WHY PROPHECY, TONGUES and KNOWLEDGE GIFTS CEASED IN THE FIRST CENTURY AD.

[Presbyterian Continuist]

RESPONSE to post #12..."If your case was bought to a court of law..."

God is the Only JUDGE. He sees in the hearts/souls/spirits of all Men for all time. This thread is about the miraculous SIGN GIFTS manifested in the early "church". He alone knows whether the manifestations of the SIGN GIFTS come from:
1. God the Holy Spirit
2. Man
3. satan / followers.

The BEST EVIDENCE: The absolute spiritual truths in the "word of God"...The miraculous Bible. And Paul is the ONLY spirit-led commentator!

The WORST EVIDENCE: false doctrines of the modern Charismatic Movement.

INADMISSIBLE EVIDENCE: the unprovable emotion laden conflicting testimonies of human beans.

Did someone in a Charismatic church hurt you in some way?

 

[klutedavid]

SEE:

27 REASONS WHY CHRISTIANS SHOULD NEITHER SEEK NOR DESIRE TONGUES.

Hello Ron.

Do not forbid speaking in tongues!

 

[tdidymas]

So when it was reported that there were 250 documented miraculous healings in the ministry of John Wesley, are you then saying that he was either motivated by man or the devil? If not, you would have to acknowledge that they were of God. If of God, then your Cessationist theory is blown, and any comments you make about any movement that promotes the miraculous sign gifts has to be very unreliable.

Oscarr: I try my best to have an open mind on everything I see and hear. So I cannot argue with your experiences or the documents you refer to about past miracles, because I wasn't there, and I don't really know enough to discern much of anything. However, I feel the need to mention 2 things about my own experience, so that you can see how anecdotal testimonies of people can conflict.

(1) I used to speak in tongues, that is, in the modern-day glossalalia we commonly hear in the Charismatic movement. I came from that background, as I have a family/relatives full of Pentecostals and Charismatics. They all are people who I consider as precious people, who I want to share eternity with. But one day the Lord spoke to me while I was praying in my "tongue," and He told me that it was not of Him. I took that to mean that He was forbidding me to speak it. After some years of considering what God told me and studying the scripture, I am fully convinced that what I had was a false gift, and was of a fleshly origin.

(2) I had 40 years of experience in fellowship with Pentecostals and Charismatics, in churches, home groups, conferences, missions, etc. My experience of them regarding miracles is that there is a great exaggeration about them. Most (if not almost all) of what they call miraculous is not miraculous (although much of it may be classified as God's Providence, that is, God working through natural circumstances). Further, some of what they call miraculous is actually fraudulent. An obvious example of that is the "gold dust" and "gold teeth" that some have claimed to appear miraculously from heaven; if you examine the details, it becomes obvious that it is fraud. Most of the 100's of Charismatics I knew personally were gullible because they had a desperate desire to find God at work; therefore they sought miracles and found them in exaggeration and urban legend.

I am not saying that God doesn't do miracles today, since I have experienced at least one myself, and hear many testimonies to that effect, some of which I accept without question. The Lord can and does answer prayer through natural means (actually most of the time) rather than performing miraculous acts, though. I am speaking from my own experience and what I have seen and heard. I am also not saying that all tongues of today is false. I am saying, though, that out of 100's (or 1000's) of times I have heard "tongues" spoken (other than my own), I have yet to hear an authentic miraculous tongues of the Acts 2 kind.

I am not arguing against your testimony, I am simply giving my own testimony as someone who has a very different experience than you have.
TD

 

[Presbyterian Continuist]

Oscarr: I try my best to have an open mind on everything I see and hear. So I cannot argue with your experiences or the documents you refer to about past miracles, because I wasn't there, and I don't really know enough to discern much of anything. However, I feel the need to mention 2 things about my own experience, so that you can see how anecdotal testimonies of people can conflict.

(1) I used to speak in tongues, that is, in the modern-day glossalalia we commonly hear in the Charismatic movement. I came from that background, as I have a family/relatives full of Pentecostals and Charismatics. They all are people who I consider as precious people, who I want to share eternity with. But one day the Lord spoke to me while I was praying in my "tongue," and He told me that it was not of Him. I took that to mean that He was forbidding me to speak it. After some years of considering what God told me and studying the scripture, I am fully convinced that what I had was a false gift, and was of a fleshly origin.

(2) I had 40 years of experience in fellowship with Pentecostals and Charismatics, in churches, home groups, conferences, missions, etc. My experience of them regarding miracles is that there is a great exaggeration about them. Most (if not almost all) of what they call miraculous is not miraculous (although much of it may be classified as God's Providence, that is, God working through natural circumstances). Further, some of what they call miraculous is actually fraudulent. An obvious example of that is the "gold dust" and "gold teeth" that some have claimed to appear miraculously from heaven; if you examine the details, it becomes obvious that it is fraud. Most of the 100's of Charismatics I knew personally were gullible because they had a desperate desire to find God at work; therefore they sought miracles and found them in exaggeration and urban legend.

I am not saying that God doesn't do miracles today, since I have experienced at least one myself, and hear many testimonies to that effect, some of which I accept without question. The Lord can and does answer prayer through natural means (actually most of the time) rather than performing miraculous acts, though. I am speaking from my own experience and what I have seen and heard. I am also not saying that all tongues of today is false. I am saying, though, that out of 100's (or 1000's) of times I have heard "tongues" spoken (other than my own), I have yet to hear an authentic miraculous tongues of the Acts 2 kind.

I am not arguing against your testimony, I am simply giving my own testimony as someone who has a very different experience than you have.
TD

I went through a period of time when I was attacked by doubts about the gift of tongues. I had some serious conversations about it, and the Lord directed me to 1 Corinthians 14 and told me that He would not have allowed a whole chapter of the Bible to be written if the gift of tongues was false. He also told me that the devil will do all he can to stop people praying in tongues because that mode of prayer is a real threat to him. The Lord also told me that the devil will cause people to teach it wrongly, fail to use self control over the use of it, speak in tongues in public meetings without interpretation - contrary to Paul's clear teaching; in order to make people think that the gift of tongues as practiced to day is false. But there is a principle that the devil will counterfeit every good thing that God does, and the counterfeit is so close to the genuine that it is difficult to tell them apart. The Lord reminded me of the three steps of faith to receive the gift - (1) Believe that it is God will for me; (2) Ask Him for it - and that if I ask for bread He will not give me a stone, therefore if I ask for the genuine gift of tongues He will not give me something different; (3) Receive it from Him - because he who asks receives. He gave the the assurance that anyone who receives the gift of tongues on that basis they will receive the genuine article.

The problem is that many receive a counterfeit because they are pressured into it, or they don't go through the steps of faith first. They look for a sensory experience and the devil is always there to give them one.

I know people who left the church and rejected Christ because of the "hypocrites in the church". They allowed themselves to throw the baby out with the bath water because of the mistakes and failures of those within the church. In the same way, many have rejected the modern use of the gifts of the Spirit because of the mistakes and counterfeits they have witnessed. But you need to know that where there are counterfeits, there has to be the genuine. And I believe that people who genuinely pray in tongues will not speak it out in church unless there is an interpreter present.

I think you may have believed at one stage that it was God's will for you to pray in tongues and when you sought the Lord for it, it was the genuine article. When, after 12 years in the Pentecostal/Charismatic movement, I became totally disillusioned with it and left and joined an Anglican church, I decided never to have anything to do with the Charismatic again. But I couldn't stop speaking in tongues. I didn't want to. This showed me that the gift I received was from God and not through some church. In actual fact, when I first received the gift it was on a beach on Wellington Harbour, and not within a church meeting at all. It seemed that the Lord spoke to me, after three weeks of asking and pleading Him for the gift He said, "Why are you pleading for something I gave you 2000 years ago? Use your faith and start speaking." That's what I did, and before long I was speaking a fluent language. Therefore my gift is not associated by any church, but it is firmly based on Paul's teaching in 1 Corinthians 14. Notice that 1 Corinthians was written to all believers everywhere, and that includes you and me.

I think you need to go before God and talk to Him about it, and examine with Him your motivation for receiving the gift in the first place, and why you decided to give it away. In my opinion, saying that the modern use of tongues is false, is contrary to Paul's teaching in 1 Corinthians 14. It is strange that we as Christians will treat the rest of the New Testament as being absolutely true and relevant to us, yet 1 Corinthians 14 is false and not for us today. If we use that principle for 1 Corinthians 14, then we have to say that all of Paul's letters are for those in the First Century but do not apply to us today and that trying to follow his teaching takes into a counterfeit Christianity. That would be ridiculous, wouldn't it? We either have to accept the whole New Testament as the Word of God to us today, and not cut stuff out of it that does not suit us.

I believe that people who reject Christ or the gifts of the Spirit because of the mistakes and shortcomings of Christian believers are making decisions based on what the world, flesh and the devil are saying, rather than what God is saying. God will never tell a person anything that is contrary to His Word in the New Testament, 1 Corinthians 12 and 14 included.

 

[tdidymas]

I went through a period of time when I was attacked by doubts about the gift of tongues. I had some serious conversations about it, and the Lord directed me to 1 Corinthians 14 and told me that He would not have allowed a whole chapter of the Bible to be written if the gift of tongues was false. He also told me that the devil will do all he can to stop people praying in tongues because that mode of prayer is a real threat to him. The Lord also told me that the devil will cause people to teach it wrongly, fail to use self control over the use of it, speak in tongues in public meetings without interpretation - contrary to Paul's clear teaching; in order to make people think that the gift of tongues as practiced to day is false. But there is a principle that the devil will counterfeit every good thing that God does, and the counterfeit is so close to the genuine that it is difficult to tell them apart. The Lord reminded me of the three steps of faith to receive the gift - (1) Believe that it is God will for me; (2) Ask Him for it - and that if I ask for bread He will not give me a stone, therefore if I ask for the genuine gift of tongues He will not give me something different; (3) Receive it from Him - because he who asks receives. He gave the the assurance that anyone who receives the gift of tongues on that basis they will receive the genuine article.

The problem is that many receive a counterfeit because they are pressured into it, or they don't go through the steps of faith first. They look for a sensory experience and the devil is always there to give them one.

I know people who left the church and rejected Christ because of the "hypocrites in the church". They allowed themselves to throw the baby out with the bath water because of the mistakes and failures of those within the church. In the same way, many have rejected the modern use of the gifts of the Spirit because of the mistakes and counterfeits they have witnessed. But you need to know that where there are counterfeits, there has to be the genuine. And I believe that people who genuinely pray in tongues will not speak it out in church unless there is an interpreter present.

I think you may have believed at one stage that it was God's will for you to pray in tongues and when you sought the Lord for it, it was the genuine article. When, after 12 years in the Pentecostal/Charismatic movement, I became totally disillusioned with it and left and joined an Anglican church, I decided never to have anything to do with the Charismatic again. But I couldn't stop speaking in tongues. I didn't want to. This showed me that the gift I received was from God and not through some church. In actual fact, when I first received the gift it was on a beach on Wellington Harbour, and not within a church meeting at all. It seemed that the Lord spoke to me, after three weeks of asking and pleading Him for the gift He said, "Why are you pleading for something I gave you 2000 years ago? Use your faith and start speaking." That's what I did, and before long I was speaking a fluent language. Therefore my gift is not associated by any church, but it is firmly based on Paul's teaching in 1 Corinthians 14. Notice that 1 Corinthians was written to all believers everywhere, and that includes you and me.

I think you need to go before God and talk to Him about it, and examine with Him your motivation for receiving the gift in the first place, and why you decided to give it away. In my opinion, saying that the modern use of tongues is false, is contrary to Paul's teaching in 1 Corinthians 14. It is strange that we as Christians will treat the rest of the New Testament as being absolutely true and relevant to us, yet 1 Corinthians 14 is false and not for us today. If we use that principle for 1 Corinthians 14, then we have to say that all of Paul's letters are for those in the First Century but do not apply to us today and that trying to follow his teaching takes into a counterfeit Christianity. That would be ridiculous, wouldn't it? We either have to accept the whole New Testament as the Word of God to us today, and not cut stuff out of it that does not suit us.

I believe that people who reject Christ or the gifts of the Spirit because of the mistakes and shortcomings of Christian believers are making decisions based on what the world, flesh and the devil are saying, rather than what God is saying. God will never tell a person anything that is contrary to His Word in the New Testament, 1 Corinthians 12 and 14 included.

Your response here makes me wonder if you actually read my whole post.

1. I never said that 1 Cor. 14 is false and not for us today. What I did say is I have yet to hear an authentic Acts 2 (or 1 Cor. 14) tongues miracle. All the "tongues" I have heard in my 20 years experience with Pentecostals and Charismatics have been the same kind of gibberish "tongue" that I spoke, which is originated from the flesh. Anyone can do it, and it lacks intelligibility, thereby proving that it is a natural phenomenon, and is not a supernatural miracle like that of Acts 2.

2. No, I do not need to go before God and reseek something that the scripture clearly does not say to seek. The scripture clearly states that I should seek the best gifts (of which tongues is not), and to seek the kingdom of God and His righteousness (of which modern day "gibberish" false "tongues" is not). The scripture clearly states that "the Spirit gave them utterance" which means they were not seeking to speak in tongues.

Everyone has an opinion, an experience, and a testimony. I have learned over my 42 years of Christian life to pay more attention to what the Word of God actually says than to what someone wants it to say. I stay on my purpose to tell you that other people have different experiences than you, and hope that you can concede that many of their experiences and opinions they draw are just as valid as yours.

I agree that God will never tell a person anything that is contrary to His Word in the New Testament, and that includes Acts 2 as the precedence context to 1 Cor. 14. I have heard all sorts of excuses, justifications, and interpretive acrobatics in defense of modern day glossalalia, but in the end, it convinces only the scripturally ignorant. If indeed you do have the authentic gift of the Spirit, and you do agree that much of modern glossalalia is not authentic, then are you trying to correct the Pentecostals and Charismatics? Can you show me posts where you are doing this? Perhaps you should be cleaning up your own house first?
TD

 

[Presbyterian Continuist]

Your response here makes me wonder if you actually read my whole post.

1. I never said that 1 Cor. 14 is false and not for us today. What I did say is I have yet to hear an authentic Acts 2 (or 1 Cor. 14) tongues miracle. All the "tongues" I have heard in my 20 years experience with Pentecostals and Charismatics have been the same kind of gibberish "tongue" that I spoke, which is originated from the flesh. Anyone can do it, and it lacks intelligibility, thereby proving that it is a natural phenomenon, and is not a supernatural miracle like that of Acts 2.

2. No, I do not need to go before God and reseek something that the scripture clearly does not say to seek. The scripture clearly states that I should seek the best gifts (of which tongues is not), and to seek the kingdom of God and His righteousness (of which modern day "gibberish" false "tongues" is not). The scripture clearly states that "the Spirit gave them utterance" which means they were not seeking to speak in tongues.

Everyone has an opinion, an experience, and a testimony. I have learned over my 42 years of Christian life to pay more attention to what the Word of God actually says than to what someone wants it to say. I stay on my purpose to tell you that other people have different experiences than you, and hope that you can concede that many of their experiences and opinions they draw are just as valid as yours.

I agree that God will never tell a person anything that is contrary to His Word in the New Testament, and that includes Acts 2 as the precedence context to 1 Cor. 14. I have heard all sorts of excuses, justifications, and interpretive acrobatics in defense of modern day glossalalia, but in the end, it convinces only the scripturally ignorant. If indeed you do have the authentic gift of the Spirit, and you do agree that much of modern glossalalia is not authentic, then are you trying to correct the Pentecostals and Charismatics? Can you show me posts where you are doing this? Perhaps you should be cleaning up your own house first?
TD

It's really up to you to decide whether tongues is God's will for you. That is what I always check when I assist people. I need to make sure that anyone who wants to pray in tongues is not doing so just to copy others or is pressured into it by someone, or just because "that is what we do in this church." I think that when you started speaking in tongues when you did it was probably for one of the above reasons, instead of getting before God in private and making sure that your desire to pray in tongues was really God's will for you and that the desire was prompted by the Holy Spirit. God is not fooled. He knows the motivations of the heart.

However, I respect your choice, but I know the story hasn't ended yet and you never know what God will say to you in the future.

 

[Cowwy]

I don't particularly agree with the OP, since I am one of the few that dream dreams and see visions of what's to come. Visions don't come all the time, they are somewhat rare occasion. When it does come, it is extremely unique and easily recognizable.

On the basis of experience, the argument that prophecy have ended is simply untrue. And based on the experiences of millions of other who spoken about their bizarre experience in dreams and vision, it makes the argument claim unlikely.

 

[Presbyterian Continuist]

I don't particularly agree with the OP, since I am one of the few that dream dreams and see visions of what's to come. Visions don't come all the time, they are somewhat rare occasion. When it does come, it is extremely unique and easily recognizable.

On the basis of experience, the argument that prophecy have ended is simply untrue. And based on the experiences of millions of other who spoken about their bizarre experience in dreams and vision, it makes the argument claim unlikely.

It is one thing to come to a conclusion based on comprehensive research which examines all sides of an argument, and quite another to quote parrot-fashion from the one or two favorite mentors. Also, a strong argument doesn't need to be put in capital letters. It's like the preacher who had one part of his sermons heavily underlined in red with the margin note, "Shout for all you're worth. Argument very weak!" Also, a good argument does not need to be repeated time and time again. One statement followed by justification backup from good research is much more convincing. That, in my mind, is good scholarship.

Most of Church history is written by those who deliberately left out the supernatural acts of the Holy Spirit in the Church through the centuries because these did not fit with their theology, Also, many movements that arose during the time when the RCC was dominant were reported as heretical because it was the RCC that deemed them so, because these movements did not go along with the established RCC in its doctrine and practice. And the only information we have about these movements is through reports from enemies and court records. Positive literature from these movements was destroyed by the established church of the time. But good researchers and historians have been able to "read between the lines" of the existing reports and have discovered that these "heretical" movements were much closer to the New Testament than previously believed.

Cessationists refuse to believe that the supernatural gifts of the Holy Spirit are for today. They refuse to examine the real reasons why they died out by the Fourth Century in the Western Church. They find it easier to say that God intended them to cease, rather than to conclude more accurately that the decline in holiness and purity of devotion to Christ was the real reason. In every "heretical" movement, there was a renewed passion for Christ and adherence to the New Testament and the supernatural gifts re-emerged as a result. But these movements were severely persecuted and put down by the established Church which had descended into spiritual coldness and political intrigue.

If Cessationists got a pair of scissors and cut out all the scriptures that they do not believe are applicable today, they would have quite a thin version of the New Testament, and their "christianity" would be just a set of moralistic principles instead of a living faith in Christ.