O.K. plugger
Now that I have your attention I would like to share something with you.
But first the way it was explained to me by a friend and off the top of my head "praying in tongues" is the only gift that edifies you. He called it "angel talk" It lifts you higher in an unknown language that communicates with God. The argument against it is the scripture that says we "moan"? when we don't know what to pray for, off the top of my head.
But the fact remains that it does edify you. (enlighten) It builds you up when you are down. It's a gift. No doubt in my mind.
Now what I found interesting from a book by Zondervan called Fresh Power by Jim Cymbala
(Experiencing The Vast Resources Of The Spirit Of God)
We need continual infillings of the Spirit to meet the strong, ungodly tendencies of the age.
...This group in Jerusalem cried out to the Lord for him to "enable your servants to speak your word with great boldness" (Acts 4:29). In response, "the place where they were meeting was shaken," as in an earthquake. There was no doubt that they had made contact with heaven. The story closes with this sentence: "And they were filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly" (v31).
Now wait a minute! Hadn't they been filled with the Holy Spirit back on the Day of Pentecost? What is this new filling all about?
This proves that we can't live off what God did in our lives last week, last month, or last year. We need continual infillings of the Spirit to meet the strong, ungodly tendencies of the age. There must be deeper enduements of power to meet deeper challenges. The greater the onslaught and the more evil the tactics that Satan comes up with, the more God's Spirit must be entreated to come and prepare us for battle. This is why D.L.Moody (see the prologue) called his convocation in 1880 for people to come and seek God for the fresh infilling of the Spirit's power that was so evidently needed.
Now check this out plugger
John Wesley, founder of the Methodist movement, preached a whole sermon in 1744 on Acts 4:31---to an audience at his alma mater, Oxford University, no less. It was a ringing call to let the Holy Spirit have his way. He barraged his listeners with of volley of hard-hitting questions about their spiritual lassitude, rising near the end to this climax:
How few of you spend, from one week to another, a single hour in private prayer! How few have any thought of God in the general tenor of your conversation! Who of you is, in any degree, acquainted with the work of his Spirit, his supernatural work in the souls of men? Can you bear, unless now and then, in a church, any talk of the Holy Ghost? Would you not take it for granted, if one began such a conversation, that it was either hypocrisy or enthusiasm? In the name of the Lord God Almighty, I ask, What religion are you of?
That is a very interesting question for us here at the beginning of the twenty-first century. What religion are we of? I believe there is a growing number of Christians across the land who are hungry for the religion of the Bible, the Christianity of the New Testament in all its spiritual splendor. They are not satisfied by the contemporary American church culture nor by the fruit it is producing. While the evil tide of the world, the flesh, and the devil is rising to flood stage, the Lord is raising up a godly standard against it---men and women whose hearts cry out with the psalmist:
O God, you are my God,
earnestly I seek you;
my soul thirsts for you,
my body longs for you,
in a dry and weary land
where there is no water.
I have seen you in the sanctuary
and beheld your power and your glory.
Because your love is better than life,
my lips will glorify you.
I will praise you as long as I live,
and your name I will lift up my hands.
My soul will be satisfied as with the richest of foods;
with singing lips my mouth will praise you ( Psalm 63:1-5)
So IMHO tongues is talking and praying and praising God in an unknown language that edifies yourself.
fwiw I'm not reading anything into the Wesley comment but it sure made me wonder if he spoke in tongues.
Which I would think not. But I liked the comment of "the Christianity of the New Testament in all it spiritual splendor." Yeah!
AI
