And now he closes chapter 3 on the same issue. It's as though a complex solar space device made to transmit distant interstellar sound waves got hijacked and put in some cheap radio station to transmit raunchy rock music all day. It's not what we were made for. Boasting is prostitution of the human soul. And that is the way it has gone ever since.
Pride destroys relationships. . . .
And he surrounds this command with reasons why such boasting should stop. He gives one kind of reasons before the command, in verses 18-20. And he gives another kind of reasons after the command in verses 20b-23. When you begin to grasp these two kinds of reasons for not boasting and then ask how they relate to each other, you start to see how deep and up to date Paul's psychological wisdom is. So let's look at them one at a time and then see how they relate to each other.