Week 46 Corinthians
For years there’s been a debate in the church about the gift of Speaking-in-Tongues. Since Paul spends quite a bit of time comparing Speaking-in-Tongues and the gift of Prophecy I decide to slow down and list the things Paul actually says (the list is my words but I’m pretty sure each of the items below is what Paul’s actually saying):
Prophecy is an especially desirable gift
Tongues – on the other hand – is an incomprehensible language that no one understands (except the Lord)
Prophecy is understandable language intended to benefit people
Tongues benefits the individual who speaks it but prophecy benefits the church
Tongues is desirable but prophecy is more desirable
A prophecy-speaker’s gift is superior to a tongues-speaker’s
A prophecy-speaker’s gift is superior to a tongues-speaker’s gift unless the tongues-speaker interprets his incomprehensible gibberish to understandable words
Incomprehensible language doesn’t profit anyone except the incomprehensible-language-speaker
A comprehensible message is what benefits people
When you’re speaking publicly it’s essential that people get-it…otherwise it’s just gobbledygook – like talking Hindi to a Cocker Spaniel
The big point of a gift is that it’s supposed to benefit the whole church
If I have a tongues-gift and want to help out the church I have to pray that the Lord helps me convert the tongues-gobbledygook into plain English
Tongues Statistic: Five non-gobbledygook words are better than 10,000 in tongues (a 2000:1 ratio)
I know there’s more to it than what’s in chapter 14. But it’s a good start.
Note: paraphrased from 1 Corinthians 14:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 9, 12, 13, 19 (NASB & NLT)