Friday, January 29, 2010

How Many Tongues Do You Speak?

We use the Internet for our phone service (Magic Jack). For some dumb reason last night I couldn't get it to work. Needing to be sure anyone with the number could call in, I tried to call my home number via my cell. Nada. Now what?

After messing around for a time, I decided to take the long-standing advice of my son, the president of Magic Jack and highly knowledgeable about computers. He always says, "When all else fails, reboot!" And voila! It worked.

"Now why was that?" my wife asked.
"How would I know?" I humbly replied. "I only speak a little computereze."

How many tongues do you speak? Fluently, that is. I know some Latin, some Greek and some Hebrew. I studied German and once took a class in Spanish, but fluent? Well, I'd better stick to English. Oh, yes, I overlooked the fact that I speak some theology, philosophy, psychology and even some history. Every discipline has its own language, i.e. computereze.

Reading Paul's counsel about pride and the ability to speak in a tongue no one knows, even if you're using that tongue to speak about godly matters:

"If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal" (1 Corinthians 13:1). 

Wise counsel and much needed.

2 comments:

  1. I have never heard the tongues of angels, but I have heard many different tongues, udnestood by me, or by others. I have heard tongues I did not understand, especially those I heard years ago attending a Full Gospel Businessmen's Fellowship meeting, some supposed "unknown" tongue. In 1 Cor.13 Paul would be telling us that all speech ought be spoken 'with love". Is all angel-speak uttered "with love"? Then I remember that there are some "evil" angels, the chief of them the devil, Satan. His speech is glib, and worse.
    His suggestions are supposed 'love", and suggested actions are supposedly beneficial to the doer. There he was with Jesus in the desert, "IF you do this or that, then You will not be hungry,...You will be delivered by angels...You will have the world and the glory thereof..." That sounds so loving -- to be fed miraculously, to be divinely protected, to be a Cameron-like "king of the world"!
    In Hias response to Satan Jesus shows that greater than the tongues of men and angels is The Word of Love, the true Scripture. Even the Son of God was guided by that in His ministry as our Brother, Savior, and Lord. May our words, our writing, our actions be guided by His love-Word.
    (harold )

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  2. Whatever tongue we speak, it must be to bring glory to God and not to impress others with our spirituality. That's Paul's point. Indeed, there are many who work to deceive—and words are frightening ways to do that.

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So what do you think? I would love to see a few words from you.