This week, I got the tongue question. It usually goes something like this: "Brother Jonathan, what do you believe about speaking in tongues?" Well, I told them and I am going to tell you, but you may not like what I have to say. This is a controversial subject and some of the poeple that I know and love disagree with me about it, but my disagreeing with them doesn't get in the way of me loving them. They have a right to be wrong. I hope that you realize that I have the same right if you disagree with what I have to say. So, here goes...
First of all, the word "tongues" is the same as the word "languages." Speaking in tongues is literally speaking another human language, rather than speaking gibberish that no-one can understand. The best explanation for speaking in tongues is found in Acts 2, when the Holy Spirit came upon the Apostles. When they stood and preached, everyone that was there heard them in their own native language. In fact, several languages were mentioned. No-one heard gibberish what-so-ever. I believe that this passage is saying that they all spoke at the same time and were heard in all these different languages at the same time. This was clearly a miracle of the Holy Spirit to tell the Good News of Jesus Christ. This kind of miracle is only mentioned three more times in the New Testament and all in the book of Acts. It wasn't something that happened often.
There are also very specific gifts concerning speaking and interpreting languages that the Holy Spirit blesses some believers with for the work of ministry (1 Corinthians 12:1-11, especially vs. 10). These are gifts that people are given to make them much more capable to speak and interpret other languages for the point of reaching people who speak those languages with the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I have met people like that and have been amazed at how easy they pick up other languages. This gift of tongues is used by missionaries everyday around the world to tell others about Jesus.
Strangely though, today there are many denominations who believe that speaking in tongues means speaking some unknown language. They think that they have Biblical support for this in 1 Corinthians 14, where in the King James Version it talks about "unknown tongues," saying that it is okay to be spoken in Church as long as there is an "interpreter." The problem is that the word "unknown" was added in by the translators. That's why "unknown" is in italics in the KJV because it is not found in the Greek text. Those translators meant well. They added the word "unknown" because they thought that it would help explain the kind of languages that Paul was talking about, but it gave the impression that these languages were foreign to all of humanity rather than just foreign to that congregation. What Paul is talking about in 1 Corinthians 14 is somebody exercising a Spiritual gift with foreign languages. If that person is speaking in the Church without someone to interpret what they are saying, God is the only One who understands them and it is doing nothing for anyone else there. It would be like someone getting up this Sunday morning and speaking Chinese to our congregation. To us it would be gibberish and without someone to interpret, it would do nothing to help any of us. Even with an interpreter, Paul said that it would better for someone to prophesy, or in other words, proclaim God's Word in a way that can be understood.
I do want to say that most of those people mean well. They honestly think that by doing this stuff, they are going to cause more people to believe because of their "signs and wonders," but God wants people to have more faith in His Word than anything else. I believe that most of this stuff is human-driven and fake, but I am afraid that some of it is spiritually-driven, but not by the Holy Spirit. As Christians, we are told to "test the spirits" to see " whether they are of God" (1 John 4:1, NKJV). That test is based upon our knowledge of what the Holy Spirit came to do. Jesus explained, saying, "...when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth... He will glorify Me..." (John 16:13-14, NKJV). When I have seen people doing this stuff (i.e. being slain in the spirit, speaking in tongues, etc.), they give glory and credit to the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit then becomes the focus of their praise. That's why they call these things "Manifestations of the Spirit," or in other words, occurrences through which the Holy Spirit reveals Himself. But when it is truly the Holy Spirit at work, the focus is always on Jesus. The Holy Spirit does not bring attention to Himself, but to Jesus.
The bottom line is, I don't believe that what most people call speaking in tongues is anything like what we see in Scripture. I also believe that the Devil wants to use anything that he can to distract people from the Good News of Jesus Christ, even under the guise of spirit-filled praise and worship. The Devil has this strategy: If he can't stop the Gospel of Jesus Christ from being proclaimed, he will pollute what is being proclaimed.
If you disagree with me, please don't write me and try to change my mind. It will be a futile effort. As a country singer once said, "That's my story and I'm stickin' to it!" In fact, I believe that my answer is entirely based on God's story, the Holy Bible. God bless you all!
