Clough Acts Lesson 5

Special: The Doctrine of Tongues

We are halting in our verse by verse approach to do a special on tongues. This is a doctrinal topic that has occurred at this point in the flow of the text and so in order to deal with it I have decided to stop, pause and work on this topic. So far we’ve seen in the book of Acts, in Acts 2 Peter citing the Joel passage. Peter, when he cites the Joel passage cites it with an IF or introductory formula that clearly shows he intends to take the principle of the Joel passage and not indicating that it is fulfilled on the day of Pentecost. This is why when Peter cites Joel and it speaks of the sun not giving its light and the moon turning to darkness it is not at all teaching that those events happened and are to be allegorically interpreted to make it fit Pentecost, but that in fact Joel’s prophecy yet stands to be fulfilled. Peter says this is the kind of thing, the kind of principle, of grace before judgment.

We, as Christians, of course are familiar with Christ’s words on those cross. One of those sayings of Christ on the cross is a saying you’ve all heard many, many times, but I think very few of you have ever thought through what it’s really saying. When Christ on the cross said, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do,” it was in the context of His crucifixion. Now what was the sin that Christ asked that it would be forgiven the people. Let’s turn that saying around; if Jesus had not said from the cross, “Father, forgive them,” would the nation have undergone judgment? The saying, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do,” goes back to this point of the cross before Jesus Christ rose from the dead and ascended to heaven. When He prayed that the Father answered that petition. He did not hold the cross of Christ against the nation Israel but in fact gave Israel forty additional years of testing. It is that that has not yet become clear to Peter in Acts 2, as history unfolds it’s going to become increasing obvious that God answered Jesus’ prayer in that way of giving forty years. But at the time that Peter quotes Joel it is not yet certain that there’s going to be forty years before judgment. And so what he says in Joel is that a phenomena has taken place on the day of Pentecost prepatory to God’s judgment upon the nation. And when that happens, said Peter, then all will be lost, and only those saved will be there who have called upon the name of the Lord; that’s what Peter… and that’s why Peter quotes from Joel.

We also said last time from Isaiah 28:11-12 that tongues was forecast in the Old Testament. Today we come to the doctrine of speaking in tongues. And this is a thing that has obviously plagued the Church, it’s going on today and we’re going to attempt to cover all the major areas of this in the hour we have together. So we’ll have to go quite quickly in order to cover all the passages of Scripture that are involved. That’s the only way I know of preparing ourselves for what’s coming in Acts 2 so let’s get it all out of the way first.

The first thing about tongues is its history. The history of tongues: what about the history of tongues. You want to discipline that when you consider a question that you always go back in church history and get perspective on it. Things don’t happen all at once; things happen over many, many centuries of time. So let’s look at the history of this so-called speaking in tongues. The history generally of the Church can be summarized this way: that in the 1900 years of church history God has majored on precisely those things that the Scripture majors on and minors on those things that the Scripture minors on. Tongues is a minor thing in Scripture and tongues is a minor thing in church history. It has never been in the forefront of the Christian church except in various breakaway movements. Said Professor [can’t understand name] of Colgate University after studying this position extensively; he says (quote): “There is not one well-attested case of speaking in tongues in the church fathers.” (end quote). Some of the fathers that report that they heard about someone speaking in tongues, second, third and fourth hand, but no father speaks directly to the issue. Some, like Origen, appear to speak directly to the issue, Origen speaks of the tongues problem in his day but when you read Origen’s writings carefully you understand that what he calls tongues is what someone else would call ecstatics or prophecy. He doesn’t use it like the other church fathers. Chrysostom, one of the great church fathers said, (quote): “Speaking in languages stopped altogether,” (end quote). And notice he doesn’t say speaking in gibberish, he says speaking in languages stopped altogether.

Tongues played no major part in the Protestant Reformation; the only place that it played a major part was in the 1900s with a movement in England, the Irvingites and this was an ecstatic group that met together, it attained notoriety because of the quality of people it attracted. One of the observers to the Irvingite movement was a very famous Bible scholar and British astronomer, Sir Robert Anderson. Sir Robert surveyed the Irvingite movement in the 1830s and reported and wrote a little pamphlet on it called Spirit Manifestations and the Gift of Tongues. And as he worked with this he describes the phenomenon, he interviewed various people connected with the Irvingite movement and here are some things from eyewitnesses that occurred, we cite this that you may understand some of the characteristics of the modern day phenomenon called tongues: I at once bowed to as the utterance of the Spirit of God. Those who have heard the powerful and commanding utterance need no description; but those who have not, may not conceive what an unnatural and unaccustomed tone of voice, and intense and riveting power of expression - with the declaration of a cutting rebuke to all who are present, and applicable to my own state of mind in particular - would affect upon me.” In the midst of the feeling of awe and reverence which this produced, I was myself seized upon,” watch that language, “seized upon by the power; and in much struggling against it was made to cry out.” He describes later on how when engaged alone in private prayer “the power would come upon me and cause me to pray with strong crying and tears for the sake of the Church.”

Now notice two things about this eyewitness report; it seems to be orthodox, he’s praying for the state of the Church, how lofty, how worthy of prayer, and yet at the same time there’s this strange compulsive nature about it. When we read in 1 Corinthians 14 that the spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets, indicating that in the New Testament times it was a voluntary phenomenon. He continues some of these eyewitness testimonies. “I was made to speak - at the same time shrinking from utterance, and yet rejoicing in it. … This prayer, short almost as I have now penned it, was forced from me by the constraint of the power which acted upon me; and the utterance was so loud that I put my handkerchief to my mouth to stop the sound, that I might not alarm the house.” Reading further, “The things I was made to utter flashed in upon my mind without forethought, without expectation, and without any plan or arrangement; all was the work of the moment, and I was as the passive instrument of the power which used me.” He says, “To those who have been used to watch over the workings of their own minds, and who have never been visited with any power beyond the mere vagaries of excitement, it may seem inexplicable how persons can be brought to surrender their own judgment,” now notice this, “surrender their own judgment and act upon an impulse, or under a power working in them, without daring” without daring “to question that power.

“It seemed to me It seemed to me to bear witness to Christ, and to work the fruits of the Spirit of God. The conclusion was inevitable, that it was the Spirit of God; and if so the deduction was immediate, that it ought in all things to be obeyed.” He goes on and he concludes with this very interesting point, very interesting point! He says, “Awful, therefore, is the mistake, if a seducing spirit is entertained as the Holy Spirit of Jehovah. The more devoted the Christian seduced, the more implicit the obedience to the seducing spirit.” I’ll read you that again because it’s a key in the whole thing: “The more devoted the Christian seduced, the more implicit the obedience to the seducing spirit.”

“I have been much confounded by the fact occurring in this instance, as also in most others of the public testimonies on preaching; that Christ was preached in such power, and with such clearness, and the exhortations to repentance so energetic and arousing, that it is hard to believe the person delivering it could be under the delusion of Satan. Yet so it was, and the fact stands before us as a proof the most fearful errors may be propounded under the guise of greater light and zeal for God’s truth. ‘As an angel of light’ is an array of truth, as well as holiness and love, which nevertheless Satan is permitted to put on, to accomplish and sustain his delusions.”

And Sir Anderson concludes with his comment on the whole thing: “Its physical phenomena are well fitted to excite distrust. To attribute to mere hysteria the bodily paroxysms which are common in the prayer meetings, is perhaps to take too kindly a view of them. The Holy Spirit,

moreover, does not promote hysteria.” And then he winds up with the statement, “If spiritual excitement be not controlled by sound doctrine even prayer meetings may become a peril.”

That’s the comment on the Irvingite movement; that’s where tongues began, really, in the western world in the 19^th century in Great Britain. In the USA tongues is traced back to a phenomenon that occurred January 1, 1901 in Topeka, Kansas with a man by the name of Charles Fox Parham. Charles Fox Parham was a preacher in the holiness tradition, Arminian theology; Parham had come to Topeka, preaching a gospel of divine healing, this is usual of that particular group, and then got into teaching various students what the signs were of the supposed baptism of the Holy Spirit. Needless to say on January 1, 1901 in the middle of a prayer meeting it was a young woman who first spoke in tongues, then all of them were doing it. And Charles Fox Parham, leader, strated the Azusa Street or started the influence on the Azusa Street Mission in L.A. from which modern Pentecostal arose.

Now since that beginning, at the beginning of the 19^th century with Charles Fox Parham, has come what we call now the neo-charismatic movement. The neo-charismatic movement differs from the mainline old fashioned Pentecostal movement in that it’s spilling over into every denomination. And you have people from different denominations getting together in the name of unity about this common experience. You have Protestants and you have Catholics who appear to be unified, who appear to have healed the breech made by Martin Luther and John Calvin over matters of truth and doctrine of Scripture but now in the name of experience we regain the lost unity. Says one of the great Catholic scholars who has studied the phenomena from the Catholic side of the fence, Edward O’Conner of Notre Dame, (quote): “Catholics who have accepted Pentecostal spirituality have found it fully in harmony with their traditional faith and life. Moreover,” and here’s the significant thing because you remember that Father O’Conner is a very skilled theologian, and watch his observation; few have the perspicacity of this man, O’Conner, in looking into the movement and watching what’s really happening. “Moreover,” says Father O’Conner, “the doctrine that is developing in the Pentecostal churches today seems to be going through stages very similar to those which occurred in the early Middle Ages when classical doctrine was taking shape.”

Now classical doctrine, what is classical doctrine as far as Father O’Conner is concerned? Classical doctrine is his term for Roman Catholic medieval theology centering on the man’s name of Aquinas. Thomas Aquinas was known because he synthesized two contradictory systems. He took the writings of the Greek philosopher Aristotle and took the stories of the Bible and put them together into systematic theology called Summa Theologica, which is a famous great book that you can read, get out of the library and look at. It’s very interesting and a lot of good things in it, but what the Protestants objected to about Aquinas was that it was like oil and water. He had taken Greek presuppositions that man’s autonomous reason is sufficient to come to God and he’d taken the Bible’s presupposition that man’s autonomous reason is fallen and depraved and not capable of coming to know God apart from God’s grace and His revelation and the Word of God, and he brought these two together into the Christian system.

Now if Father’s O’Conner’s observation is correct and we indeed see the rise of classical doctrine of the Middle Ages now in Pentecostal circles what he is admitted is that we see a synthesis; a synthesis of human viewpoint and divine viewpoint; this time the human viewpoint is not the human viewpoint of the Greek philosopher Aristotle; this time the human viewpoint is the human viewpoint of the modern existentialist, where there’s no such thing as absolutes, everything is relative and it depends on a crisis moment in the present. O’Conner, I believe, is exactly correct; he’s exactly correct and we have here a synthesis that’s extremely danger.

So in conclusion to the first point, the history of tongues throughout the Christian church commends nothing to the Christian seeker after truth. It has been obscurest, it has been a cultic type thing and has never been in the mainstream of church history. And for that reason it doesn’t have anything to commend itself.

Now we come to the second point, the character of tongues. We’ve worked with the history a little bit, now the character. What are tongues like? Some of you have heard speaking in tongues, some of you haven’t, so for those of you who haven’t we’re going to play a 30 second tape so you can hear what tongues sounds like: [plays tape] You’ll notice that during this tongues situation there was a confession that sounded very orthodox, there was a praise of Jesus is the center, Jesus is the center. I didn’t want to get into all the gory details but it turned out later that particular woman was possessed of a spirit whose name was Jesus, and Jesus was the center, he was the very center of her soul but not the Lord Jesus Christ of Scripture. So that is what is passing today for tongues, what you just heard, a kind of gibberish, not a known language at all but just kind of this queer phenomenon that seizes people and can take whole groups into its grip.

But let’s go back and look at the character of tongues in Scripture. We know from Acts 2 that tongues, far from that gibberish you just heard, basically was known human languages. That much we know from Acts 2. Luke strains the Greek language to communicate that fact to us, that tongues were known human languages. But, say some people, turn to 1 Corinthians 13; some say that in Corinth it was different, in Corinth there was something different than in the book of Acts. In Corinth it was a unknown tongue; in Corinth it required an interpreter and so therefore that’s proof that it was unknown. And moreover, say these same people, that these verses prove it was a heavenly language, and thus justification is made for sounds like you just heard a few moments ago, gibberish. That’s not gibberish, they say, it’s heavenly language. In 1 Corinthians 13:1, this is one of the verses that is used to substantiate this interpretation: “Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not love, I am become as sounding bronze, or a tinkling cymbal.” So they say see, it’s possible to speak in the tongues of angels as well as the tongues of men, so there’s such a thing as an angelic language, and that’s, they say, what tongues is. And in 1 Corinthians 14:2 it says, “For he that speaks in a tongue,” notice in the King James unknown is in italics, it’s not in the original Geek, “he that speaks in a tongue speaks not unto men, but unto God; and no man understands,” now surely, they say, if it was known human language somebody would understand it. And so using 13:1 and 14:2 people argue for the ecstatic unknown image of tongues.

What do we say to this? We say that what happened in Corinth is exactly the same as what happened in Acts 2, known human languages. What do we mean by this? The book of Acts is made up of a composite series of writings. Part of the book of Acts is eyewitness of Dr. Luke; Luke was Paul’s personal physician, which is interesting, if Paul could heal everybody why he had a personal physician with him. But Luke went along with Paul because Paul suffered physically and Luke took care of him. And as Luke wandered from place to place he would report on what had happened. Then there were some times when Luke would just stay in one place and Paul would go into an area and then Paul would come back and he’d tell Luke, hey Dr. Luke, do you know what happened, I went in the synagogue and this happened, this happened, this happened. And then Luke would write down what Paul said and he’d bring it into his book of notes, which was eventually published as the book of Acts. So Acts is known for the fact that part of it comes from Paul and part of it comes from Luke, and if you read the book of Acts carefully you’ll even see where that section occurs, because Luke will start saying we did this, we did this, we did this, obviously he was there. Then he shifts out of the second person and goes to the third person and says Paul did this, Paul did that, Paul did this. So you have the second person sections of Acts and the third person section of Acts.

Now if you turn to Acts 19 you’ll see an outbreak of tongues. And in Acts 19 this particular section is not… is not one of the “we” sections, it’s one of the third person sections. What’s that mean? It means that what you read here in Acts 19:6 is something that Luke did not eyewitness himself. Acts 19:6 is something Paul saw that he subsequently told Luke and the Luke wrote it down. I’ll show you why that little observation is very critical to the argument. In Acts 19:6 it says, “When Paul had laid his hands upon them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they spoke with tongues, and prophesied.” Now Luke doesn’t say they spoke with tongues different from those that I told you about on the day of Pentecost. When Luke goes to report the Acts 19 incident he uses exactly the same language as he used to report the Acts 2 incident, the Acts 10 incident. And so looking at Acts 19:6 we say that since there’s no in context difference made from Acts 2 and Acts 10 it is exactly the same phenomenon that was occurring in Acts 2 and Acts 10. So Acts 19:6 is not talking about gibberish at all, it is talking about known human languages once again.

Why is that significant? Because Paul is the one who told him that, and so what you have in Acts 19:6 is not Luke’s use of the word glossa, or tongue, but you have Paul’s use of the word glossa, or tongue. Therefore, we can argue that both Paul and Luke used the word glossa or tongue exactly the same way, and they did so because when Luke interchanges with Paul he does not interchange his vocabulary. Why is that important? Because it shows that in 1 Corinthians and other places where tongues occurs that Paul speaks of, Paul does not mean to convey to us there’s some new phenomenon taking place, it’s just the same old Pentecostal phenomenon, speaking in known human languages. Well, but you say, what do we do then with 1 Corinthians.

Let’s turn to 1 Corinthians and look at the context; as the old saying goes, when all else fails look at the context. And if you look at 1 Corinthians 13:1 look at it carefully and read it in the context of verse 2, that’s all, just read one more verse. “Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not love, I am become as sounding bronze, or a tinkling cymbal. [2] And though I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not love, I am nothing.” Would anyone care to venture a guess as to how many mountains in Asia Minor Paul moved. Obviously none; what is it we call this in literature, when you see something like this? Hyperbole; Paul is using hyperbole here, he’s giving exaggeration, he says even if I could move mountains, if I could do all that and I didn’t have love, it’d be a waster of time. And so he uses hyperbole, “though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels,” I can’t but if I could, “and had not love,” then it would be just “as sounding brass.” Moreover, there’s another complication of verse 1; we don’t know what the language is that angels speak. Every time the angels speak in the Scripture they’re speaking Aramaic, Greek or Hebrew, known human languages. We have no evidence from revelation that angels speak any other language than languages we are familiar with.

What do we do, then, about 14:2? If 13:1 is hyperbole, what do we do about 14:2, that “no man understands,” very simple. In the context… in the context he’s talking about the way the Corinthians were using the gift. Notice in verse 4, “He that speaks in an tongue edifies himself,” that means without an interpreter. In other words, Paul’s taking what the Corinthians were doing and working from there as he develops his text. 14:2 and 14:4 are not models or a norm of what ought to have been done, it’s a description of what in fact was being done in the city of Corinth.

Therefore we hold that the character of tongues were known human languages and not gibberish. And it’s interesting that not only do we hold this, but the fountain of all Pentecostalism in America, Charles Fox Harmon himself held that. The early Pentecostals all held that tongues were known human languages…all of the early Pentecostals held that position and it wasn’t until linguists, who studied this gibberish discovered it wasn’t a known human language at all, it was just gibberish, but it was then that they changed their interpretation and said oh well, just a minute, it’s really not known human language, it’s ecstatics, it’s a heavenly language. This is an interpretation thing that has come within the last 30-40 years, in the face of this overwhelming evidence that this phenomenon of the modern day is not a known human language. So simply stated it’s just Bible teachers fudging their interpretation of Scripture to fit the facts.

Dr. George Day Jennings, professor of anthropology at Wheaton College says this after examining in detail the tongues group: “Pentecostal people have an uncommon degree of uncertainty concerning interpersonal relationships. Pentecostalism attracts uncertain, threatened, inadequately organized person with strong motivation to reach a state of satisfying interpersonal relatedness and personal integrity. Conditions for trance and possession,” he’s comparing it with what goes on in Africa, “are favored by ceremonial order including considerable repetition in singing, dancing or similar behavior. Even in sedate groups, speaking in tongues usually comes at the end of a time of testimony and prayer together, considerable emotional involvement, even if no over display.”

So in the character of tongues we know that from the Scriptures there’s all the evidence it was known language. We go back to the father of Pentecostalism and he agrees with us, it was known language until scholars who have examined the tapes come up with the conclusion, overwhelming, Eugene Nida of Wycliffe Bible Translators has done, he’s examined hundreds and hundreds of hours or tape recordings as one the world’s foremost linguistics and says without a doubt this is not a language pattern, it’s alliteration and repetition of certain vowels and consonants in a certain sequence but it is not a language.

Then, with all this evidence, now we suddenly jockey our interpretation around, depart from the historic interpretation, depart from the fathers of Pentecostal and their interpretation and come up the last minute with this makeshift interpretation that is it’s a heavenly language. That’s all it is, is a last minute fudge.

Now we’ve dealt with the history of tongues, we’re dealing with the character of tongues. Before we leave the character of tongues, another point, besides being a known human language, we want to have you understand that in the book of Acts and the rest of the Scripture portions, tongues was never given to all believers. Tongues was never given to all believers! It was only, even at the very first, given to some believers; not all believers. In Acts 2 you only had 120 people at the most that were speaking in tongues. What about the hundreds and hundreds of disciples in Galilee? Didn’t they speak in tongues? There’s not a word of it in the book of Acts, not a word. Why? Because they never spoke in tongues, that’s why; only some believers spoke in tongues. Moreover, there are five explicit references in the New Testament that teach dogmatically, clearly and emphatically that not everyone spoke in tongues. I’ll just cite the verses: 1 Corinthians 12:10 says this. 1 Corinthians 12:30 says the same thing. 1 Corinthians 14:5; 1 Corinthians 14:13; 1 Corinthians 14:27. Five times Paul makes the point that all do not speak in tongues.

So what do we learn from the Bible concerning the character of tongues? It was known human languages and not the gibberish you heard on the tape; it was not given to all believers and therefore is not a sign of overwhelming spirituality and unnecessary adjunct of the baptism of the Holy Spirit. So much for the character of tongues. From the history of tongues we learn nothing too exciting; from the character of tongues we see the modern phenomenon does not fit the Scriptural norms.

Now we come to the third point, the purpose of tongues. Staying in 1 Corinthians 14 let’s develop the purpose of tongues. We said the purpose of tongues of Isaiah 28 was to talk to the unbelieving nation Israel in baby talk. You remember the objection to Isaiah’s ministry, who do you think you are Isaiah, talking to babes that have just been separated from their mother’s breast; what are you going to do, “precept upon precept,” that’s the way they were… they were laughing at Isaiah’s ministry. They said Isaiah, you’re speaking as though we’re little babies, we’re not babies Isaiah, and so God, moving back through Isaiah speaks to that generation, you people despise My Word as baby talk? All right, then you’re going to get baby talk and this time not through the lips of Isaiah but through the lips of stammering people, Gentiles, and you’re going to have Me speaking to you baby talk through Gentile believers. And this is why in Acts 2 when that baby talk occurred it was not a coherent gospel message, it was more or less ejaculations of various praises, short sentences and that’s about it, so that Peter had to get up and give the complete gospel presentation.

So much for Isaiah 28 and Acts 2; but you say, in 1 Corinthians 14, and many will say this, there’s another purpose for tongues; it’s not just to witness to Jews, in 1 Corinthians 14 argue these people, tongues was given to edify the user. Doesn’t it say in verse 4, “He that speaks in a tongue edified himself,” isn’t this emphasis, then, on personal edification. Surely we… we don’t have to speak in tongues in the assembly but can’t we use it in our private devotions. Again, when all else fails look at the context, and in particular look what the context is in chapter 14. Look at verse 12, “Even so, forasmuch as ye are zealous of spiritual gifts, seek that ye may excel to the edifying of the church.” The church! Verse 19, “Yet in the church I had rather speak five words with my understanding….” Verse 23, “If, therefore, the whole church be come together….” Verse 26, “What is it, then, brethren? When ye come together….” Verse 28, “But if there be no interpreter, let him keep silence in the church….” Verse 34, “Let your women keep silence in the churches….” Verse 40, “Let all things be done decently and in order.”

What is the subject of chapter 14? Assembly worship; it’s not talking about private devotions; the topic and the context is about how to conduct a worship service with many of the brethren; that’s the point of chapter 14. And so when you read in verse 4 you read about tongues edifying the individual, that’s just plan B. It’s like God has given me the gift of pastor-teacher; He didn’t give it to me to use it in a closet and edify myself; He gave it to me for my to develop by hard work and study of the languages, study of theology, study of issues, to develop that gift and use it to edify people who have trusted in Christ. It wouldn’t do me any good before God to just edify myself, that’d be a by-product but that’s not the reason God gave me the gift. Nor is that the reason why God has given you gifts that He has given you; it’s not to edify yourself but to edify the body of Christ. So why take plan B and elevate it as though that’s the purpose of tongues; not at all; that is an antecedent auxiliary, fringe benefit, but that’s not the purpose of tongues.

Let’s see the purpose of tongues demonstrated in 1 Corinthians 14:21-23. Now as I said last week, I have never heard, I have read, I have never seen a Pentecostal scholar handle adequately Isaiah 28:11-12, and I have never heard them handle adequately verses 21-23. Never! And I have read almost every piece of Pentecostal literature that I am sent and I am sent a pile; I am on the mailing list of every nitwit organization on the face of the sun. I have a massive amount of material that comes here from every place on earth and a lot of it is Pentecostal; I get Pentecostal newspapers, I get textbooks, I get articles all the time and I think I’m pretty well read in what’s going on in that area and I have never heard a careful exegesis of these three verses. As we go through these three verses I want to show you something about them and why they can’t be handled by a Pentecostal person; not the way they’ve done it; there’s only one way of interpreting these things and these verses have to be interpreted in order not to produce a conflict within them; they have to be interpreted as though the purpose of tongues is witnessing to the Jew, as Isaiah 28 teaches.

Notice 1 Corinthians 14:20, what’s the context, “Be not children in understanding,” see the same context of Isaiah 28, immaturity, childishness. And he says don’t be this way, be mature, “In the law it is written,” and in that exact same context of Isaiah 28 Paul recites Isaiah 28:11, that’s what verse 21 is, it’s a citation [“In the law it is written, With men of other tongues and other lips will I speak unto this people; and yet for all that will they not hear me, saith the Lord.”] Some of you in the more modern translations will have that in darker print and that’s a signal that that is a quotation out of your Old Testament. And it’s a quotation of Isaiah 28 out of the Old Testament. And it’s applied perfectly in the same way Isaiah applied it, baby talk. Now in verses 22 and 23 Paul says something that conflicts.

I’m going to read verse 22 and 23 and I want you read carefully with me in your own translation, read carefully and watch something in there. “Therefore, tongues are for a sign, not to them that believe, but to them that believe not…” “to them that believe not; but prophesying serveth not for them that believe not, bur for them who believe. [23] If, therefore, the whole church be come together into one place, and all speak with tongues, and there come in those that are unlearned, or unbelievers, will they not say that ye are mad?” Now people read that and read that and they go right over the most obvious thing about it. If you look carefully at verse 22 you must have seen an apparent conflict in those two verses because you look at verse 22 and what does it says? That tongues are for a sign for whom? Unbelievers. And yet in verse 23 it’s stated don’t exercise them because it’s going to confuse the unbeliever. Now how are we going to solve that problem? Apparently there’s a conflict between these two verses.

Well, it’s very easy, we go back to the original languages and examine the text a little bit more carefully. We notice, “tongues are for a sign, not to them that believe, but them that believe not.” The word is a Greek noun that means unbeliever, plus the article. What he is saying in verse 22 is he’s interpreting Isaiah for us; he’s just cited Isaiah in verse 21, now he says, “therefore tongues are for a sign, not to the believers but to the unbeliever,” a particular group of unbelievers, “the unbelievers,” the unbelievers par excellance, who would be “the unbeliever?” The ones that Isaiah 28 mentions; and who are the ones that Isaiah 28 mentions? The Jewish people who had rejected Isaiah’s ministry, that’s who. And so who are “the unbelievers” in verse 22? They are simply the nation Israel as it existed in that day, “the Jewish unbeliever.”

But now in verse 23 is an entirely different group of people. “If therefore the whole church be come together into one place, and all speak with tongues, and there come in those that are unlearned, or unbelievers,” no article there, just plain unbelievers, and it’s used in coordination with the word “unlearned” which in the original Greek is the word from which we get the word “idiot” except it didn’t mean idiot then. The word idiotes meant a proselyte, one who was interested in Christian but who wasn’t fully accepted into the Church yet; he was still studying. By the way, it shows you that they did not baptize right away; did not baptize right away. They baptized Jews right away but Gentiles who did not have the culture and could not understand the basic doctrines, they were not baptized for a long time. They had basic doctrine classes first and the “unlearned” mentioned in verse 23 had a particular place in the church, they sat in a particular section. It’s mentioned back in the text, there’s a place where they used to sit in the congregation in Corinth. So the unlearned are those Gentiles who were in training and the unbelievers in verse 23 are Gentile unbelievers. That’s the only interpretation you can come up with that’s going to avoid the conflict of verse 22 and 23 and as an excellent rational thinker as Paul is, he doesn’t deliberately write illogical literature. So verses 22 and 23 are speaking of two different groups and it simply fortifies our claim, not weakens it, fortifies our claim that tongues were originally given in order to witness; they are a particular witness to the Jewish unbeliever.

We’ve studied the history of tongues; we found nothing positive there. We’ve studied the character of tongues and we discovered that tongues are not very… the modern day thing that passes, the gibberish doesn’t fit with what we see in the Old Testament on two counts, it isn’t language and the people that promote it try to promote it for every believer. The third thing we studied is the purpose of tongues, it was to unbelieving Israel during that interim period of time when Christ said “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they have done.” In other words, give the nation Israel another chance and so for forty years, the time of testing, between 30 AD and 70 AD, Israel was given a time to reaccept Messiah and by 70 AD the nation did not and Vespasian and Titus brought the nation down.

We come to the fourth point, the end of tongues. After the history, the character and the purpose the end of tongues. Has the New Testament phenomenon called tongues ceased? Turn to Hebrews 2:3-4. Hebrews was written toward the 11^th hour of that testing period; between 40 and 70 AD the Israel people had been witnessed to, witnessed to, witnessed to, witnessed to and witnessed to until as the closing hour, actually it was in 66 AD that the Jews began their revolt and it wasn’t over until 70 AD, actually 72 when Masada was taken, and you have this period of revolt. Just prior, as this revolt was beginning, whoever it was wrote the epistle of Hebrews. The epistle of Hebrews is addressed to a second generation group of people. If a person, say was 30 years old in 30 AD, how old would he be now? He’d be about 70 and so by that time there would be newer, younger people that had become Christians. So the epistle to the Hebrews was written for that second generation of the church. That’s why in verse 3-4 it speaks of the signs as having ceased. Notice: Hebrews 2:3, “How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation, which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed unto us by them that heard Him. [4] God also bearing them witness, both with signs and wonders, and with various miracles,” the main controlling verb is the verb “confirm” in verse 3 and it is aorist tense, past tense, it is now not going on. So by the second generation those signs were already fading out and this author of Hebrews is able to look back and say yes, there was that glorious age when the signs and the miracles were happening. And that was to confirm the ongoing Christian church.

In connection with the signs and the miracles let’s turn to Mark 16:15 about drinking snake venom and so on; remember Philip’s daughters, mentioned in extra-Biblical history, that Matthias drank venom, please notice that Matthias was an apostle who drank snake venom. Here’s another favorite text brought up by this crowd. It says, “Go ye into all the world, and peach the gospel to every creature,” the great commission, well known passage. [16] “He that believes and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned. [17] And these signs shall follow them that believe: “In my name they shall cast out demons; they shall speak with new languages; [18] They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.”

Now the way that verse is usually taken they’d say, now doesn’t that teach that every Christian is to have signs? Again, when all else fails let’s look at the context, and in particular let’s look at the historic context. Who do we know that knew church history very well and is telling us and evaluating for us what actually happened? Luke; what book? Acts. Let’s look at a few passages in the book of Acts and see who performed these signs and these miracles; was it indeed every Christian? Was it that first Pentecostal, first century Christian church that everybody wants to get back to, where every believer was going around and every believer was doing signs and every believer was doing miracles, every believer was using snake venom. Is that the picture that the Church historian, Luke, reports to us.

Turns to Acts 5:12, let’s let the early church talk to us and let’s stop trying to read back into the early church what we think should have happened then, and let’s just read what Luke said in fact did happen then, so that history, not our imagination, is our standard of reference. I’m not going to show you all the passages in the interest of time but at least a few. “By the hands of every believer were many signs and wonders wrought among the people???” Obviously not. “By the hands of the apostles were many signs and wonders wrought among the people.” Oh, it’s a little different story, isn’t it. [15] “Insomuch that they brought the sick out into the streets, and every believer healed the sick…” not at all. The apostles did the healing.

Turn to Acts 14, the same kind of thing, this time in a non-Palestinian context. And in the context, notice in the previous chapter, Acts 13:50 it is Paul and Barnabas, the special apostle or the 13^th apostle plus his assistant. Acts 14:1, “And it came to pass in Iconium that they went both together, there are only two of them, “both” is a word we use for two people, not many people, “both went together to the synagogue of the Jews, and so spoke, that a great multitude, both of the Jews and also of the Greeks, believed. [2] But the unbelieving Jews stirred up the Gentiles, and made their minds evil affected against the brethren. [3] A long time, therefore, abode they speaking boldly in the Lord, who gave testimony unto the word of His grace, and granted signs and wonders to be done by their hands.” Who’s “their?” All believers? Not on your life, Paul and Barnabas.

Now we can go through the book of Acts and you’ll consistently see this pattern. Now what does that tell you? Who wrote Acts? The Holy Spirit wrote Acts through Luke? Isn’t this the Holy Spirit’s own interpretation of the Holy Spirit’s signs? Of course and so therefore here’s how Acts should be used. You know, it’s a funny thing, these people that are always using Acts to build their doctrine never use Acts to control their [can’t understand word]; it’s very interesting; Acts can’t be used to build doctrine but it can be used to give us an accurate historic picture in the early Church and yet precisely the very purpose for which the book of Acts is written, to give us an accurate picture, is exactly what’s ignored by this crowd. They never will allow their imaginations in control by the text and the reports of Luke and Luke insists that signs and wonders were not done by every believer; they were only done by the apostles who represented Christianity in these new communities. But apparently it’s too much to ask for some of these people to let their fluent imaginations be disciplined.

We know in Hebrews 2, in combination with that, that these signs of Mark 16 were done by the apostles and gradually faded out as that forty year period came to a close. By 70 AD Jerusalem will be destroyed and the signs would end. But I believe there’s another text that is even more direct and that’s 1 Corinthians 13:8. Now a lot of Christians will disagree but I don’t think that if you study the text carefully and use a concordance and just take your time and don’t rush, just think and relax and meditate on this, that you can help but come to the conclusion that 1 Corinthians 13 spells an end of tongues. “Love never fails, but where there be prophecies, they shall be fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; where there be knowledge, it shall vanish away.” Notice three things are mentioned, three of the sign gifts of the early church: prophecy, that was speaking prophesies; tongues, that short ejaculatory praise of God; and knowledge, and that is giving new doctrine; three gifts. All three of these gifts are scheduled for cancellation. Now let me do a little quick thing here; let’s look at these three gifts: prophecy, tongues and knowledge. Notice what it says, knowledge and prophecy cease; now in the Greek there is a passive voice which means the subject receives the action of the verb, so if this is passive it means that prophecy will be cut off; knowledge will be cut off; that’s the teaching of a passive voice. But the verb that is used for tongues is in the middle voice and it means it fades out in and of itself, so that whatever it is that cuts off prophecy and whatever it is that cuts off knowledge, will not have to operate on tongues because by the time that operation occurs tongues will have ceased. Tongues cease in and of itself.

Let’s look further because we still haven’t solved the problem of when this happens and that’s what we want to solve. Look at the next verse, verse 9, “For we know in part, and we prophesy in part.” Notice what gift is missing in verse 9—tongues, because tongues is not used to do whatever is being done in verse 9. It was an associated gift but the two other gifts were the mainline gifts. What does it mean to know in part and prophecy in part? Here’s what it means: it means to prophesy and gain knowledge bit by bit, piece by piece, or we would translate it part by part. And it’s talking about the progressive gaining of New Testament revelation as one brick was built upon another. Some men had added insight as to who Christ was; somebody else had added insight as to the Church; somebody else had added insight as to the relationship between Christ and the Church. Paul had insight into the mystery of the Church. And so local church after local church he would have a development of a core of revelation, piece by piece, bit by bit. And it was being done by the two gifts, the gift of knowledge and the gift of prophecy. We prophecy bit by bit and we gain knowledge bit by bit.

“But” says Paul in verse 10, “when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away.” Now everyone thinks that’s the Second Advent of Christ because they get down and they see verse 12 and they see “we see through a glass darkly; but then, we see face to face; now I know in part, but then shall I know even as I am known.” Surely, they argue, this is where we go to be face to face with the Lord. One little theological problem and I don’t think it’s ever occurred to the minds of these kind of people. You know, when you go to heaven and you’re face to face with the Lord do we become omniscient? No, that would make us God. We still retain our creaturehood, do we not? Do we not retain our finite knowledge for all eternity? Then how can you interpret, as these people do, in verse 12 to refer to the acquisition of omniscience? It must refer to something else, other than that. So right off the bat we’re forewarned that there’s a little theological problem here that’s not dealt with correctly. You can’t just barge into this passage at sixty miles an hour and come out right at the end; you’ve got to be careful and think your way through and understand these things.

Let’s look at verse 10, “When that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be taken away,” the word “perfect” is to teleion, singular ending. To teleion, that ending, on on a Greek noun is a neuter singular ending. What’s important about that? Because whatever…this is an adjective, an adjective has to modify a verb and if you’re going to have an adjective modify a verb in most cases in languages it must agree in gender, and if you have to teleion it must modify, then, a neuter noun. Now if it modifies the Church, thinking of the Second Advent when the Church is perfect and complete, the word for Church is feminine; the word Christ, if that’s what it refers to, is masculine. Why is to teleion neuter? Because it’s not an adjective that modifies the Church or it is not an adjective that modifies the noun Christ. Well, then what does the adjective teleion modify, it’s got to modify something. Well, that’s the $64,000 question, what is it that it modifies. We know what it doesn’t modify; it doesn’t modify a feminine noun and it doesn’t modify a masculine noun.

The solution to this problem is no further away than your nearest concordance, plus about 15 minutes of just a little patient reading and all you have to do is look up to teleion and see how it’s used in the New Testament. And it’s used for the will of God… the will of God. Turn to James 1:25, here is a typical use of to teleion, “Who looks into the perfect law of liberty, and continues therein, he being not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed.” Now what do you suppose James is talking about? Let’s look in the context; verse 22, “But be ye doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. [23] For if any be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like a man beholding his natural face in a glass.” Now James is a little humorous here, it’s a pun. See, the word for “man” in verse 23 is not anthropos, which is the usual Greek word for man, it’s aner, which means male and what James says is you know how guys treat themselves in front of mirrors verses how girls treat themselves in front of mirrors; ever see a woman in a mirror, you can never get them apart. Drive down 34^th street and come up behind a light, the light can change for 30 seconds and we’re having a hairdo modification going on. That’s just typical, ladies, don’t be embarrassed by it, because your sisters 20 centuries ago were doing the same thing. They didn’t have as good a mirrors as you do and that’s what James is talking about; he’s saying look, “if any be a hearer of the Word of God and not a doer,” he’s like a guy, a guy looks in a mirror and goes on; hair might look like it was combed with a lawnmower but nevertheless, he just walks on. But a girl is different, she sees herself in a mirror and every hair has to be in place or there’s a major catastrophe.

All right, this is what James is talking about, looking into a mirror. Now I want you to notice two themes in this passage of James that reappear in 1 Corinthians 13. First of all, the theme of the glass, the mirror in verse 23; and then notice in verse 25 that which is called the glass, which is the Word of God is also called that which is teleion, perfect. Now in context James is talking about the Old Testament; he’s talking about the canon of the Old Testament. Now come to Paul in 1 Corinthians 13, now let’s look at what Paul says. Paul says, “When that which is perfect is come,” now let’s just test our interpretation. Let’s say to teleion there equals the New Testament canon that is now being developed in part, let’s just test this and see how it goes. Let’s say, “when that which is perfect,” that is all the revelation, all the prophecies now together under one roof, the New Testament, “when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away.” Now what is it that’s going on partly? The gifts of prophecy, and the gift of knowledge so he’s arguing when this comes these gifts will disappear because they’re not needed any more. Why do you need the gift of prophecy if you’ve got the New Testament? What was the gift of prophecy given for? To build up the New Testament, wasn’t it. All right, once the New Testament is built you don’t need it any more; once your foundation is poured you don’t need the forms, take them away and use them on the next foundation some place. You don’t need them any more in that place.

And then in verse 11, notice a theme that we return to, “When I was a child,” see, same thing as Isaiah 28, the immaturity theme, “When I was a child,” look what he does, “I speak, I understand and I think,” three verbs. What were the three gifts in verse 8? The gift of prophecy, the gift of knowledge, and the gift of tongues and what is verse 11? Speaking, understanding and thinking, exactly corresponding to those gifts. And so he says, “When I was a child, I spoke childish things; but when I became a man, I put away childish things.” That is, I put away these, and he’s talking of himself standing for the Church. When the Church receives the New Testament canon she will no longer need the childish early foundational gifts. Verse 12, “For now we see through a glass that is dark,” what is the glass that is dark? The incomplete canon of Scripture, the glass, same thing as in James, is now viewed again, but this time Paul says it’s dark because it’s not all clear as to what’s happening. So where we stand as the church, the New Testament part hasn’t been finished. “For now we see through a glass that’s dark, but then we will see face to face,” as in a mirror, there will be a perfect picture in the New Testament of what the Church is, “now I know partly,” know partly about what? All things? No, partly about the will of God for the Church, “but then I shall know even as I am known,” this is his function and his role in the body, it doesn’t mean he acquires omniscience unless you’re going to deny the Creator/creature distinction. So this in combination with Ephesians 2:20 that says the Church was founded on the apostles and prophets, teaches along with the rest, the end of tongues.

We’ve studied the history of tongues; we’ve studied the character of tongues, we’ve studied the purpose of tongues, we’ve studied the end of tongues, now we’ve got one final question to finish. Well, you say that the New Testament bona fide gift of tongues phased out. Oh, one little fine point to clear up before we go on; how does this relate to the purpose of tongues, the New Testament canon. Let’s look at our chart for the book of Acts. In the book of Acts we have the kingdom being proclaimed in the early part with the Church growing. In this early era the Church is in a baby stage, without any canon, without any New Testament, and what do you find the Church doing? It isn’t even identified as a Church but what is it doing? Testifying to Israel, isn’t it? Aren’t the early believers constantly reminding Israel, Israel, Israel, accept your Messiah, accept your Messiah, accept your Messiah. Now what happens as the book of Acts goes on? The Church grows and grows and grows and gets more revelation and more revelation as the New Testament is building and growing and growing, until finally 70 AD is reached. And then what is the Church doing; it’s got its canon, basically, developed it’s need to act in a childish testifying way to the nation Israel is gone. That which transformed the baby talk of the early church to the talk of a mature man is the acquisition of New Testament theology, New Testament doctrine. That’s how those two are related.

But we’ve got this one final problem and that is, if this represents true tongues and if what we see today is not true tongues, what is it. Turn to Isaiah 8:19, “And when they shall say unto you, Seek unto them that have familiar spirits, and unto wizards that peep and that mutter: should not a people seek unto their God?” Now what is the “wizards that peep and mutter?” They are demon powers, and peeping and muttering is gibberish. It’s that simple. The Holy Spirit of truth is never pictured in Scripture as going through some blah blu blah blu blah blu blah blu kind of thing. Why? Because the Holy Spirit is interested in communicating truth, you can’t communicate truth and communicate gibberish at the same time. All throughout the Scripture the only gibberish that’s ever mentioned is always mentioned like this verse, in connection with demonic phenomenon. I think that’s a very interesting observation from the text of Scripture. The only kind of mention in the Bible of gibberish is its demonic. You say well wait a minute, I know some good people in this movement; sure. Remember I read you in the history of the movement, what did Irving say? You can preach Christ, you can preach the gospel and it’s still basically a demonic type communication. That was the testimony of the Irvingite movement, that’s what Sir Robert Anderson pointed out to us was wrong with it. An angel of light isn’t going to come up and say hey, you want so sin a little, let me put my pitchfork behind the pulpit so you can’t see it. Now that’s not how Satan is going to approach; he’s going to approach as an angel of light and therefore we have this phenomenon today; that tape you heard, as I said before, what you actually heard were the demonic phenomenon in that woman. Later, if we had played it out further you would have heard the interrogation where that demon power refused to confess that Jesus is the Lord; he would only say Jesus is center, Jesus is center, Jesus is center, Jesus is center, but when it came do you confess the Lord Jesus Christ having come in the flesh, couldn’t do it and wouldn’t.

Now it sounded pious on the surface and the person who had this demonic phenomenon may have been a very sincere individual but that doesn’t excuse us from not going along with the canon of Scripture. It’s the canon of Scripture that counts and in conclusion we want to ask ourselves okay, how does it all apply to us. It applies two ways; negatively and positively. It applies negatively in that we should beware of this phenomenon of our day; be gracious to these people, don’t be nasty to them but be gracious, yet if they continue to reject God’s Word there’s going to have to come a separation. As long as they will remain teachable to the standards of Scripture and open to that, fine. But if they are going to impose this latter day re-re-reinterpretation to justify a gibberish phenomenon that even the Pentecostal fathers wouldn’t acknowledge, there’s something wrong and there’s got to be a separation occur. Many of you I know have gone through personal suffering in your family unit because of this thing and I know how it can tear some of them up, but this is just the way it has to happen. We have to stand for the Scripture at this point.

Now positively what is the application? Positively once again we should have reinforced in us the necessity of using our tongue to teach clearly the truth of God. What is the whole gist of the matter? That God, when He communicates communicates clearly; He doesn’t communicate with an uncertain sound, He communicates His truth because He desires you, He desires me to know Him better and we can’t know Him better unless the truth about His character is communicated clearly.

Shall we stand and sing….