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What Must I Do To Be Saved?

  

FROM: 6/30/02 Radio Program

Question:

What does the Bible say about speaking in unknown tongues?

Answer:

The New Testament talks about those who spoke in unknown tongues. For instance, in Acts 2, when the Holy Spirit fell on the apostles, they "began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance" (Acts 2:4). But what was this "tongue"? Continuing in reading Acts 2, we find it was a language (Acts 2:6). The apostles were speaking in the languages of those Jews who had gathered in Jerusalem on that day (Acts 2:5). These people said they heard those "Galileans" speak in "our own tongue, wherein we were born" (Acts 2:7-8). The Bible said when they heard this, they were hearing the apostles speak "in his own language" (Acts 2:6). Acts 2:9-11 records some of the nationalities gathered that day in Jerusalem, and all of them admitted they heard the apostles speak "in our tongues the wonderful works of God." Acts 10:46, as well as Acts 19:5-6 record others who spoke in tongues.

Paul discussed the gifts of the Holy Spirit in I Corinthians 12-14, and especially noted the gift of tongue-speaking in chapter 14. There, he emphasized the importance of the people understanding the speaker, and saying that he would rather speak five words "with my understanding" than "ten thousand words in an unknown tongue" (I Cor. 14:19). This chapter stresses the need for an interpreter, and that if there were no interpreter, that tongue-speaker was to "keep silence" (v. 28). Does this sound like modern-day "tongue-speakers" who many times will babble on, and no one ever understand what they say?

Therefore, the "tongues" these people were speaking were languages. (ex: Egyptian, Greek, Latin, Swahili, French, German, Spanish, etc.) The power of God was seen when those people who had not learned, nor studied these languages, spoke them fluently in order to teach unbelievers the truth (I Cor. 14:22). This began in Acts 2, when those who were "Galileans" spoke foreign languages perfectly. Yet, this spiritual gift, like the other eight mentioned in I Corinthians 12, have ceased today (I Cor. 13:8-10).

Some have suggested that the apostles spoke in their native tongue (language), but the people "heard" their own tongue (language). This is not true. Please note, this tongue-speaking was not a miracle on the "ears" of the people, but on the voices of those speaking!

The sense in which the tongues were "unknown" is in the sense that this language was unstudied or unlearned by the speaker in conventional ways. It was not "unknown" from the standpoint that it was some "heavenly" language as some would suggest.

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