Speaking in Tongues

INTRO: My wife and I spent a week helping with her parents who have been sick, and who live quite a distance from here. We wanted to give those in the family a break who had spent so much time doing that for the past few months.

While we were there we joined Church Sunday morning. In the Sunday School class, the subject was the baptism and filling of the Holy Spirit and the topic that was raised several times was the matter of speaking in tongues. It is a very long time ago since I studied that subject and there were some questions raised I could not answer. However, for the first time in a long time my interest was tweaked. I have not had this interest since I completed a booklet on the subject of tongues many years ago. In that booklet I deal with tongues in 1 Corinthians 12-14. I will attach it to the end of the notes on this message which we will post on sermonaudio.com/mecl for those who might be interested. There I deal with some very difficult questions.

Well, in discussing this subject after church, a thought was raised that we probably don't have answers to what is meant by the gift of tongues on this subject. I said to my wife, "That is a good thought for me. I have to look at it again." Well, for the first time in many years I had a renewed interest in the subject.

Since there is only one Sunday between now and the Passover season, which we call Easter, I decided to take a little break from our studies in Hebrews and cover this subject in the passages where it is dealt with before one gets to Corinthians. I have not spoken on these before. Now the subject of the gift of tongues has two interpretations. Either it means speaking in foreign or other languages