signs of the holy ghost

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majin

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I have three questions that have been troubling me for a while


1. is speaking in tongues really a sign of the holy spirit or are the scriptures in acts and corinthians only valid for those times?

2. i know there is two types of speaking in tongues the first being praying to god and the second being prophesising in tongues followed by a spirit led interpretation. Is this interpretation of mine correct

3. As well as this I was wondering if it is justifiable when a whole congregation speaks in tongues (1ST TYPE)( praying to god)

Thankyou inadvance for any input




:D Faith is one of the notches on the key to eternity:D
 
majin said:
I have three questions that have been troubling me for a while


1. is speaking in tongues really a sign of the holy spirit or are the scriptures in acts and corinthians only valid for those times?
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Hello Majin,
It seems to me it is only valid today for those who believe as such and have received the witness. To those who don't believe it is not valid.

2. i know there is two types of speaking in tongues the first being praying to god and the second being prophesising in tongues followed by a spirit led interpretation. Is this interpretation of mine correct
Click to expand...

That is what the Bible indicates.

3. As well as this I was wondering if it is justifiable when a whole congregation speaks in tongues (1ST TYPE)( praying to god)

Thankyou inadvance for any input
Click to expand...

You must know from your reading concerning #2 that Paul wasn't too fond of everybody speaking in tongues when unbelievers were present unless it was interpreted which would not include the 1 st type you mention.

Peace,
JM
 
JosephM said:
Hello Majin,
It seems to me it is only valid today for those who believe as such and have received the witness. To those who don't believe it is not valid.



That is what the Bible indicates.



You must know from your reading concerning #2 that Paul wasn't too fond of everybody speaking in tongues when unbelievers were present unless it was interpreted which would not include the 1 st type you mention.

Peace,
JM
Click to expand...

When the Holy Spirit first settled on the Apostles and emboldened them to speak to the crowds for the glory of Jesus, did they not speak as themselves, yet each member of the crowd heard their message in that individual's own language, even though two men of different tongues stood sided by side listening to the same message from the mouth of the same Apostle?

Indeed, this appears to be the exact case:

Acts 2 "1 When the Day of Pentecost had fully come, they were all with one accord[a] in one place. 2 And suddenly there came a sound from heaven, as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting. 3 Then there appeared to them divided tongues, as of fire, and one sat upon each of them. 4 And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.
The Crowd’s Response


5 And there were dwelling in Jerusalem Jews, devout men, from every nation under heaven. 6 And when this sound occurred, the multitude came together, and were confused, because everyone heard them speak in his own language. 7 Then they were all amazed and marveled, saying to one another, “Look, are not all these who speak Galileans? 8 And how is it that we hear, each in our own language in which we were born? 9 Parthians and Medes and Elamites, those dwelling in Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, 10 Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya adjoining Cyrene, visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, 11 Cretans and Arabs—we hear them speaking in our own tongues the wonderful works of God.” 12 So they were all amazed and perplexed, saying to one another, “Whatever could this mean?”
13 Others mocking said, “They are full of new wine.”"
 
majin said:
1. is speaking in tongues really a sign of the holy spirit or are the scriptures in acts and corinthians only valid for those times?
Click to expand...

It depends who you ask!:D Any opinion would likely be biased by denominational backgrounds.
You need to make your own mind regarding this.
Speaking in tongues in my experience won't make you an inch more or less spiritual than other christians. It's not like a magic wand that will give you a spiritual edge, as some would like to claim, just remember Paul regarding the gifts and the body of christ.

majin said:
2. i know there is two types of speaking in tongues the first being praying to god and the second being prophesising in tongues followed by a spirit led interpretation. Is this interpretation of mine correct
Click to expand...

As far as I know yes.

majin said:
3. As well as this I was wondering if it is justifiable when a whole congregation speaks in tongues (1ST TYPE)( praying to god)
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If you take Paul's advice on this then imo no, it is not acceptable.
Based on my church experience, some particular groups love to showoff, not just to the outside world but among themselves, it is like an authenticity seal of their spirituality (just remembering my very own first church).



It would be interesting to discuss what are the explanations of speaking in tongues, both from those who believe and from the skeptics.
Any takers?:)
 
Caimanson said:
It depends who you ask!:D Any opinion would likely be biased by denominational backgrounds.
You need to make your own mind regarding this.
Speaking in tongues in my experience won't make you an inch more or less spiritual than other christians. It's not like a magic wand that will give you a spiritual edge, as some would like to claim, just remember Paul regarding the gifts and the body of christ.



As far as I know yes.



If you take Paul's advice on this then imo no, it is not acceptable.
Based on my church experience, some particular groups love to showoff, not just to the outside world but among themselves, it is like an authenticity seal of their spirituality (just remembering my very own first church).



It would be interesting to discuss what are the explanations of speaking in tongues, both from those who believe and from the skeptics.
Any takers?:)
Click to expand...

Considering I know a bit about languages, and have heard the so called speaking in tongues, on more than one occasion, well let's just say I'm not entirely convinced it is anything but wishful thinking. For one thing, languages have an order, rhythm and syntax that can be identified easily, whether the language is understood or not. Most of what I heard was repetetive gibberish.
 
it was a given ability at that time for those to establish that god was with them and to speak to many peoples in their language the words that god gave them, so that the establishment of world-wide churches for the spreading of the gospel could take place through the power of god.
 
From the Catholic perspective:

There's an interesting aspect highlighted in the ideas of eros and agape from the Greek Fathers.

Generally, the oracles of the Ancient World were 'speaking in tongues', not from the standpoint of a different language, but rather that they had been 'taken over', 'possessed' or in some other means become the instrument of another voice.

The same tendency was visible in the table-rapping craze of spiritism that swept Europe and the US a century or so ago.

Catholicism viewed this as 'erotic' in the sense that the person loses all self-awareness and control - they are in some kind of rapture - and sexual energy was often implicit in religious activities as a means of engaging with the gods (the whole 'sacred sex' thing, temple prostitution, orgiastic festivities, etc.) The same can also be witnessed in some modern evangelical churches with invoke a kind of frenzy in their congregation - the whole thing was parodied beautifully in the Life of Brian when the blind man "I can see!" fell into a hole, and the lame "I can walk!" fell over.

The Fathers favoured the 'agapic' sense in which the person never loses consciousness, that is they are aware of themselves all the time, and the word then appears to them as inspiration, insight or intuition, rather than some rapturous moment after which the speaker recovers with little or no memory of what was said.

The Gospels, for example, and the Epistles, were written under an agapic cover, even though St Paul alludes to a moment "whether in the body or not, I cannot say" when the boundaries become blurred.

The Apostles speaking in tongues were not enraptured, nor were they unintelligible, but rather they were speaking in a language which each and every person could understand as talking directly and personally to them (ie 'in their own language') - it is believed now that both Jesus and his apostles would have had Greek and Latin as well as Aramaic, the former two beling the common language of the empire - it's not too much to accept that their audience, drawn from across the empire, would similarly be multi-lingual. Such was not uncommon in the ancient world.

In Christian terms St Paul was rightly suspicious, as a method wide open to abuse. The Montanist Sect was a man who set up his daughters as prophets.

Then again, some of the OT Prophets record their visions in such a way that we might say they were 'erotic' or rapturous encounters, whilst others, such as Moses when he spoke with God on Sinai, were in line with the agapic - he was fully conscious throughout.

Again, what is the message? Catholicism holds that since Jesus was the Word of God Incarnate, there will be no more general or public revelation - what more could be said(?). The apparitions of the Blessed Virgin, for example, never add anything more to the deposit of faith, the Fides Qua, nor are Catholics obliged to believe in them.

Private revelation is another matter, but then that is personal and should not be treated as something for public consumption, should not be sought as a sign, and is not something you can turn on and off according to your service times.

The history of the mystics of the Church show both tendencies. The Orthodox East, for example, is vary wary of the human and 'erotic' tendencies they see, from Augustine through to St Theresa, as an 'unhealthy symptom' of the latin Church ... then we have Eckhart, Merton and others, whilst regarded as mystics, never claim to have seen or heard anything ...

It's a really interesting area of inquiry, spiritually, psychologically and theologically.

Thomas
 
majin said:
I have three questions that have been troubling me for a while


1. is speaking in tongues really a sign of the holy spirit or are the scriptures in acts and corinthians only valid for those times?

2. i know there is two types of speaking in tongues the first being praying to god and the second being prophesising in tongues followed by a spirit led interpretation. Is this interpretation of mine correct

3. As well as this I was wondering if it is justifiable when a whole congregation speaks in tongues (1ST TYPE)( praying to god)

Thankyou inadvance for any input




:D Faith is one of the notches on the key to eternity:D
Click to expand...
speaking in tongues served a purpose at the time , it was to spread the goodnews to other places, we dont need to do it now because the goodnews is being preached in all the inhabited earth . and it was not just babble it was understandable to those who spoke that language it served a purpose at that time .
And this good news of the kingdom will be preached in all the inhabited earth for a witness to all the nations; and then the end will come. matthew 24;14
 
Ah, mostly cessasionists so far... Wise words Joseph, if you believe then yes, if you don't then no!

Anyway, I find that the bible can be ambiguous regarding the pentecostal signs and wonders, there is enough material to support both sides of the argument really.

In my christian early days, we where encouraged to pray in tongues (to God) as frequently as possible, the belief was that tongues bypassed the conscious and came directly from the spirit, therefore it had a clear edge because prayers where not contaminated or distorted by our own "stuff" and the content was beyond our conscious knowledge or awareness.
Sooner than later, I felt that deliberately praying in tongues was mechanic and impersonal (I doubted that the spirit was involved), it just didn't feel purposeful or meaningful (to me at least), and praying out loud in public started to disgust me.
If I felt that the spirit spontaneously prompted me to pray in tongues that was different, but it wasn't a daily occurrence anyway.

In my long journey of skepticism I began to realise that it is possible that the manifestation of the spirit could be in actual fact the manifestation of my inner self. Bearing in mind that I'm a sort of bankrupt christian at the moment, I can still do tongues if I want to.
In recent years when I've been deeply touched in my heart/soul, I've naturally groaned in tongues and has been very meaningful for me, as a part of the catharsis.

I think is a psychological phenomena where one is allowed to verbalise the unspeakable from deep inside, it is not about a concrete meaning but the expression of deep emotions. Just like one may choose to express itself in dance, music or painting without any coherence or structure, so I think my early mentors weren't that far off target.

I just found this stuff in Wiki, which is line with my view:
In 2006, at the University of Pennsylvania, researchers, under the direction of Andrew Newberg, MD, completed the world’s first brain-scan study of a group of Pentecostal Practitioners while they were speaking in tongues. The study found that while participants were exercising glossolalia, activity in the language centers of the brain actually decreased, while activity in the emotional centers of brain increased.
New York Times wrote about the study today, and it has been published in Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging, Volume 148, Issue 1, 22 November 2006, Pages 67-71


Interesting:)
 
Re: Speaking in Tongues

Yes, in Kenya a few years ago. I was at a young people's morning prayer meeting. Very quickly people started "speaking in tongues". I put it in inverted commas because I'm skeptical, of glossolalia in general, but certainly of what happened that morning. People began crying, laughing, shouting, rocking back and forth, wailing. Obviously my skepticism of this kind of thing played a part but I felt it was genuinely un-nerving.

In the strong East-African revival movement, a great importance is placed on speaking in tongues. Certainly there are some who feel a pressure to perform. Talking with an Kenyan Anglican pastor, I was told a story of a woman in his congregation who felt bad because she had never done it. She decided she would pretend using a few words of a foreign language. She only knew a couple of words though, "sit down", so during prayers on Sunday morning she stood up and shouted, "Sit down, sit down Jesus, sit down."
 
Speaking in tongues IN BORAT

When Borat goes to the Pentecostal church. Is that what really happens at Pentecostal church gatherings?
 
Re: Speaking in Tongues

BlaznFattyz said:
before even diving into scriptures, common sense should tell you that something is wrong in that scenario.
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Indeed, but I wonder whether there isn't a pressure to perform in all churches where "speaking in tongues" is a regular event.
 
Quahom1 said:
Considering I know a bit about languages, and have heard the so called speaking in tongues, on more than one occasion, well let's just say I'm not entirely convinced it is anything but wishful thinking. For one thing, languages have an order, rhythm and syntax that can be identified easily, whether the language is understood or not. Most of what I heard was repetetive gibberish.
Click to expand...
Reminds me of another Kenyan story. Same pastor and his wife. They were telling me about people they had heard speaking in tongues, that it sounded like they were repeatedly and quickly saying, "she came riding on a honda"
 
I believe that tongues are gift the Spirit still gives... I believe its only a personal gift for your own edification..I think that groaning in the Spirit is pretty much the same thing.. you dont know what to pray for so you let the Spirit pray for you. I do not believe that tongues should be spoken w/o an interpreter in public and Ive yet to meet someone with the gift to interpret tongues.
 
Re: Speaking in tongues IN BORAT

What is Borat? Some pentecostal churches are hard core and some are more conservative... Some pentecostals believe that being saved and speaking in tongues is synonymous.. that to be truly saved you have to have tongues. they do it openly and theres always someone that interprets and they say "so speak the lord" its all very unbiblical and its called a charismatic church. You even get more hardcore when they use snakes. a more conservative pentecostal church just strongly believe in the gifts of the Spirit.. all of them.. and that they be used to serve the body of Christ. My belief system is somewhere in between pentecostal (conservative) and fundamentlism (big surprise) but I dont hold to "religion" so I dont label myself with a denomination.. I just follow Christ.

denominations are labels and all they do is put walls up dividing the body of Christ. Its a shame really.. what would happen if we took all the walls down.. the denominations.. the social classes.. the genders.. the age groups...
 
is speaking in tongues really a sign of the holy spirit or are the scriptures in acts and corinthians only valid for those times?

The 'speaking in tongues' in Acts refers to the miracle of the Apostles speaking to people in their own language:

"... the multitude came together, and were confounded in mind, because that every man heard them speak in his own tongue. And they were all amazed, and wondered, saying: Behold, are not all these that speak Galilean? And how have we heard, every man our own tongue wherein we were born? Parthians and Medes and Elamites and inhabitants of Mesopotamia, Judea, and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya about Cyrene, and strangers of Rome, Jews also, and proselytes, Cretes, and Arabians: we have heard them speak in our own tongues the wonderful works of God."
Acts 2:6-11

In Corinthians Paul is referring, somewhat dubiously, to the ecstatic utterances of those supposedly infused with the Holy Spirit. It's something he'd rather say 'no' to, but it would seem that might raise too much argument, so he settles for the fact that such phenomena is for 'personal edification' only – it is not prophecy, nor instruction.

i know there is two types of speaking in tongues the first being praying to god
Not necessarily. If one is in an ecstatic trance, one is not consciously praying... therefore there is a question of what precisely are you doing?

and the second being prophesising in tongues followed by a spirit led interpretation. Is this interpretation of mine correct
Again, there is no record of Scripture in 'prophecying in tongues' – the prophets spoke in plain language.

As well as this I was wondering if it is justifiable when a whole congregation speaks in tongues
Again, this is questionable.

The distinction lies in the area of whether the person or persons has actually 'lost control' ... whether they are so overwhelmed by the experience that they lose their sense of self - in which case it's 'valid' and 'authentic' as a response – but it's an unfortunate by-product of a profound experience (a bit like hysterics at a rock concert) and someone more spiritually developed would not react or respond in the same way; or whether the Holy Spirit is inducing such a state ... the question is then why? It does nothing for the spirit, nothing for the individual, and nothing for an audience ... so why?

Ecstacies - whether self induced or otherwise - are a common feature of all religious experience, and St Paul was dealing with people introducing 'alien' habits into their spiritual practice. I don't think its part of Jewish liturgical practice, nor is it Christian, but it is a means of expression in some cultures and so has to be viewed against cultural practice ....

... but in short I would say its that. It's a human response to the Spirit, not a Spirit induced reaction in the human, and it should be questioned, psychologically (the easiest person to convince is ourselves).

The state of ecstatic prayer is, from every source I've read, quiet and self-contained, there's no element of exhibitionism, just intense concentration...

As for the East African revival movement, active in Kenya and elsewhere, is back by American Fundamentalist Christians and is the cause of a great deal of social unrest and ill-health. There was a TV News item about it in the UK. It's all part of the End-Time thing, which certain Fundamentalists want to 'bring on' as fast as they can ... so the message is don't bother sending your kids to school, or working your farm, as the world's about to end anyway ... it shows a marked lack of irresponsibility, if not disrespect.

And Scripture states that if a man won't work for his supper, then don't feed him – so they're not even Scriptural.

+++

As a closing thought, I've heard that if you listen to the speeches of Adolf Hitler, then often he would slide into near incomprehensible shouting, but by that time his audience is so hyped up they were not listening anyway ... certainly not a sign of the Spirit at work.

Thomas
 
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