or to at least become vulnerable to it.
Paul considered his education as rubbish. Paul was poor and he was dressed in rags. He thirsted for the redemption of his body of death. He died daily. He was out of his mind somtimes, he had a messenger of Satan torment him, and was he scorned and rejected by the rich and the intellectual in the church.
Philippians 3:8 Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ
1 Corinthians 4:10 We are fools for Christ, but you are so wise in Christ! We are weak, but you are strong! You are honored, we are dishonored! 11 To this very hour we go hungry and thirsty, we are in rags, we are brutally treated, we are homeless.
James 3:13 Who is wise and understanding among you? Let him show by good conduct that his works are done in the meekness of wisdom.
1 Corinthians 3:18 Let no one deceive himself. If anyone among you seems to be wise in this age, let him become a fool that he may become wise.
Jerimiah 9:23 Thus says the Lord:
“Let not the wise
man glory in his wisdom,
Let not the mighty
man glory in his might,
Nor let the rich
man glory in his riches;
24 But let him who glories glory in this,
That he understands and knows Me,
That I
am the Lord, exercising lovingkindness, judgment, and righteousness in the earth.
For in these I delight,” says the Lord.
25 “Behold, the days are coming,” says the Lord, “that I will punish all
who are circumcised with the uncircumcised— 26 Egypt, Judah, Edom, the people of Ammon, Moab, and all
who are in the farthest corners, who dwell in the wilderness. For all
these nations
are uncircumcised, and all the house of Israel
are uncircumcised in the heart.”
1 Corinthians 1:17 Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel, not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of no effect.
Christ the Power and Wisdom of God
18 For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. 19 For it is written:
“I will destroy the wisdom of the wise,
And bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent.”
20 Where
is the wise? Where
is the scribe? Where
is the disputer of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? 21 For since, in the wisdom of God, the world through wisdom did not know God, it pleased God through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe.
22 For Jews request a sign, and Greeks seek after wisdom; 23 but we preach Christ crucified, to the Jews a stumbling block and to the Greeks foolishness, 24 but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. 25 Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.
Glory Only in the Lord
26 For you see your calling, brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble,
are called. 27 But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty; 28 and the base things of the world and the things which are despised God has chosen, and the things which are not, to bring to nothing the things that are, 29 that no flesh should glory in His presence. 30 But of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God—and righteousness and sanctification and redemption— 31 that, as it is written, “He who glories, let him glory in the Lord.”
