The Reason for Reasoning
Acts 17:2
And Paul, as his manner was, went in unto them, and three sabbath days reasoned with them out of the Scriptures
When Paul would visit a town, he would visit and speak at the local Synagogue. In the Greek and Roman world of Asia Minor and Europe, there would typically be Hellenized Jews in the larger cosmopolitan areas. Thus, a synagogue would be in town somewhere. The lack of a Synagogue in your town, if you happened to be Jewish, probably meant that you lived in the backwater.
Paul was an intellectually-gifted and educated man. By his very personhood, he demonstrated the value of being intelligent and educated and informed. He reasoned with others on a very high level about Christ but he did not do so with a spirit of haughtiness or superiority (in a prideful posture).
I fear that many evangelicals extol ignorance of issues and knowledge in an attempt to demonstrate our humility and simple faith in Christ. Surprisingly, we cite Paul's words of knowledge "puffs up" to legitimize our ignorance of the larger world of study. It is more than ironic, it borders on the moronic, that we use Paul's words to justify our intellectual laxity...he the most educated of all the apostles and truly one of the great intellects of all time...in the order of Einstein, Newton, Jefferson, and Aristotle.
And Paul, as his manner was, went in unto them, and three sabbath days reasoned with them out of the Scriptures
When Paul would visit a town, he would visit and speak at the local Synagogue. In the Greek and Roman world of Asia Minor and Europe, there would typically be Hellenized Jews in the larger cosmopolitan areas. Thus, a synagogue would be in town somewhere. The lack of a Synagogue in your town, if you happened to be Jewish, probably meant that you lived in the backwater.
Paul was an intellectually-gifted and educated man. By his very personhood, he demonstrated the value of being intelligent and educated and informed. He reasoned with others on a very high level about Christ but he did not do so with a spirit of haughtiness or superiority (in a prideful posture).
I fear that many evangelicals extol ignorance of issues and knowledge in an attempt to demonstrate our humility and simple faith in Christ. Surprisingly, we cite Paul's words of knowledge "puffs up" to legitimize our ignorance of the larger world of study. It is more than ironic, it borders on the moronic, that we use Paul's words to justify our intellectual laxity...he the most educated of all the apostles and truly one of the great intellects of all time...in the order of Einstein, Newton, Jefferson, and Aristotle.
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