Therefore, if I do
not know the meaning
of the language, I
shall be a foreigner
to him who speaks,
and he who speaks
will be a foreigner
to me.
Even so you, since
you are zealous
for spiritual gifts, let
it be for the
edification of the church that
you seek to excel.
Therefore let him who speaks
in a tongue to pray
that he may interpret.
1 Corinthians 14: 11 -- 13
Once again, the Greek word,
glossalia, carries the meaning of a language if this was not so then how would
a foreigner understand when another person is speaking? Once again, Paul is speaking about their
zealousness to have spiritual gifts and especially their zeal was toward the
ability to speak in some form of "tongues" and had forgotten that the
gifts were there for the edification of the church. It is to have the gift to have the ability to edify the church so that
by this they were to seek to emulate, or excel.
Furthermore, Paul once again says that that person who was speaking in a
tongue must have the ability to interpret what he is saying. Now comes the problem, a person may be able
to say one thing or another as though what he is saying is the truth, that he
has some sort of private revelation from God: yet, there is no way to prove
what that person says he has heard from God.
Therefore, a person who speaks in tongues must know what he is
saying. Furthermore, another person must hear and understand what the other person is saying. This is not some form of
unknown gibberish. Paul has already
made mention that love must be the guiding principle and everything we say and
do and this love is God's love that is principled, God's principles. Anything else is another type of gospel but
it is not the true gospel. Remember
Paul recommended Christian love or charity above all spiritual gifts. Furthermore, he has directed by means of a
command, using the imperative in Greek, that one was to follow after charity,
to have an earnest concern to obtain this excellent disposition of mind. No matter whatever pains or prayers that it
may cost a person. While they made this
their main or chief pursuit, and this pursuit did not absolve them or take them away from
desiring other spiritual gifts. If by
means of spiritual gifts one is to edify the church, then this being their main
goal. Whatever communicated must be in
the language of the person to whom they are speaking because what cannot be
understood can never edify. Every
endowment, every gift, is valuable to its usefulness whether it be in public
ordinances whereby they are conducted according to truth for they must tend to
the edification, exhortation, and consolation of believers and even do the
conversion of sinners. Paul could not
edify, if what he spoke was not understood.
Remember Paul went into those lands where there are many dialects, for
even the country of Galatia was a mixture of the Gallic people and other Greek
people and had several dialects and for them to understand the gospel one must
speak in their dialect. This a must, what
they understand must be the gospel, is this not true? To speak in an unknown gibberish language, would this
be nothing more than into the "air?"
If those hearers who are barbarians, meaning foreigners, and hear that
which they cannot understand then what is being spoken has no meaning, has no
sense, only causes a person to become confounded, and they are left without
instruction, therefore, a gibberish form of speaking is utterly vain and
unprofitable: "For if I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays, but my
understanding is unfruitful. What is
the conclusion then? I will pray with
the spirit, and I will also pray with the understanding, I will sing with the
spirit, and I will also sing with the understanding. Otherwise, if you bless with the spirit, how will he who occupies
a place of the uninformed say "Amen" at your giving of thanks, since
he does not understand what you say?
For you indeed give thanks well, but the other is not edify" (1
Corinthians 14: 14 -- 17). Why all
this contention and controversy over this gift that God used especially in the
early Church to spread the gospel before the coming of the complete thing which
is the Bible? I am afraid, that over
the years and especially since the 1960s there has been a culture change whereby
people want everything for themselves, they want to be titillated, they want to
experience some euphoric feeling, and they call this Christianity. This it is not! Oh! You may spend time
teaching Vacation Bible School, or teaching Sunday School, or even do other
things around the church, and all these things are good, but, even the
non-Christian does good things. If your
doctrine is not the doctrine of the Bible then all your good is only for
another reason than for the edification of the Church of God and that church is
all the people whom He chose as one of His children. Surely every true follower of Jesus Christ would rather desire to
do good to others, rather to obtain some name for their eloquence or learning. The desire to do good, is a good thing, but
a better thing is to speak the truth, and to live the truth, and to edify the
Church of God. This edification begins
with a husband teaching his wife and children, reading the Bible together,
praying together, going to church together, sitting in the church pew together,
showing by their example not only to their family, but exercising their faith,
thereby others seek true faith in action in the edified.
In that day you
shall not be
Shamed for any of your deeds;
in which you
transgress against Me;
for then I will take away from your
midst
those who rejoice
in your pride, and you shall no longer be haughty
in My holy mountain.
Zephaniah 3: 11
Trust in the LORD
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