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Question: Is tongues only used as a sign gift?

Answer: Speaking in tongues is one of the nine supernatural gifts of the Holy Spirit as listed in 1 Corinthians 12:7-11.

Speaking in tongues is the supernatural ability to speak in a language we have never learned.

What is the purpose? If we were to read only from 1 Corinthians 14:22, we would understand that tongues are a miraculous sign to the unbeliever as they see and hear this manifestation.

However, we learn in 1 Corinthians 14:1-5 that the gift of tongues, along with the gift of interpretation of tongues is another method God uses to speak to His church.

Let's look at yet another benefit of tongues. This is the ability to speak in tongues to communicate with God in our daily prayer life. And this is, in my opinion, not necessarily the gift of tongues, but rather the evidence of tongues that comes to a believer when he is baptized with the Holy Spirit, as noted in Acts 2:1-4; Acts 10:44-48; Acts 19:1-6.

This evidence of being baptized in the Holy Spirit is a power house in the life of the Spirit-filled Christians who use it.

Consider the words of Paul in 1 Corinthians 14:13-19. If Paul would rather speak five words with his understanding, than ten thousand words in an unknown tongue in the church, where did he do all of his speaking in tongues?

To me the answer is obvious. Paul spoke in tongues, or prayed in tongues in his private prayer life. In other words, he was praying in the Spirit even as Jude commanded in Jude 1:20. This reference supports what Paul said in 1 Corinthians 14:4.

Some think it carnal to want to edify, or build up ones self, but how can we give out something we do not have? Could this be why Paul was such a dynamic person? I believe it is at least partly so.

It is a wonderful blessing to be able to commune with our Heavenly Father in a heavenly language each and every day.


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North Central Ohio, U.S.A.

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