I almost walked out of a church service for the first time in my entire Christian life yesterday. I am always excited to spend time in God’s presence, even more so in the fellowship of brethren. So when I heard about this prayer program that would last about ten hours in God’s presence oh boy was I excited!
The program was scheduled to start at 7 am, I did everything to get there on time but sadly, I got there about 12 minutes into the service. I was hoping and anticipating that I would walk into a praise and worship session or perhaps the opening prayer. But that wasn’t the case as I walked into a great prayer session! I waited for some time to catch up with the prayer session to pray along but I was lost; I was lost in the sounds of the heavenly language that filled the room. I wasn’t going to blame it on the person leading the session, I should have arrived early. It was such a struggle for me to connect with heaven, connect with anything going on, such a struggle. The next person came on the podium and it was about the same thing, a few words here and there and immediately proceeded to tongues speaking. It was such a struggle for me, I wanted to just leave but resolved that if it continued like that till noon, I would walk away. But thank God, things switched as men and women came up after the third person began to minister God’s word and then charged us to pray. These men and women who came afterward prayed in tongues in between their sessions but this time there was a direction, the congregation had been blessed and energized by God’s word to charge into prayer. I instantly felt the switch in the environment when these people led their sessions. I know for sure that it wasn’t only me who struggled to connect during the first three sessions.
I thought about so many different things during those first three sessions. it occurred to me there and then why The Deeper Life church adopted the doctrine of no tongue speaking when their ministers mount on the pulpit. When my friends who go to Deeper Life told me, I didn’t understand it. I laughed at it actually because it just did not make any sense to me at the moment. But my attendance at this service brought it into perspective for me. The doctrine was put in place to create order and also help proper stewardship of God’s gifts and God’s people.
It is great to speak in tongues! Oh! what joy and strength we get from exercising our spiritual muscles. But here is the thing about speaking in tongues – it only edifies the speaker. Apostle Paul tells us in I Corinthians 14:4 that the person who speaks in tongues edifies himself but one who prophesies edifies the whole church. So you see as a minister of God standing before God’s people, it is an opportunity to edify the church with God’s word or God’s mind(prophesy) or charge the people into a mode of worship or prayer. All in all, ministering before God’s people is a charge to edify and bless the church. Therefore when people stand before the church, say one line of God’s word and just begin to blast in tongues non-stop that minister has only blessed himself or herself. And I am sorry to say, that the minister has not exactly thought about the people, the minister only thought about themselves.
Do you know something else I would like to touch on? Individuals who pray in tongues at the slightest provocation. I do hope this blog post doesn’t come across as disrespectful. What I would love for us as a church is to reevaluate our worship and time with the Lord. There is time to minister unto the Lord in words, songs, worship, and hymns. The Lord wants to hear our words of thanksgiving and praises. He wants to hear us say those nice things to Him. Therefore when it is time to worship or praise God, please speak to the Lord, minister to the Lord in your understanding and then you can blast in tongues for hours non-stop. Furthermore, there are times when we need to pray in our understanding, declare God’s word to situations, and Declare and decree God’s words over situations – it is great we do that in those moments and as prompted by the Holy Ghost.
Thank you so much for posting this. I had been questioning and researching the benefit of speaking in tongues for months and everytime my conclusion would come to it being mostly selfish. As Christians we’re supposed to be “disciples” and draw others to Christ. How can a prayer or sermon that no one you’re speaking to can understand be helpful? I don’t know all the facts (if there are any) and I haven’t studied everything about it but I always come back to this.
Thank you so much for reading and sharing your thoughts Patricia. As much as you have understood how it can be selfish, I would also love for you to know that there are so many benefits that come from speaking in tongues. Romans 8:26 says “Likewise the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered”
When we pray in tongues, we pray God’s perfect will over our lives and the earth.Praying in tongues regularly also strengthens our sensitivity to the voice of the Lord.
Jude 1:20 also encourages us to keep building ourselves up on our most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit.
I think it is ok to have people gather together with the sole purpose to pray in tongues; this way everyone knows that all have come to do this spiritual exercise together versus having people gathered to hear the word of God and you just start to blast in tongues.
Please let me know if you have more questions.