As will rapidly become apparent, your note full of questions has been forwarded to me; it's a rather extended note, and I don't think I'll answer it all in one shot--apart from the time it would take and the size of the resulting letter, I don't know that it would be much use to you to get so much back at once (or as effective for me to try to write so much on so many topics so late at night). But we'll get started.
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"Well, I am procrastinating, and I need a good reason to not work. You are it. Here are some mindless brain ramblings. asfask asred9i l;jh[oif asdfg jlijfdtgge et asdggiuj[;; ewwetishgd okjigdk I have been speaking in tongues, if you were real religious like me you would have understood it. Isn't it strange to think that God has so much time to waste that he can just make up special languages for special people that no one else can understand."
Tongues is a hot issue with a difficult history. I'm going to try to thumbnail just a few points. Let's start by observing that the Roman Catholic Church was the bastion of orthodoxy in the west for most of a millennium. During that time, it developed a layer of teaching and practice built around the idea that most of its adherents were uneducated and untrained in the basics of thinking. Unfortunately, much of what is the gospel got lost in that layer--it was not seen as reasonable to try to explain to these people that God would forgive anything, but that they shouldn't want to do all of these things which were at some level wrong. It was easier just to tell them that God didn't want them to do these things, and if they did they would have to talk to someone educated in the ways of God who would assure that they received forgiveness and in the process try to help these peasants understand the tiniest fragments of what their faith was.
In the process, the study and understanding of scripture fell by the wayside. It became the unchallenged opinion of the educated that the uneducated could not understand the subtleties of religion, and should not attempt to do so. Closely related to this was the notion that church experience should be structured and uniform, and always controlled by those with the understanding to prevent heresy from slipping into the faith. (I would observe that this was not entirely a bad idea, given the complications of some of the heresies that had faced the church in the first five centuries of its existence, some of which still appear today in variations.)
Because of that desire for uniformity and structure, spontaneous and emotional religious expressions were disapproved; yet they did continue to appear from place to place. The church father Tertullian fell into disfavor himself when he became affiliated with a "schism" which included tongues and prophecy in their meetings. (A "schism" is distinct from a "heresy", in that the latter denies critical doctrines of the faith, such as salvation by grace, the deity of Christ, the humanity of Jesus, or other similarly significant points, while the former adheres to all the critical points but has additional doctrines or practices not found in the church general.)
With Martin Luther, the Protestant movement truly took hold. Although Huss and others had preceded him, nothing impacted on the faith so much as Luther's "sola scriptura"--that the bible was the only measure of truth, regardless of what our predecessors said about it. To many, Luther was rejecting centuries of traditional interpretation which the church had regarded as equal to the text on which they were based, although his position was less ambitious--he should be considered more as saying that although all of that was valuable and instructive, we should weigh it in the light of our own understanding of scripture, and not judge the meaning of scripture by it.
I would have to say that in many ways the Baptists and related fundamentalists became the ultimate expression of this focus on the scripture alone--as the Baptist charismatic Rev. Charles Simpson once said, when you say Independent Baptist, you've just said Independent twice. Rank and file Baptists tend to be extremely well taught in the Bible as compared with other Protestants, and more careful in the way they handle the text. There is also a certain amount of emotional expression within the church (a good thing) which is missing in many of the older denominations. Thus it was not unreasonable for Baptists to believe what all of their predecessors believed, that they were the ultimate expression of God's intent for the church.
Pentecostalism popped up in the late nineteenth century. This was the re-emergence of that undercurrent of supernatural phenomena which had been repressed by the organized denominations all along. Largely because of the growing concept of freedom of religion in America, it began to take hold as a denomination in its own right, and to spread as such through the 19th century missionary movement to the rest of the world. But Pentecostals tended to be less well educated, drawn from poorer segments of the population (no doubt in part because the poor are less concerned about the "image" of belonging to an emotional church). Few of their pastors were seminary trained; most learned what they knew at the evangelistic tent meetings conducted by their elders. For them, the supernatural expressions reported in the New Testament and experienced in their meetings were normative, and they preached this.
It has been said that every new move of God is persecuted by the last one. The Baptists were particularly offended by the Pentecostals--these people suggested that there was something inadequate about the salvation they had, the message they had preached for generations. Indeed, among Pentecostals, there often were incorrect statements about the importance of various aspects of their tradition. I've often observed that even today Pentecostals expect their preachers to move into a style of vocal delivery which overemphasizes final consonants and has a very metered and tonal quality. This is considered proof that the Spirit has truly inspired the preacher. However, consideration of the matter will show that the early Pentecostal preachers spoke to large gatherings in tent meetings without the aid of amplification, and so developed this style so as to be clearly heard and understood by the crowds--and their younger pupils associated the style with the message, and incorrectly concluded that the style was part of the evidence of the direction of God in the sermon. I'm sure that it's a natural thing to those who do it--they intrinsically shift into this mode when they are moved while they preach without realizing that it is just something they learned to do.
Anyway, a significant tension developed between the Baptists and the Pentecostals. From the Baptist perspective, the Pentecostals were shoddy in their exegesis (they frequently were) and emotional in their faith (sometimes that was the pot calling the kettle black); and the Pentecostals couldn't be right or the Baptists were wrong and had missed something that God meant for them to have for all this time. To the Pentecostals, the Baptists were being unreasonable, making accusations of demonic involvement and denying the reality of an experiential aspect of the Pentecostals' faith which could not always be easily explained or argued (argument was not the Pentecostal's strong suit, but the Baptist's) but was no less real.
What of tongues? Both Pentecostals and Baptists have made too much of them. It must be said that they seem to be present everywhere in the New Testament. If you'll follow the Book of Acts, you'll see that it reports a series of events in which groups of people "receive the Holy Spirit". In every case, it is immediately apparent to the Christians present that that has happened. In quite a few of those cases, we are told that it was obvious because the individuals began speaking in tongues; in the rest, we are not told why it was obvious--and it seems more reasonable to assume that the evidence was the same and so not worth mentioning than to assume that it was different but not important. Paul mentions tongues, suggesting that they are common throughout the churches he founded, and used by him--but he places little emphasis on them, and never suggests that they are important in their selves, even though he says he uses them more than anyone else.
However, there is a misunderstanding inherent in the matter. If we look at the day of Pentecost, the presence of tongues was a major factor in attracting the attention of the crowd and persuading many of the reality of the gospel. But one tends to think that the disciples went out preaching to them in many languages; the text does not actually support that position. It seems more likely that each was praying in languages unknown to themselves. Some of the onlookers thought them drunk, babbling nonsense. If you were in an international gathering and saw someone speaking to someone else who was listening, but you didn't understand the words, would you think it nonsense? Probably you'd have thought they were speaking a common language. No, it seems that each was praising God in languages which were sometimes recognized by bystanders who happened to speak that language, and other times written off as gibberish by others. Now let me suggest that that is the normal function of tongues: it is not normally intended as a tool for preaching to others, but a tool for expressing something within which may be beyond your comprehension intellectually, but can be expressed as praise from your spirit if you get your mind out of the way.
I don't want to minimize anything God gives; but that seems to be the essence of why He gives tongues. It seems to have no other intended use, although there are cases (such as the second chapter of Acts) in which it has had the effect of catching the attention of persons who speak the language.
"It doesn't matter that God is all inclusive and all encompassing and if he said something to us we would all understand it no matter what language you speak."
I'm not sure that's true. It's often asked whether God can make a round square; this is supposed to be proof that He can't really do everything. But the problem illustrates the matter of definitions. We've decided what is a square, and what is a circle, and the definitions are mutually exclusive. To our minds, a thing cannot be both a square and a circle, because our perception of reality is limited by the definitions. In fact, He can make a round square--and so can I. It's called a cylinder. However, you should remember that at Babel God divided the world by confusing the language. It became impossible for all men to understand each other; God has ruled that there should be no language understood by all. I believe that God is limited by His own rules. Once He decided that we could not all understand the same language, even He could not break that rule--he would have to speak to each of us in a language we could comprehend. And all the more so his human servants.
But, as I've already said, the point of tongues isn't for us to talk to each other, but for us to talk to Him.
"Why would God want to say something to only special people instead of all of us. Doesn't it seem reasonable then that if you are speaking a special language - maybe it isn't God talking through you as much as it is you filling the desire to be special and separate from everyone else. what better way to say 'hey - I'm better than you' then to say 'God speaks a special language to me and not you'."
Setting aside the fact that that's backwards (God isn't speaking to me in a special language; He's allowing me to speak to Him in it--I may have no idea what I'm saying, and someone else in the room just might), your argument cuts all ways--basically because nothing about the church is about one being better than another. What better way to prove yourself better than to know more? or to be a pastor or deacon? or to have a beautiful voice and sing solos in the choir? God gives many gifts, but He doesn't give them to us so that we can say we are better. There are people throughout the church who believe they are better because of their gifts--but I need not go into an extended discussion here. Instead, I'll cut my answer here by observing that my teaching on Philemon addresses this point quite adequately--and that you can find it on the web. Take a look at that, and I'll continue with your questions, probably tomorrow. I do need to get some rest tonight.
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