Why Fear Speaking In Tongues?
Oct 20
When you start talking about the gifts of the Spirit, many people start to freak out. And if they’re honest, it’s mostly because they are afraid of the gift of tongues.
But why fear the gift of tongues? I know the standard reasons given, but for fun, I want to offer five reasons why you should fear the gift of teaching more than the gift of tongues.
- The gift of teaching requires public speaking. That’s the second biggest fear for many people (death is #1, perhaps taxes is #3). On the other hand, the gift of tongues is primarily meant for your own personal prayer time, and the Apostle Paul even discourages its use in public (1 Corinthians 14:19).
- The gift of teaching requires a person to extensively study Scripture in order to be effective. Tongues, on the other hand, can be spoken regardless if you’ve been reading your Bible or not.
- According to James, you should be afraid of becoming a teacher, because teachers will be judged more strictly by God (James 3:1). Jesus even says that it would be better for you to have a millstone hung around your neck and to be cast into the sea than to lead a little one in the faith astray (Mark 9:42). There are no such warnings for those who possess the gift of tongues.
- When you teach, you must continually strive to ensure your audience understands what you’re trying to say–praying that the “light bulb” inside their head flashes on. Even if you do end up speaking in tongues publicly, the whole point is that no one understands. No pressure at all!
- You can totally fake speaking in tongues and no one will ever know. Just speak some gibberish and put a little passion behind it in your voice. People will be unable to prove whether you have the gift or not. Even if you’ve duped yourself into believing that you have the gift of tongues, no one will be the wiser. (That is, unless they have the gift of discernment…but that’s another blog post…) It’s a lot harder than that to fake people into believing that you have the gift of teaching!
So there you have it. Five reasons why fearing speaking in tongues is kind of silly. If you want to fear a gift of the Spirit, it seems more sensible to fear something like the gift of teaching.
The 2 reasons I fear it is because I don’t understand it, but that is where my faith needs to grow and second I only see it in selective churches. I don’t know why all churches don’t adapt it.
I think my fear is tied into #5 on my list. I want to know that something is genuinely coming from God, and I wonder if oftentimes people speaking in tongues are just saying gibberish.
I am afraid that I could or would fake it, but not even realize that I’m faking it myself, and that it would therefore be insincere. Like, I would wish so hard to be able to speak in tongues that I would make it happen myself, perhaps subconsciously, and therefore I would never really know if it was real or not. Even though there’s much more risk involved with the gift of teaching, as in your example, at least generally speaking there is external, impartial evidence that can tell you if you have the gift of teaching or not–your students. With tongues, how could I ever be certain?
When I was younger I sometimes laugh at those who speak in tongues. So when I do, I feel that someone might do the same to me