Spiritual Gifts - Part
19
Charles E.
Wigg
In verses fourteen and
fifteen, Paul mentions praying in tongues, and it is to be noted that he advises
against it. However he does say that when doing so the spirit of the person
prays but their understanding is unfruitful, and that it is much better to know
what we are saying, or praying about, than to pray in the spirit.
I recall that we were
once visited by a missionary who was serving the Lord on the Island of Hokkaido,
or the Island that was northernmost of those Islands that together make up the
country of Japan. He made an impassioned plea that we might pray for the
conversion of the in habitants of that Island. Many of us gave our names and
addresses to that missionary, so that he might send us his prayer letter. He
kept sending that prayer-letter, and in it he made the same impassioned plea for
us to pray for the salvation of the people to whom he was ministering. We of
course were happy to do so. Then the prayer-letters became less and less, until
they ceased to arrive. One last letter came, and in it he confessed that for the
past two years he had been praying in tongues! The believers who gathered there
with one accord were made to feel the uselessness of the whole exercise. Once he
was so deeply concerned for the salvation of those people to whom he was
preaching, that he would beg that other believers would join him in prayer for
the salvation of their souls, but now he had lost that evangelical zeal, and was
prepared to apparently waste his time, praying for what he knew not what. I ask
my readers “is it possible that such behaviour could be of the Holy Spirit?” I
personally doubt it! My prayer is that God might save us from such folly. Let us
be like Paul who says in verse fifteen, “I will pray with the spirit, (that is
with true spiritual fervour), but I will pray with the understanding also”. Let
us see to it then that whether singing (to the Lord), or praying to Him, or
blessing Him, we are in control of our faculties, and we know what we are
saying.
There are many
believers who think that so long as my spirit is praying, singing, or audibly
worshipping, then it is OK if I don’t know what it is I am saying. Let me
caution my fellow believers; lest we are deceived by one of the host of
deceiving spirits that seem to be so active today.
It is plain that Paul
even discourages one from publicly participating in worship in any language
other than the language used by the Church with whom we may be gathered. This
goes to show that in saying AMEN, it is no mere formality, but it means that the
whole congregation that is present at such a time agrees with what the brother
is saying. Because Amen means “It is so”, or “let it be so”. However,(as Paul
reasons), if the congregation does not understand what the worshipper is saying,
how can they rightly say AMEN, when a brother gives thanks? Especially so, when
it is possible that the brother praying in a foreign language might be saying
things that I certainly would not say and may even be blaspheming the Person of
Christ, or saying, (under the influence of a deceiving spirit), “curse on
Jesus”.
When Paul says “I
thank God that I speak in tongues more than you all”, he is not speaking of
using the ‘Gift of tongues’ (as is claimed by many today), but rather is
speaking of his using many different languages, in his ministry of preaching the
Gospel. That ministry took him to many lands, from Jerusalem to Syria, and as
far west as to Spain, and as far north as present day Albania, and not once to
we read of him ever making use of a translator or interpreter. In Acts chapter
fourteen for example, when he spoke in the synagogue he would speak in Hebrew,
(a language that was sacred to the Jews), but in the open air he would speak in
the “speech of Lycaonia”. Thus he did speak in a tongue more than all the
Corinthian believers, (in a foreign language). Yet though he had such abilities,
when he was in the Church in Corinth, (or anywhere), he would only utter words
that he understood, he would never use foreign languages , even if he only knew
five words of the language of the place.
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