Gifted 2: Tongues and Prophecy

Today on Summit Life, Pastor J.D. Greer tackles a controversial topic. Welcome to Summit Life, the Bible teaching ministry of pastor, author and theologian J.D. Greer.

I'm your host, Molly Vidovitch. Today, Pastor J.D. is dealing with one of the most debated topics in Christian circles, and it's the role of tongues and prophecy in the modern church. So does God still speak through prophets? Is the gift of tongues for every believer just for some?

Or was it only for the early believers in the first century? Let's dive in and see what the Bible has to say as we continue our series titled Rushing Wind. And as a reminder, this is the last week to get Pastor J.D. 's new 20-day devotional that follows our current teaching series.

So be sure to check that out at jdgreer.com. Now let's turn to 1 Corinthians 14 and dive right in. Here's Pastor J.D. We are going to look at tongues and prophecy.

This is a good bit controversial. I'm not going to lie to you. Our pastoral team is pretty nervous. The great thing for me is that I get on a plane tonight and I fly to London, England for about four days, so I don't have to deal with any of the fallout.

I can just drop my bomb and then go overseas and they can deal with all of it. So you email all you want this week and ask them whatever questions you want to ask them. People in our church are literally all over the map on this. There are some who have taken what the Bible teaches about these things, and they have gone way beyond it. And then there are those of you who, in reaction to those people, have gone beyond what the Bible teaches by denying the presence of these things altogether. In other words, there is the error of embracing more than what the Bible teaches, and then there is the error of embracing not as much as the Bible teaches. Well, I have good news for all of you, regardless of where you are on that spectrum, God's Word contains everything that God intended to say on this matter. God is not up in heaven wishing that he'd been a little clearer here, like, oh, my gosh, they're just like, you know, they're misconstruing that and I wish I could clear this up. And you wait till the second edition of my Bible comes out.

I'm going to clean all this mess up. That is not how God wrote the Bible. He wrote it perfect the first time, which means it says everything that God intended to say.

And I will tell you, this is very important what I'm about to say. There is a lack of hard and fast clarity when it comes to these issues. And I believe that is intentional. In fact, I know it's intentional because God's intentional. God wants us, you see, to be open to anything God chooses to do in these areas. But he leaves us clear parameters so that we can know when it is him that is doing it.

All right? Now, a little perspective. There are generally four positions when it comes to spiritual gifts like tongues and prophecy. All Christians believe in spiritual gifts to some degree. But when it comes to tongues and prophecy and miracles and healing, there are primarily four positions. The first one is what we call the cessationist position. And that is the idea that certain gifts have ceased, cessation, that there are, you know, that gifts are in operation, but tongues, prophecy, healing, those were for the times of the apostles. They were there to signify the Bible being written, but after the apostles moved on, then those gifts died out, a cessationist. On the other end of the spectrum is what we call the Pentecostal position. And that is basically that the gifts are in full operation. They are normative for every Christian. And if you are not using them, then there's something wrong with you.

And you either need to fix it or start faking it, one, if you want to fit in. All right? That's the other end. Then there's another position, a third, which we would call the charismatic position, which is that these gifts are in existence and they are part of the normal ministry operations of the church, but not everybody in the church has them. Then there is a fourth position that doesn't really have a name, but that position maintains that these gifts have not ceased, they're still around, but that most of the ways that these gifts are being used today is not really biblical at all or really even helpful. And that's where I would put our church, for the most part, in that fourth category. That's why I told you last week, we would consider ourselves charismatics with a seat belt. We are not the kind of church, you know this, where the husband and wife are co-pastors and she's got hair the size of Texas and her makeup looks like she lost a paintball gun wore. I can't even imagine my wife that way.

I don't have a charismatic mullet with a coiffed hair, you know, thing in the front there. We don't smack people on the head so that they fall down and flop around on the ground like a perch on the dock. We don't do that. I've never intentionally done that. I've gotten a little, you know, rambunctious during worship.

I maybe smacked somebody in the head, but that was an accident. I've had somebody try to do it to me before. A year, several years ago, I was in a pastors conference with about 30 pastors and the guy that was leading it invited anybody that wanted to at the end to come forward and be prayed over. I'm always for somebody praying for me.

And so I go forward and I'm in a line and I notice the first five or six guys that after they get prayed for, they just collapse on the ground. And he's coming to me and I said, this is what I said to God. I said, God, you can knock me flat on my back.

You can knock my shirt off if you want to. But I am not letting that man push me down. So he gets over to me and he lays his hand on my head. He starts praying. And after about 30 seconds, I can feel the pressure of him pushing me. And I was like, God, you can knock me on my back, but this man ain't pushing me down. And so I bowed up my back and I start pushing back. And he starts praying harder and I'm pushing harder.

And after a while, I think he just concluded I was hard-hearted and he moved on. And so we don't do that kind of stuff at our church. We don't have church bands with flames painted down the sides or the terms Holy Ghost, Anointed, Revival, Dominion, Rain, Fire, or Shekinah Glory written in stencil on the sides. People don't routinely pull a hammy during our worship services. We don't give out tambourines with ribbons or banners or flags to wave during our worship service.

We don't have running lanes built around our sanctuary for people. But Summit, listen, I want us to be open to all that the Bible teaches us that the Spirit might be doing or wanting to do in our services. And I want us also to do it in the way that the Spirit said that he would do it. So with that in mind, if you have your Bible, I want you to take it out and open it to 1 Corinthians chapter 14. 1 Corinthians 14, I'm just going to go verse by verse through this chapter.

There's going to be a couple times I stop and try to give you a little context, maybe explain a couple words, but for the most part, I'm just going to read it to you, tell you what it says and what it means. If you are willing for the Word of God to challenge you, then I want you to open your heart right now and let's pray together, okay? Father, I pray that you would give us a posture of humility. God, will you challenge what we have been comfortable with? Will you challenge with what we have believed or think we have believed? I pray that you would give us an openness to your Word knowing that you, God, are good and your way is best. God, you know that I have prayed that this would not be simply a doctrine, that we learn some new things that we add to our repertoire of Christianity, but this would be something that changes the culture of our church, that we would be a tabernacle of your Spirit where your Spirit lives and moves and communicates your reality that you are a real God in real time giving real answers to real problems right now. Father, I pray that you would grant that this morning.

We pray together in Jesus' name and all God's people said, amen. 1 Corinthians 14, verse 1. By the way, I always put the transcript online. It has copious, almost pedantic footnotes in it that chase down obscure details, lines of thoughts, Greek word studies.

You may want to get that out later and you can look and dig down deeper if I skip over something you think needs more attention. 1 Corinthians 14, verse 1. Pursue love, says Paul, and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts, especially that you may prophesy. For one who speaks in a tongue speaks not to men but to God, for nobody understands him but he utters mysteries in the Spirit. Last week I gave you a definition of tongues that was this, a form of prayer and praise that you express to God in a language you do not understand. Do you see that phrase there in verse 2? It says that you speak not to men but you speak to God. Tongues are a form of prayer and praise in a language that is unknown to the speaker that is spoken to God.

Let me give you just a couple of examples. There are dozens I could choose from in Scripture but let me just limit it to two. Acts chapter 2. If you're fast with your Bible, you can turn over there.

If you're super cool with an iPad, you can flip there. Otherwise, just listen and I will walk you through it, all right? When the day of Pentecost arrived, they were all together in one place. Suddenly there came from heaven a sound like a mighty rushing wind and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. And divided tongues of fire appeared to them and rested on each one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and they began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance. Now, they were dwelling in Jerusalem, Jews, devout men from every nation under heaven. And at this sound, the multitude came together.

What sound is he talking about? Talking about all these people that are speaking in different languages. They came together and they were bewildered because each one was hearing them speak in his own language. And they were amazed and astonished, not just amazed, amazed and astonished, saying, are not all those who are speaking Galileans? Galileans.

Galilee was like the redneck part of Israel. I mean, those people barely spoke one language. You know, they didn't even speak Hebrew that well.

Now here they are. They're not multilingual. They're not multicultural. They're Galileans and they're speaking our language and each of us hears it in his own native language. It's fluent in our language. Verse 11, we hear them telling in our own tongues the mighty works of God.

So you see that? It's a language that's unknown to the speaker, but it's known to somebody that's listening to it and they're giving prayer and praise to God. They're telling the mighty works of God. Verse 12. And all were amazed and perplexed, not just amazed and astonished, but amazed, astonished and perplexed, saying to one another, what does this mean? But others mocking said, they are filled with new wine. These guys are drunk.

But Peter, standing up with the 11, lifted up his voice and addressed them, men of Judea and all who dwell in Jerusalem, let this be known to you and give ear to my words. These people are not drunk, as you suppose, since it's only the third hour of the day. Peter's like, they're not drunk, it's 9 a.m. I mean, Peter probably should have realized that doesn't stop everybody, right? You know who you are. You had your breakfast beer before you came in here, but Peter's like, hey, it's 9 a.m.

These people aren't drunk yet. Verse 16. This is what was uttered through the prophet Joel, and in the last days it shall be, God declares, that I will pour out my spirit on all flesh and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy and your young men shall see visions and your old men shall dream dreams. And then he goes on to explain the gospel, okay?

All right, leave there, Acts chapter 2, go to Acts chapter 10. This time, Peter, verse 44, is standing in front of a group of Gentiles, namely Cornelius and a group of his soldiers. He's explaining the gospel to them, and it says this, while Peter was still saying these things, the Holy Spirit fell on all who heard the word, verse 45, and the circumcised believers who had come with Peter.

But don't you love that designation? The circumcised believers. Are you Baptist, are you Presbyterian, are you Pentecostal? I'm circumcised, thank you for telling me, all right? The circumcised believers who had come with Peter were amazed because the gift of the Holy Spirit was poured out even on the Gentiles, for they were hearing them speaking in tongues and extolling God.

Now, here you go. Who's amazed and perplexed this time? The circumcised believers who are Jews, and they're hearing these Gentiles who don't speak Hebrew, they're hearing them extolling God. How did they know they were extolling God? Well, evidently, they understood them. So what you've got is you've got now the Gentiles extolling God in a language they don't know but that these Jews understand, all right?

And there's a number of other places which I could go to, but let's just suffice it there. Tongues are when you praise God in a language not your own. And it is being given to these people as a sign that God is bringing them into his family, his family, that God was including in his family not just the Jewish peoples but all peoples of every tribe and tongue everywhere, that God was no longer working just to the nation of Israel.

He was interested in all people of all places in all times becoming a part of his family. That's very important, and we're going to come back to that. But for now, let's just keep reading, okay? Verse 3, on the other hand, so Paul set up a contrast. On the one hand, you've got tongues. On the other hand, the one who prophesies speaks to people for their upbuilding and their encouragement and their consolation. All right, so let's talk about prophecy for a minute. Last week, I gave you the definition of prophecy, that prophecy is speaking God's word or speaking God's will into a situation. That takes primarily three forms in the Bible. The first form is just preaching.

It's what I do each week. It's when I take the word of God and I explain it and then I apply it to you. It's more than just explaining the word of God.

I mean, you could read a commentary and get that. It is God giving me spiritual insight, capital S, spiritual insight and spiritual timing so that I proclaim the word of God into your life with power so that it changes and transforms you. That is the gift of prophecy when I'm taking the word of God and I'm preaching it to you and it's coming alive in your heart and God is setting you free. That's prophecy and that's the predominant form.

But there are two other forms. The one we saw last week was called the word of wisdom and that's where God gives somebody insight into an issue where you don't have a chapter and verse, a decision you need to make, a way that you need to handle a situation and I can't just quote a verse. God sometimes gives different people in his church words of wisdom where they say, this is how I think the Holy Spirit is leading you to resolve this issue or this decision to make.

That's the word of wisdom. There's a third kind called the word of knowledge, the word of knowledge and that's where God gives somebody supernatural insight into somebody's life so that they know just what to say or just how to pray. The example I gave you is John chapter 4 where Jesus is dealing with a Samaritan woman and he's just a woman that's pretty promiscuous and so they're having a conversation and he's not really getting through and he says, well, why don't you go get your husband and bring him and we'll all talk?

And she says, well, I don't have a husband and he says, you're right, you don't have a husband, you've had five husbands and the guy you're shacking up with now is not your husband. And all of a sudden, he's like, how did you know that? I perceive that you are a prophet and he's like, you're exactly right because God the Spirit just told me that about you. That is a word of knowledge. You have insight into somebody's life that you should not really have other than the Spirit of God gives it to you. You're going to see it again referred to in 1 Corinthians 14, 25 in just a second where he talks about knowing just what to say in a way that somebody says, nobody can know that about me except God told you. All right, so preaching word of wisdom, word of knowledge. Now, here's the thing about those last two.

Listen, this is very important. The word of wisdom, the word of knowledge never take on the weight of Scripture. When I stand up here and tell you this is what God's word says, that takes on a whole different weight than somebody saying, you know, I think God might be leading you to do this.

I'll prove that to you in two or three ways. For one, last week, we saw that one of the gifts that God gave the church was the interpretation of spirits. And what that is, is the ability to interpret between when somebody is claiming to give an insight from the Holy Spirit to be able to interpret and distinguish between those. Paul would never tell you to do that with Scripture or his writings. Paul's not like, hey, you know, nobody in here has the gift as I'm preaching a verse to be like, well, that verse is just wrong. The Spirit of God just told me that.

That's not a gift that you would ever get. Paul says this, 1 Thessalonians 5, 20, look at this. Paul says, do not despise prophesying, but test everything and hold fast to what is good.

In other words, weigh it out. Paul would never tell you that about his writings. Paul would never be like, hey, test out my writings and keep what's good, leave what's bad.

Paul's MO was, I'm an apostle, you shut up. So he's talking about prophesying here in a different light. When Moses and Paul said something from God, we wrote it down as Scripture and we read it thousands of years later. When you have something you think the Holy Spirit puts on your heart, we read it in an email, we skim it, and we hit delete. Okay, so it's on an altogether different plane.

All right, I'll give you one more thing here. Chapter 14, verse 36, down in 1 Corinthians 14, Paul says that even with all these words of wisdom and knowledge that the Holy Spirit is giving to the Corinthians, he says, quote, listen, the Word of God did not come from you. By Word of God, he means Scripture. So even with all this Spirit speaking, he says the Word of God never came from you. So there's a distinction between the Word of God, Scripture, and these kinds of words of wisdom and knowledge. Words of knowledge and words of wisdom are supernatural insights that God brings to mind, but they do not take the level of Scripture.

You report them in your own words, which means that they can have errors in them. I'll give you a great example. In the book of Acts, chapter 21, there's a disciple by the name of Agabus. And Agabus comes and it says, full of the Holy Spirit, he spoke through the Spirit, to Paul, and told Paul that the Jews would deliver him into the hands of the Roman rulers.

Now, here's the thing. Agabus was mostly correct, though not entirely. It was the Romans who bound Paul, not the Jews. And the Jews did not deliver Paul to the Romans, they tried to kill him. Wayne Grudem says this, the prediction was not far off, but it had inaccuracies and detail that would have called into question the validity of any Old Testament prophet. This is exactly the kind of fallible prophecy that would fit the definition of New Testament congregational prophecy, or reporting in one's own words something God has spontaneously brought to mind. Paul expects every New Testament congregation, he expects every small group to be filled with this gift. Your sons and your daughters will prophesy. Just like in the Old Testament there was a special class of priests, but in the New Testament we're all priests. In the Old Testament there was a special class of prophets, and in the New Testament every congregation and every small group is filled with the gift of prophecy. Does that make sense? So let me give you, nobody responded when I said that, no, we're lost. All right, let me give you a few practical ways of, let me give you a few ground rules for when you're giving a word of prophecy, okay?

How about that? I'll give you three of them, you should probably write these down. Number one, when you give a word of prophecy, you should never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, I think that's seven evers, which is the number of perfection, claim the authority of God when you speak. When somebody comes up to me and says, well, God said this about you and about the church, I mean, how do you argue with that? Oh, did God say that?

You know, like, I mean, yes, sir, or, I mean, what does that mean? I can't dispute it, it's just, you should never speak that way. It should sound something like this, you know, God, I think might be putting this on my heart, I'm going to give it to you, I'm going to let you test it out, like Paul said in First Thessalonians, I think God is leading me to tell this to you, but you should never, ever, say this is what God's word says unless you've got a verse of scripture behind it. Number two, it is always best when tied to scripture. It's always best when tied to scripture. When you speak a word from yourself, I can't be sure it's coming from God, but when it resonates with the scripture, then I have no doubts about it.

Number three, you should use it for the purposes that are given. Do you see verse three, Paul said there are three purposes for the words of prophecy, for upbuilding, for encouragement and consolation? Those are the three reasons that you give someone a word of prophecy, right? So you make sure that you give it for the express purposes God said he gave it, right? So that's ground rules for giving it.

Here's a few ground rules for receiving it. When somebody speaks it in to you, three questions you should ask. Here's the first one, does it contradict what God has clearly said elsewhere? Does it contradict what God has clearly said elsewhere? I still have people in our church that will come up to me and say something like this, well, God told me to divorce my wife.

I'm like, oh, really, did he? He actually got out his Bible, opened to the page where it said not to divorce your wife, marked that out, said that don't apply to you. I'm sorry, I'm gonna need to see that in writing and probably notarized by an angel, just to throw that in there, too. God does not contradict his word, so it never contradicts scripture.

You gotta ask that. Number two, does it accord with what God is doing in your life? In other words, does it make sense? Does it further something that you see God doing? That's one of the signs that you know that it's coming from God. Here's a third thing, does it glorify God or the prophet? Does it glorify God? The reason I say this is because I hear people all the time trying to use this stuff to bolster their own authority.

God didn't give you this to bolster your authority. He gave it so that it could be used for upbuilding, encouragement, and consolation. I think it's safe to say that we're passionate about bringing you gospel-centered Bible teaching on the radio every single day.

But the truth is that it's only possible thanks to supporters like you. When you donate, you're really giving to your fellow listeners, helping them dive deeper into the gospel through these daily messages and free online resources. We're so grateful for your partnership. And just to say thanks for your donation at the suggested level of $25 or more, we'll send you a brand new devotional by Pastor JD titled like our current teaching series, Rushing Wind. This resource deals with the often neglected member of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit, and the abundant life that he brings to the lives of believers. God wants to show us that the Spirit-filled life has more in store for us than we can even imagine. This is a foundational 20-day devotional with reflection questions and a daily prayer guide.

This is perfect for going through yourself or to walk along the journey with others. Ask for your copy of Rushing Wind when you give by calling 866-335-5220. That's 866-335-5220. Or it might be easier to donate and request the book online at jdgreer.com. That's jdgreer.com. And if you're new to Summit Life and you'd like to get to know us a little bit better, sign up for our email list. You'll receive Pastor JD's devotional blog posts, as well as the popular Wisdom for Your Weekend posts. Subscribe right now when you go to jdgreer.com. If you'd rather mail your donation, our address is JD Greer Ministries, P.O.

Box 122-93, Durham, North Carolina, 277-09. And please make sure you include a note requesting the new devotional. I'm Molly Benovitch. Thank you so much for joining us today. Be sure to listen Wednesday as we continue our study of the Holy Spirit and find answers to the controversial and misunderstood subject of the gift of tongues on Summit Life with J.D. Greer. Today's program was produced and sponsored by J.D. Greer Ministries.