Quote:
Originally Posted by Walks_in_islam
"When they heard this sound, a crowd came together in bewilderment, because each one heard them speaking in his own language. Utterly amazed, they asked: `Are not all these men who are speaking Galileans? Then how is it that each of us hears them in his own native language?... We hear them declaring the wonders of God in our own tongues!'"
Neither do you. ^^ (above) is the miracle of "tongues" as outlined in your book. This is not what you do or what you experience.
The other references to tongues not only describe other tongues but describe what is said. Such as "for they heard them speaking in tongues and magnifying God" in Acts 10.
I believe the term for what you do is "glossolalia" which really pales to and is not the same as what is described to be a real unusual event ( Acts 2) - one that I don't believe has ever been repeated in any of your lifetimes.
Unless you have a specific example. Otherwise you completely ostracize people until they blah blah blah for a few minutes and join your club.
Sorry dude, that's how I see it. Maybe i'm wrong but that's what it looks, smells, and sounds like. |
I could give you a specific example but I don't think you would believe me. It doesn't concern me, but several others whom I know and have met, and who relate to one another specifically because of a genuine xenolalic experience.
But that's besides the point.
"Speaking in tongues AND praising God" - ie two distinct things. While it is true they were likely praising God in other languages, it is also entirely possible and indeed probable they were doing both. In most Pentecostal meetings (my experience, anyway) you will see the same thing: people speaking in tongues AND praising God. The two go hand in hand. Again, per my experience.
As for foreign languages:
Now when this was noised abroad, the multitude came together, and were confounded, because that every man heard them speak in his own language. And they were all amazed and marvelled, saying one to another, Behold, are not all these which speak Galilaeans? And how hear we every man in our own tongue, wherein we were born?
(Acts 2:6-8)
A close examination of what is actually written shows a unique phenomenon. Each person who showed up to see what the hubbub was about heard all the disciples speaking in his, the visitor's, own language. Which technically speaking is an ontological impossibility, because a person cannot speak more than one language at a time. So not only were the disciples "speaking in tongues", but a distinct phenomenon occured whereby the visitors understood that "tongue speaking" as their own native language or dialect (that is, the language of the country in which they were from). So the guy from Rome heard all these Galilean disciples speaking Latin, whereas the guy from Parthia heard all those same disciples speaking Parthian, and so forth.
That being the case, the disciples were not simply "speaking in otherwise known foreign languages", but something entirely weird was going on in that first Pentecostal meeting. Along the lines of something that almost nobody can relate to unless they've been in a genuine Pentecostal meeting, in which inexplicable things like this tend to happen. Unfortunately, such meetings are getting rare nowadays, even among those who call themselves "Pentecostal".