Tongues, Prophecy & Order in Worship - 1 Corinthians 14:14-40 Explained

Hello and welcome to Through the Bible with Les Feldick. An Oklahoma rancher and farmer, Les Feldick has been teaching homestyle Bible classes for 20 years in Iowa, Oklahoma, and Texas. Les Feldick's unique style of Bible teaching has made the books of the Bible come to life. When Les is teaching, it's so interesting that people say time just seems to fly by. And now, here is Les Feldick. Okay, good to have everybody back with us. And again, we're going to go right on where we left off in 1 Corinthians chapter 14. For those of you in the studio, for those of you out in television, we'd like to welcome you into our class setting. And we nothing like better than when you write and say you feel like you're sitting right in the class with us. This is what we try to put across, that you're just part of a classroom setting. We are not a big church congregation. We're just an informal Bible study. And we don't care whether you're Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, or whatever. We just want you to see what the book says, and we don't try to twist any arms. And as I've said from day one, it's not our purpose to move you from one group to another, but to just reach out and help you to understand what the Word of God really says. All the programs that we've produced from Genesis 1 up to where we are now in Corinthians have been made available for all these years by way of the videotapes. And the tapes have been transcribed into the printed page. And now we've made available by popular demand only. We aren't doing this for a money gimmick whatsoever. We're going to sell them as reasonably as we can. But we've put the same 12-program sequence that are in a video in the audio tapes. And so there are six hours in one of these little attractive packages. We like it. We've had Keith Decker put it all together for us, and we just think that he does a tremendous job in our newsletter and with getting the little books ready for the printer. And so we've got to give Keith credit for even getting the audios ready. So if you're interested in any of these vehicles, whether it's the books or the videos or the little audio cassettes, you call us or write to us, and we'll get the information in your hands. Okay, now we want to get right back into the book. That's what we're here for, is for Bible study. And we left off in our last half hour with verse 13, and let's just jump back in at verse 14 now. And I guess in that light I'll have to explain to our audience that the 9714 over here on this side is for the benefit of our television people. I wish we'd have known all this when we started. It probably would have saved a lot of confusion. But this is the program number that they'll be going by. For those of you ordering books and tapes and audios, this is the number that you'll go by. Which means that we are now up to Book and Tape 28. We are presently in the third set and in the second half hour. That's what the formula really means. Okay, so much for that. Now back into I Corinthians 14, and dropping down to verse 14, where Paul continues now to admonish the Corinthians to take stock of what they were doing and realize that all that glitters isn't gold, is the way we put it. And that's all I'm saying. I'm not condemning the folk who claim to have spoken in tongues. I'm not going to look down my nose at them. But all I do ask everyone in the spirit of chapter 13, the love chapter, is to analyze this whole thing in the light of what God wants. Not what men want. We're living in that era of instant gratification. Regardless of what area of our life we may be looking at. But listen, we have to line everything up with the Word of God, or we're on thin ice. And that's all I try to do. I don't try to browbeat people into everything the way I see it. You can disagree with me on things, and that's fine. But on the other hand, I think it's my responsibility since the Lord has given me this avenue of teaching, that we show what the Word says. Now verse 14, to me this is so plain. Where Paul now speaking in the first person says, If I pray in an unknown tongue, there's that singular again, that sound that can't be reduced to a phonetic sound or reduced to writing. If I pray in an unknown tongue, my spirit prayeth, but my understanding is unfruitful. Now how much plainer can you get? Even for the individual. What good does it do, Paul says, to speak in a language that you don't know you're talking about? And I know their answer is what God does. The Book doesn't say He does. We know that being omniscient He certainly can if He wants to. But there is nothing in here to indicate that this is what God expects people to do. Not a word. Next verse, verse 15. What is it then? I will pray with the Spirit, again Paul says, I'm going to pray from my innermost being, that's a small spirit, his own spirit, and I will pray with understanding. Now look, how many of you would talk to God in prayer, whether it's thanksgiving or supplication, or whatever thing you may have in your mind. What good would it do to talk to God in something that you don't know what you're talking about? Even if God may be able to discern it, what if you can't? You don't know what you're asking for, and this is what Paul is pointing out. Whatever you do with regard to communication with God, do it in understanding. And then he reads on, I will sing absolutely. Now here again, my I know some, and I probably include myself sometimes, we've gotten too laid back. But on the other hand, we know that there were instances in Scripture when people sang and danced before the Lord, and there's nothing wrong with singing. There's nothing wrong with an exuberation in our Christian spirit. Absolutely nothing. But again, it has to be tempered with common sense. So he says, I will sing with the understanding also. Now I'm just going to more or less read these verses, and I hope they keep it on the screen. Ephesians 2.1a In other words, you're asking the blessing over a table around whom many people are sitting. And if you supposedly pray in an unknown, guttural language, how do your people around the table know when you've finished, and you have finished your prayer? How will they know what you're talking about? Seeing understandeth not what thou sayest. Ephesians 2.17 And then verse 18, Paul makes a graphic statement. I thank God. I speak with tongues, plural, languages. I speak with languages more than you all. Now I for years have said, this is what Paul was driving at. And now some of the great scholars are beginning to write it in their books. What's Paul saying? That when he went into these various areas and different tribes, and dialects, and different languages, could he communicate? Yes! Yes! He had that special gift. Christianity was just getting off the ground. And he could go in, and he could speak a Greek dialect, or a Latin dialect, or a Hebrew, or Aramaic. And he had that gift, and that's what he's driving at. He's speaking of languages with which he could communicate the Gospel. And he says, I speak with those languages more than you all, yet, verse 19, in the church, in the congregation, in the worship service, I had rather speak five words with my understanding, that by my voice I might teach others also, than to have ten thousand words in an unknown tongue. Brethren, be not children in understanding, how be it in malice, that's not a very nice word you know, how be it in malice you be children, but in understanding grow up and be what? Men! See how plain all this is? Verse 21. In the law it is written, with men of other languages, tongues, plural, with men of other languages and other lips, I will speak unto this people, and yet for all that they will not hear me, saith the Lord. Alright, Paul is quoting from Deuteronomy, and we're going to go back and look at that one in a minute. Go back and look at Deuteronomy 28. Deuteronomy 28, verse 49. And let's just read it a second. Deuteronomy 28, verse 29. And of course, Deuteronomy is one of the five books of Moses, so Moses is writing, and it's directed to the children of Israel. Verse 49, Deuteronomy 28. The Lord shall bring a nation, see, a nation of foreign people, the Lord shall bring a nation against thee from far, from the end of the earth, as swift as the eagle flyeth, a nation an enemy, an invader remember, a nation whose tongue thou shalt not understand. Now what's the tongue referred to? Their language. Whether it was the Babylonians that he was referring to, or whether it was the Greeks or the Romans, there would come a time in Israel's history that a foreign nation would overrun them, invade them, and the Jews would have to listen to them talking in their language as they were being occupied. You see that? Now it wasn't an unknown tongue, but it was a language that the Jews would not be able to understand, and it was a warning. It was a warning to the nation. Listen, you're going to have people in your midst that you're not going to like to have around. You're not going to be able to understand what they say. They're going to be foreigners. And so this is exactly what Paul is referring to. Now come back with me to I Corinthians 14 again. And so this is exactly the situation that he refers to that he says in the Law, verse 21, it is written, back to I Corinthians 14, verse 21, "...with men of other languages, and other lips, I will speak unto this people, by occupying them, by taking tribute from them, by putting them under servitude." And yet for all that Paul says, or Moses as he wrote, from Deuteronomy, "...yet for all that they will not hear me, saith the Lord." Now verse 22, "...wherefore tongues, this ability to speak in languages, as we showed a few programs back, it was for a sign to the Jew." Now turn back with me to I Corinthians chapter 1, I think it is. Stay in I Corinthians chapter 1, verse 22, and again all we're going by is what the Book says. This isn't what my idea is. I'm not pulling this out of the woodwork. This is what the Book says. I Corinthians 1, verse 22, "...for the Jews require," what? "...a sign." Now stop and think. How long has Israel been demanding signs? Well it goes all the way back to when Moses was first called out of the desert, and even Moses, the Jew, did not believe that he was supposed to do what God wanted him to do. And so how did God prove it to him? He says, throw your shepherd's rod on the ground. You all know the account. And what happened? It became serpent. And he says, pick it up. He picked it up, and it was his shepherd's rod. Well what's God trying to show old Moses? That he is in it. He is going to take him back to Pharaoh. And then Moses said, yeah, but when I get to Pharaoh, he's not going to believe that I'm supposed to lead the children of Israel out. And what does God tell Moses and Aaron? Same thing. You throw your rod down on the ground, and it will become a serpent. And all these signs were not so much for Pharaoh's benefit, but for Moses and Aaron. To prove to those two men that God was going to do the supernatural. He's going to bring Israel out of Egypt. And so all the way up through Israel's history you have the supernatural. And you come into Christ's earthly ministry. And I've taught it, and I've taught it, and I've taught it, until I'm blue in the face. Why did Jesus perform miracle, after miracle, after miracle? To prove to the Jew that He was who He said He was. It was signs. Remember when we taught the book of John, there were seven signs, miraculous signs, recorded in the book of John. And every one of them had a whole trainload of truth for the nation of Israel. They didn't mean that much to us Gentiles, but they meant everything to the Jew. And now Paul comes in, even as he writes to a Gentile congregation, he says, "...the Jews require a sign." The Greek philosophers of his day, they sought after what? Wisdom. But the next verse says the flip side. Paul says, "...I'm not outperforming signs to convince the Jew." I'm not out being philosophical to convince the Greek. But Paul says, "...we preach Christ and Him crucified." Do you see the difference? Alright, now then, come back to chapter 14, and again he comes back with that same concept. The tongues, the ability to speak all these languages, such as he had, were for a sign. They were for a sign, not to them that believe, but to them that believe not. But, again the flip side, prophesying. Not like we had in the last half hour. What did I say the gift of prophesying was for? To proclaim or preach the Word before they had the New Testament. It was a gift. Now he says, signs and all this, this isn't going to accomplish all that much, but what will? Preaching the Word. This is what people need to hear today. People have to hear the Gospel. They have to hear the plan of salvation. They don't have to see some kind of a miracle. Now I'm not condemning these people that can prove some miraculous manifestation. They've got to prove it before I believe it. But if they can prove it, then I'll say, Yes, I know we have a God who can perform miracles. I know God can heal miraculously, and I do not deny that. Alright, but now Paul says, reading exactly what he says, speaking forth the Word, or prophesying in verse 22, "...serveth not for them that believe, not but for them who believe." Well what's he talking about? To bring them in growth in their Christian experience. To bring them so they wouldn't be blown about with every wind of doctrine. Well now I wish I could go through this a little bit faster, but let's just sort of skim through these intervening verses, and then I've got to come up and deal with another one that's a hot potato, especially in our day and time. What about the women's activity in the local church? Well we'll come to that in a minute, but before we get there, let's just skim verses 23 down through verse 33. Verse 23, "...if therefore the whole church be come together in one place, and all speak with various languages, and then there come in those who are unlearned, or unbelievers, from off the street, and they hear all this conglomeration of languages." Paul says, "...will they not say, You are mad?" Now you know what the word mad in the King James, what the root word is in the Greek? Maniac. That's where the word maniac came from. Same Greek root word. And he says, "...they'll come in off the street, they'll look at you, and they'll say, You're a bunch of maniacs. You're mad." Alright, verse 24, "...but if all prophesy, and he's speaking forth the word, and there come in one who believes not, or one unlearned, he's convinced, or he's judged, because he's hearing the word of God." See what a difference. "...and thus are the secrets of his heart, made manifest, and so falling down in his face, he will worship God, and report that God is in you of a truth, if he can hear the word. How is it then, brethren?" Verse 26, "...when you come together, every one of you has a psalm, or a doctrine, or a tongue, or a revelation, and you have an interpretation, if you do all of that at once, what have you got? Confusion." See? Confusion. "...and so he said, Let all things be done unto Ediphi." Now if you wonder what he's driving at, come on over to verse 40. That puts the cap on it. "...let everything be done decently, and how?" In order, that's what the Book says. It's not what I'm saying. The Book says, "...let everything be done decently, and in order." Now then, let's come all the way up to verse 34. Now he says, "...let your women keep silence in the churches." Now here's where the women have come down on the Apostle Paul, isn't it? They say, He was an anti-feminist. He didn't want to give women credit for anything. Now here again, I'm going to have to explain in detail why the Holy Spirit inspired the Apostle Paul to write the things concerning women in these coming verses that he did. There's a reason for it, and I've already alluded to it in previous programs. Corinth was a wicked, wicked city. Gross immorality, like I guess, from what I'm hearing even the internet is coming close now. But it's gross. That temple up there on that bluff, every night a thousand of those priestesses from the temple came down into the streets of Corinth practitioning prostitutes. So this was something that had to be dealt with every day of this little church's existence. So what is Paul going to lay upon the congregation of believers? Don't do anything that will smack of being like one of those prostitutes. Now do you see that? And so he has to come in and he says, Now ladies, watch your languages and your speaking and your behavior, because if you do anything that smacks of those brazen, talkative prostitutes, the world is going to get the wrong impression. You following me? And so anything, anything that would make someone say, Well they're no different than those prostitutes. Paul says, Then you have to be careful. Now like I've always said, the prostitutes were completely in a class of their own. Now you know that even today in the Middle East, I was reading an article not too long ago, in the Middle East, if a lady is veiled, she can go almost anywhere in any street in any place in the Middle East without fear. No one dares touch a veiled woman. Now we can't understand that, but that's their culture. But let her take her veil off, and she becomes the object of almost anything that they want to do to her. And so Paul is using all this as an example that these prostitutes were so brazen in their dress, in their behavior, in their talkativeness, and he said, In light of that, now I want you women of the Church, don't you be anything like one of those women of the street. Consequently, be subdued, be subservient to your husband, and don't be like they are. Read on in verse 34. Let your women keep silence, as a complete opposite of those out on the street. For it is not permitted unto them to speak, but they are commanded to be under obedience, as also saith the law. Now I had to point out to someone here just the other day, you've got to remember that under the Law, even under God's Law to Israel, the woman had almost no rights. It was unfortunate, but God had His reason for doing it. And I've said it over and over on this program, and in my class wherever I teach, the greatest liberty for the feminine portion of the human race was Christianity. Christianity brought women out of that place of being downtrodden, not permitted to be educated, not permitted to read, but Christianity brought the woman up onto almost an equal level with men. But what has present day women done with that? Well they've abused it. And anytime you abuse something then it begins to backfire. So Paul is still writing here in the light of the culture and the day and time in which he writes, and so he says, Women remain subdued, don't be talkative, don't be the one that take authority there in the local church. Verse 35. If they will learn anything, let them ask their husbands at home. Well why? In order again to keep that mood of subservience. Not slavery, but recognizing that the husband was the head of the house. And that goes all the way back of course to the Garden of Eden. Man that's where it all began. And it was prompted of course by Eve's eating of the fruit first. And let's go back and look at it. I hope we've got time. I haven't seen a minute or so for a while. Genesis. Genesis chapter 3 I reckon is where it has to be. Genesis chapter 3 beginning at verse 16. Okay we've got time enough. Genesis chapter 3, verse 16. Now this is after Adam and Eve have eaten. After sin has entered. And he's already dealt with Satan. And now in verse 16, unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow, and thy conception in sorrow, and thou shalt bring forth children. Now you know whenever I teach on the millennium, I scare women half to death you know. Now you want to remember that in the thousand year reign of Christ the curse is lifted, and childbearing will no longer be part of the curse as it was here. See the travail and the pain and the suffering that women go through in childbearing today is a result of the curse. That isn't the way God intended it. And so when you get the curse lifted, childbearing is going to be an exhilarating experience beyond even what it is today. But because of the curse, look what God did. And He said, And in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children, and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he the husband shall rule over thee. Now that's the way God commanded it. That's the way He ordained it. And so all the way up through the Old Testament, yes the woman was, to our way of thinking, almost overly subdued, but nevertheless this is still part of Paul's thinking as he deals with the Corinthian church. That the women were to recognize the fact that the man was still the head of the family, he was the head of the woman, and that she was to be subdued under those services in the church. Now let's finish the chapter quickly before the end of the half hour. So he says, verse 36. What? Did the Word of God come out from you, or did it come unto you only? If any man think himself to be a prophet or spiritual, let him acknowledge that the things that I write unto you are what? The commandments of the Lord. Now I'm sure Paul at this point in time had not recognized or understood that his letters would become part of Scripture, and that you and I would be studying it 2 ,000 years later. But he did know that what he wrote to this little congregation in Corinth was inspired by the Holy Spirit as he wrote it. So this wasn't just man's idea. This is the Word of God. And this is why he's saying it. Alright, read on. Verse 38. If any man be ignorant, let him be ignorant. You know what that boils down to? It's a matter of choice. If you want to know what the Word says, you come into it and you read it. You study it, you'll learn. If you don't want to know what it says, and you want to remain ignorant, God gives you that prerogative. Go ahead and stay ignorant. Nobody's going to force you. Alright, next verse. Wherefore, brethren, covet or desire to prophesy, to speak forth the Word, because the printed Word hasn't come yet, and forbid not to speak in these languages. Nor will I, because of this verse. It's a commandment from the Lord Himself not to forbid the use of languages. Now then, verse 40. Let all things, regardless of what it is in the local congregation, is what we're dealing with. Let it all be done decently and in order, because then you see it brings honor and glory to the God whom we claim to worship. But how many people are taking these things out of context, and they're forgetting that the primary purpose of all that we do is to bring honor and glory to God. Thank you for watching Through the Bible with Les Feldick, a weekly Bible study. If you would like more information about the Les Feldick Ministries, a Bible study in your area, or about this program, write to Les Feldick Ministries, Route 1, Box 760, Kinta, Oklahoma, 74552. That's Route 1, Box 760, Kinta, Oklahoma, 74552. Through the Bible with Les Feldick is viewer supported, and your gift is appreciated. Thank you, and be sure to tune in next time for Through the Bible with Les Feldick.