Paul as a boy was also greatly interested in the building operations of the city, if we are to judge by the number of times that he refers to building and architects. Every time you find the word "edifying," Paul is really saying "building." The following illustration will perhaps suffice at the present time.
["]In the exercise of the grace given me by God, I, like the competent masterbuilder, have laid a foundation, and others are building upon it. But let every one be careful how he builds. For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is already laid, namely, Jesus Christ. And whether the building which anyone erects on that foundation be of gold or silver or costly stones, or of timber or hay or straw, the character of each individual's work shall appear. For the Day will disclose it, because that Day is to reveal itself in fire, and it is the fire which shall test the quality of every one's work. If the work which any one has erected stands the test, he shall be rewarded. And if any one's work is burnt up, he will suffer loss; he will himself be rescued, but only, as it were, by escaping through the fire." I Cor. 3:10–15.
Thus Paul drew his illustrations from the city life about him—the shops, the slaves, the games, the buildings, just as Jesus drew his from the country life familiar to him and his hearers—the flowers, the birds, the trees, the rain, the wind. These things appear so frequently in Paul's letters because he, like Jesus, was addressing in fact the common people of his time, not, as we often seem to believe, a selected intellectual class. Paul gives a clear indication of the sort of audience he was addressing in I Cor. 1:26–27.
"Not many educated, not many influential, not many of noble birth are called, but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise."
To reach such an audience effectively, Paul must be simple and direct. He says (I Cor. 1:17) that he was sent to preach the gospel "not with wisdom of words." In Chap. 2:1, he says, "I came to you, not with superiority of speech or of wisdom, declaring unto you the testimony of God."
With the audience that he had, the theological subtleties of which Paul has been accused would have been simply impossible. And too, we must remember that Paul was so desperately in earnest that he could not have engaged in theologising or philosophising. I am reminded of what John Bunyan said in the preface to "Grace Abounding":
"I could also have stepped into a style much higher than this in which I have here discoursed, and could have adorned all things more than here I have seemed to do, but I dared not. God did not play in tempting of me, neither did I play when I sunk as into a bottomless pit when the pangs of hell got hold upon me. Wherefore, I may not play in relating of this, but be plain and simple and lay down the thing as it was."
That, I contend, is all that Paul did. He tried to express plainly and simply what he had experienced. He says, "We have renounced the hidden things of dishonesty, not dealing in craftiness nor handling the word of God deceitfully, like a petty tradesman, but by clear statement of the truth commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God." (II Cor. 4:2)