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Do you believe you can speak in tongues at will?

Site Admin Posts: 3222 **6/9/06 4:10 pm**

In this post, the following thoughts were written:

Semantics....

Acts Enthusiast Posts: 1248 **6/9/06 4:15 pm**

I suppose a person could in theory... but that doesn't mean it's of God.

Razz

Hey, DOC Posts: 87 **6/9/06 4:25 pm**

Yes you can. Or I can at least. For the simple minded it's like a water faucet that you never turn off.
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New Member Posts: 14 **6/9/06 4:39 pm**

I do.

Golf Cart Mafia Soldier Posts: 2438 **6/9/06 6:12 pm**

I think a person can on their own but it will be them doing it alone with out the unction of the Holy Ghost.

I'd be too afraid to try it. I have too much respect and fear of God to try and mock him.

True "they did speak" in tongues but as the "Holy Spirit [gave] the utterance."
Anything other than that would be man giving the utterance. His out their on his on.

I've seen Parsley tell everyone to speak in their prayer language when he gave the sign to do so. That to me would be manipulating the tongues. And to me that is fear full!!

You can .. but it wouldn't be inspired ..

Acts-dicted Posts: 7766 **6/9/06 6:50 pm**

as my princess saith .. it is the SPIRIT who gives the utterance that we may rightly call divinely inspired.

It is the human vessel that the Spirit uses to bring forth naturally spoken tongues. But that vessel is occupied by a human spirit who can mimick what it is familiarized with .. and can do so wilfully, on demand. Many in the Pentecostal churches of today are doing just that, I am afraid, for it is often something you see go on quite frequently. The vast majority of these who ape the anointing really do so on feeling that this is a benchmark of spirituality and acceptance in the Tongue Talking world. It's sad because the Comforter is there, ready to bless them with the Reality.

Sadly, there are those who can do likewise for often less than Holy reasons. I remember watching a young student preacher (with a less than stellar testimony) during convocation in the Conn Center prayer room at Lee having a conversation with a pretty young blond female student - in tongues. Both of them waved and did the rapid fire diction of the UntieTheBowtieWhoStoleMyHonda bit. It was bizarre. Nobody seemed to be too concerned about it. Figures. When I asked him afterwards what was going on, since I was an altar worker at Lee he looked at me and said "well I know it looks strange and I don't know what's going on, but God was in it!"

Personally, I think he was getting ready to hit on her since he was definitely in the Marry Or Burn phase, but I really didn't follow it too closely back then .. I had my own cross to carry with that. But I do know that I never tried asking out on dates the women I pursued at Lee and off campus with stammering lips and another tongue (my own tongue was enough to get me in trouble, thank you .. ).

But I digress. FYI .. I haven't done this often, and I really hesitate to say this, but there are times I have spoken a few lines in "tongues", looked contemplative and pitched it in such a way that it sounded like I was speaking a divine oracle for God. I did this in situations that were meant to help believers discern the true and the false. It makes the point.

If shysters like Robert Tilton can do it and make millions, then such discernment is truly in short supply in the world .. and it's proof that you can speak in tongues, sound like the real thing and be completely bereft of the Spirit of God.
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Acts Enthusiast Posts: 1248 **6/9/06 9:03 pm**

Watermelon Assassin Posts: 640 **6/9/06 9:14 pm**

What about free will?

I didn't think that Pentecostal Arminians believe that God overrides a person's will for any reason at all. If you don't will to do it, then you are not exercising your free will. So those who believe they can't control it are not believers in free will after all? Question

Which is it? Free will or no free will?

Fascinating discussion!

[Insert Acts Pun Here] Posts: 13680 **6/9/06 9:59 pm**

I can believe in free will when it comes to salvation, but not other things. For example, I don't have free will to heal anyone. Somehow, I think you knew that. Very Happy

Golf Cart Mafia Associate Posts: 2160 **6/10/06 8:33 am**

I agree with speaking in tongues as the Spirit gives the ability, so I guess my views on this don't fall into the "all or nothing" categories that some might prefer. As an Arminian, I am by definition a synergist, though I would certainly qualify that term to point out that it is not a synergy of equals, but is the synergy of sheep following their Shepherd.

Several years ago, my eyes were opened to the horrible results of teaching people that they can speak in tongues at will (and that it will be the Spirit of God anointing them to do so). My mother, who after 27 years of being a faithful pastor's wife, left our family for one of dad's "friends." While shacked up with this guy she said to me, "Now I know 'once saved, always saved' is true, because all this time I've still been able to speak in tongues whenever I want to." She didn't appreciate it very much when I told her she could probably speak in tongues in Hell, too.
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Acts-perienced Poster Posts: 11849 **6/10/06 8:46 am**

Since I was baptized with the Holy Spirit at the age of 11 or 12, I have been able to speak in tongues whenever I wanted to pray in tongues. Some people say they can't. I think this is a case of varieties within the same gift.

While someone of you are concerned about people faking it, and think it is dangerous to try to do so if the Spirit moves you, it could also be dangerous to reject the idea that people who speak in tongues at will are faking it.

The Bible implies that speakers in tongues can control when they speak in tongues. At least they can, and in some cases should, refrain from speaking in tongues when they can. It does not say if they always can or not.

Some of the people who think you have to be moved to speak in tongues could pray in fake tongues. Some of the people who can turn it on and off could speak in fake tongues. Just imagine someone who thinks if they are 'moved' they must speak in tongues. The organist hits the right notes and everyone is excited, so the emotional goosebumps come up on this person, and he or she feels 'moved' and starts speaking in tongues, even if there is no interpreter and it is, Biblically, out of order. If the tongues are fake, they would be fake if the person is emotionally moved. I Corinthians 14 is written about people who do have at least some control over tongues, enough to refrain if there is no interpreter.

Smith Wigglesworth had an interesting testimony about this. He spoke in tongues once when he was baptized with the Spirit, according to one of the books of his sermons, but it was not until later that he said he received the gift of tongues and could pray in tongues at will. I don't see scripture to make a distinction between the two types of tongues that he believed in, but I do see that the Spirit can operate in a variety of ways. If Smith could use the gift of healing at will--for the sake of argument-- that would not make it a fake gift. He had a testimony about his wife dying, his laying hands on her and her coming back to life. She told him it was her time, and he let her die again.

I am also concerned about fake tongues, as Rafael is. I was in a Liardon before the scandal broke out church meeting in Indonesia. He visited a denomination within Bethel, affiliated with COG, with is very TV charismatic in style with its own unique Asian flavor. I had noticed some people saying 'bababa' or 'badabadabada' for 'tongues' when the worship leader told everyone to speak in tongues in church before. But this time, there were 6,000 and I was shocked to hear a whole room saying 'babababababababa' and considering it to be tongues.

I suppose 'bababa' could mean something in some language, but everyone doing it makes me wonder if it is some kind of psychological thing. Liardon preached a sermon i considered to be rather fluffy on 'warring tongues' calling their tongues 'baby tongues.' I can't recall him showing even a prooftext for this, but I guess he did not need to being a celebrity and all. His books were in the bookstore after all.

Anyway, at the end, he asked those seeking to be baptized with the Spirit to raise their hands, and told them not to think, but to say whatever 'bubbles up out of your belly.' Then he told everyone who had gotten it to speak in tongues around them.

Hmm. I wonder if someone really wants to believe they have been baptized with the Holy Spirit, and they blank their mind and say whatever 'bubbles up out of their belly'--and someone says 'bababababa' in their ear-- if they could say 'bababababa' without getting filled with the Holy Ghost. I don't know how this COG affiliate gets people to seek for the baptism normally when foreign guests speakers aren't there, because the English service had guest speakers, but if they follow this pattern, I could see how there could be a lot of counterfeits.

Overall, I think Pentecostal churches often push the tongues thing too much. No scripture says everyone is going to speak in tongues, and Paul very strongly implies that not everyone will. There are other gifts and evidences of the Spirit in people's lives. It took me a long time to let go of the 'initial evidence' doctrine. Even though the Biblical case for the initial evidence doctrine was weak at best, in my experience, it seemed like everyone who did the other I Corinthians 12 things and similar things to that spoke in tongues. But, when you run into people with other gifts who have never spoken in tongues, though, it makes even less sense to hold on to it.

I am also concerned that when it comes to speaking in tongues, a lot of people, and entire churches and church organizations, don't go to the trouble to actually read the passages on tongues and imply them in church. Paul said if there was no interpreter, to keep silent in the church. He went to great lengths to explain how tongues to not edify if they are not interpreted. But these people think their own doctrines about tongues being the most spiritual form of prayer, the theory that devils can't hear you if you pray in tongues, or other such ideas to outway the teaching of scripture on the issue. So they tell everyone to pray or sing in tongues at the same time in church without interpretation, contrary to what Paul wrote in the Bible, in that passage which he calls commandments of the Lord. If I visit a church like that, I refrain from praying in tongues in the congregation while they all do it as a matter of principle and obedience.
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Watermelon Assassin Posts: 640 **6/10/06 9:43 am**

Re: Do you believe you can speak in tongues at will?

Friendly Face Posts: 150 **6/10/06 10:37 am**

Golf Cart Mafia Underboss Posts: 3954 **6/10/06 2:09 pm**

what i don't get, and alluded to in another thread, is why God would interrupt a worship service with a message in tongues and the person giving the interpratation just gives a warmed over rephrasing of a verse of scripture or some generic "i am with you...you will overcome" type message.
it seems if this were all so real and emphatic then the message of interpratation would carry the same weight, gravity, impact that you would expect if God showed up and talked.
now, i believe in tongues and interpratation, but what we get is so milque-toast, it makes me wonder.
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Acts Enthusiast Posts: 1441 **6/10/06 3:21 pm**

This line of thought is the result of the invasion of the Charismatics into Pentecostalism forty years ago. If you can speak in tongues at will, then you are in control. I have not discovered in my lifetime any place where the Holy Spirit has surrendered Himself to the control, whim and fancy of mortal man. He is Divine. He is God. And He is not under the control of man.
The first line of defense these Charismatics will use is the excesses and mistakes of the past which were committed by Pentecostals. Well, two wrongs don't make a right, and there is no firm Biblical basis for speaking in tongues at will, while there is a clear foundation for the Holy Spirit giving the utterance.
If speaking in tongues is not Divine and Spirit inspired, what good is it?
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Golf Cart Mafia Underboss Posts: 3954 **6/10/06 4:41 pm**

Remember words, yes. Speak in tongues, no.

Acts-celerate Owner Posts: 6957 **6/10/06 4:48 pm**

At almost any time I can remember and repeat words I've said in tongues in the past. That probably is completely OK, but the Bible says of the disciples and all others gathered in the Upper Room "And they all began to speak with other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance."

Remembering words said in the past is OK but I think a fresh move of the Spirit comes each time when the Holy Spirit gives utterance. That doesn't mean I have to discount what God said to me or through me in the past.

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Golf Cart Mafia Associate Posts: 2160 **6/10/06 8:31 pm**

Hon. Dr. in Acts-celeratology Posts: 5657 **6/10/06 8:58 pm**

Bingo Doyle!

A person can indeed speak in tongues at will -- so to speak. Rolling Eyes

But if they are then they are not speaking as the Spirit gives them utterance and the origin of the tongue speaking in question would then seem to be other than Divine in such a case. Wink

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Acts-perienced Poster Posts: 11849 **6/11/06 3:42 am**

The question is, does the Spirit 'will' to give the utterance to the believers who wilfully speak in tongues in their private prayer or at other times.

The idea that you can't speak in tongues unless specifically moved to do so is an idea that causes a lot of problems. It is clear from scripture that one can speak in tongues out of order. People who hold to this idea are often the ones who think they don't have to have an interpreter if they speak in tongues, contrary to scripture, or speak in tongues interrupting someone.

Some of the 'fluff' out there comes from people who think you can't speak in tongues at will. It doesn't just come from those who think you can.

Could it be that the Spirit gives the utterance to many people whenever they want to use tongues in prayer?

Paul says "I will pray with the Spirit...." Notice that 'I will...' He doesn't say he'll sit around and wait for the utterance.

Like I said before, i believe there can be varieties within the same gift.
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