 Alright, welcome back. Any questions before we go ahead to the next chapter? Any questions? Shall we move to chapter 14 then? Alright, so chapter 13 was wonderful, right? Even as we all continue to serve in different areas, whether we are business, ministry, the workplace, our family, let this be our desire, right? That we walk in love, let love be the basis of everything that we do, right? And of course, we are all growing in this aspect as well. So let's go to chapter 14. Now after introducing the gifts of the Spirit and understanding the believer's function, now Paul is addressing proper order for these gifts to be exercised in gatherings. That means in church services and the times when they meet together, right? Start off by talking about the benefits of tongues and prophecy. Let's read chapter 14 verse 1 to 5. 1. Pursue love and desire spiritual gifts, but especially that you may prophesy. 2. For he who speaks in a tongue does not speak to men but to God, for no one understands him. 3. However, in the Spirit he speaks mysteries, but he who prophesies speaks edification and exhortation and comfort to men. 4. He who speaks in a tongue edifies himself, but he who prophesies edifies the church. 5. I wish you all spoke with tongues, but even more that you prophesied, for he who prophesies is greater than he who speaks with tongues, unless indeed the church may receive edification. Now we must understand the context of verse 4 and 5, but let's look at verse 1. So all believers are to pursue love and also desire spiritual gifts. We talked about this, desiring the right gift at the right time. Now there is no restriction on how many or which gift, but we know that what we spoke about last time, desiring the right gift at the right time. But again, pursue love and then desire spiritual gifts. So again Paul is emphasizing on love being the first thing. Verse 2 and 4, we see, for he who speaks in a tongue does not speak to men but to God, for no one understands him. But he who prophesies speaks edification and exhortation and comfort to men. Praying in tongues is a personal benefit to each one of us. I'm sure that we all understand praying in tongues, it's a personal prayer language. And in contrast to prophecy, tongues is something that enables us to speak mysteries. Our mind may not have thought about it. Our mind may not have knowledge about it. But we are praying. The Holy Spirit enables us to pray. Our spirit is uniting with the Holy Spirit and making intercession with God. So this makes our prayer life limitless because the Holy Spirit can do so many things. Or when we are praying in tongues, we may be praying for something that we don't even know. We may be praying for another country. We may be praying for some other nation. Or we may be praying for a different group of people. We don't know. But here's the thing, praying and speaking in tongues edifies us and builds us up spiritually. Many times this has happened to me. We've been praying, praying for certain things. Within the church, maybe something that I've been planning for, prayed for it over 2-3 months. But I've not really got a direction or a leading from God. But there were times, I was just praying in tongues. What I prayed for maybe 6 or 7 months back, immediately I get clarity. I said, okay, this is what we have to do. Or there must have been a vision or a dream that I had. Any of us can have these visions or dreams that we don't understand that dream. Let me ask God, God, what is, can you please reveal the dream? Help me to understand. Maybe we don't get an answer. Maybe a year later, we're praying in tongues. God can reveal that dream in point-by-point precision. This is what your dream was and this is what it means. And you're not even praying for that dream. You're all praying. You probably forgot the dream when you're praying about something else. You're just praying in tongues. But God can do that. So there are wonderful benefits and Pastor Ashish has got a book, what the wonderful benefits of speaking in tongues. I want to encourage each one of us to take up this book. You can download the PDF on the website too, from the publications. And just read them. Take time to minister and pray in the Holy Spirit. It's a wonderful, wonderful gift that God has given us. And verse 6 onwards, do everything to edify others. But now, brethren, if I come to you speaking with tongues, what shall I profit you unless I speak to you either by revelation, by knowledge, by prophesying or by teaching? Now, to benefit people, let me just mark this. So we know where we are. So to benefit people in the congregation, we must speak either by revelation that is bringing out God's word, the truth of God's word, things that people may not have known. You're bringing it. You're revealing it to them, revelation. It could be anything. It could be something very simple. For example, the Samaritan woman. You could just be saying, what about the Samaritans? Why did they hate the Jews? You're just bringing out some truth, and then the whole meaning becomes so much more powerful. You bring revelation. Two is knowledge, imparting spiritual truth to build people up. So you could be talking about the episodes of what Jesus did, the parables, there's so much in the scripture. So imparting spiritual truth. The parable of the sower. The seed is thrown. The seed is some fall on good grounds or fall on thorns or rocky places. So what is the seed? The seed is God's word. So you're just imparting knowledge. You're helping them to understand. Three is prophesying by divine inspiration. So God is speaking to you about certain situations, and then you're releasing that prophetic word within the church. And four, teaching the truth of God's work. This teaching, being able to spend time in detail, talking and teaching about the scriptures. Like for example, what we're doing in 1st Corinthians, it's a teaching. It's not just a message or a sermon, but it's a teaching. So these are the four things that we must do to benefit people in the congregation. Now verse 7, he says, unless what is spoken is understood by the congregation, it will not benefit them. Now, in Paul is saying, for my personal time, I will pray in tongues. I will pray later on, he says, I pray in tongues more than any one of you. I will pray in tongues. If I have to, you know, in a congregational setting, if I want people to be benefitted in the congregation, I must bring revelation, knowledge, prophecy, prophesy and teaching. And that's how they will grow. They will mature. Now, does it mean that Paul is saying, don't speak tongues in church? No. He's saying, you can do that, but make sure these four are done because it shouldn't be that we are only speaking in tongues and we go back home and maybe a group of people are wondering what is happening? There was no teaching. There was no preaching. There was no prophesying. There was no partying. So Paul is trying to say, our goal is that we must build people up. Verse 12, even so you, since you are zealous for spiritual gifts, let it be for the edification of the church that you seek to excel. Now, this word zealous, since you are zealous for spiritual gifts, now we know that zealous is being passionate. We know that the Corinthian church was already flowing with the gifts and the gifts of the spirit. Maybe there were some of them in the church who were saying, hey, I also want these gifts. I also want to flow in these gifts. How come this person has a prophetic word, word of knowledge or gift of healing and I don't have anything? So maybe there were people within the church who were zealous for more gifts, but he finishes that verse in verse 12. He says, let it be for the edification of the church. So our goal in exercising spiritual gifts is to build people. Spiritual gifts must be exercised as a motivation to build people. Paul is not telling them, don't be zealous for the gifts. He's not saying, now everyone are flowing in the gifts of the spirit, you don't be zealous, at the right time God will give you. Paul is not saying that. He's saying, good, but their zeal has to be properly directed, which means the zeal should be for the edification of the church, not because my neighbor can speak in tongues and I can't speak in tongues or my life group leader can prophesy so even I want to prophesy. Not for that. The zeal is good, but what is the reason for that zeal to edify the church? And so he's making it very clear here that he's telling the church, it's good your zealous for the gifts, zealous for the things of God, but why are you zealous? You must ask yourself that. Is it for your personal, so that people can recognize you and appreciate you and talk about you or is it for the building of the church? So that's a question that we must ask ourselves. Verse 13 through 15. Therefore, let him who speaks in a tongue pray that he may interpret. For if I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays, but my understanding is unfruitful. With this conclusion then, I will pray with the spirit and I will pray in the understanding as well. I will sing in the spirit and I will sing with the understanding as well. Now you and I as believers, when we are speaking in tongues, the only way we can benefit the congregation is by interpreting what we speak. Otherwise they're not going to, they're just going to hear words that have no meaning. They're just going to hear syllables. Most likely they're not going to understand. But we know we're praying in a tongue. But when we pray in tongues, our spirit empowered by the spirit of God does the praying and hence the mind is not involved. So what is Paul saying? We must learn to pray in tongues and to pray with understanding. So that is pray in the spirit and pray with understanding. Sing in the spirit, sing with understanding. Now the term pray with the spirit and sing with the spirit is easier to refer to praying and singing in tongues. Right? Now it does not mean that, you know, for example, let's picture this, there's a church service, it's going to start. I can't go and keep praying in tongues, singing in tongues. Right? Because it's not going to bring understanding to the congregation. They're not going to understand what I'm saying. So, but they may be worshiping God, all of it. But for me to, how do I put this? If I want the congregation to grow, to understand the songs that they're singing and to make it meaningful, I need to sing with understanding. Okay, these are the words of the songs, these are the lyrics, the lyrics are up there. Let's all sing together. And then has so much more, has a lot of meaning. But Paul is also saying, there will be times the Holy Spirit will work in this, you know, during the church service, during your personal time. And you will begin to pray and sing in tongues. Now, don't exclude that out. Let there be a combination. Let there be a flow of both together. Right? Now, like I said, when you're praying in tongues and personally, you don't have to interpret everything. Right? You can spend several hours praying in tongues. And then, how many of you have gone through this? Maybe I'll just share this. Many times when I'm very tired or weak, just don't have strength or maybe I don't have the energy to read or anything. Many times. It just said, okay, let's stop praying in tongues. Just five minutes or 10 minutes. Many times it's happened. After 10 minutes, certainly there's a strength. That's just that tiredness force. Right? Oh, there are many times when I remember this one Sunday, many years back, it was in Bangalore. I had to lead the worship and share the word. But I had a terrible headache that morning. It came to a point that I usually don't mis-charge. But keep a point that I said, can anybody lead the worship and share the message because I don't think I can today. It was a terrible, terrible, terrible pain. I prayed, I did everything but nothing really worked. So I dragged myself to church, took the guitar and there was nobody else to lead. I had to lead the worship. And I just began just very tired. I thought, when will this get over? When will the sermon get over? When will I just go home and lie down? I just had that feeling throughout. But I remember that day, that Sunday very clearly, I began to exhort, just began to sing in a town initially. After the first song, I realized that I felt like I've, you know, I'm all fresh, like I've slept for 10 hours or so and I've had a good break first. I felt that way. Just refreshed in my spirit, my body as well. Now, how did that happen? It was just that, I began to pray in tongues. I didn't break out, remove my headache, remove my pain, I didn't do all that. And I didn't realize that my praying in tongues has caused this headache to just be lifted up. So sometimes, when we are speaking in tongues, we don't, for our personal use especially, we don't need the interpretation always. If you get the interpretation, it's good. But if you don't get it, why don't you pray in tongues? There are several areas where tongues and interpretations can be beneficial for our personal use. So we see here tongues and interpretation for our personal use. For personal guidance and direction the plans of God and the purposes of God in our life many, many times. What happened to us? We're praying in tongues. So singing in tongues. Suddenly, God says here's what you have to do. Do this or do that. Go this way. Don't do this. You suddenly begin to understand God's plan. Everything becomes clear. Second, for decision-making matters that you are responsible for. Now, as leaders maybe some of us here are pastors or leading businesses, leading ministries or leading families. And as a family man you are the leader. You are making decisions for the house. So it's very, very important. These decisions are crucial decisions. Maybe it's cool to put your children in, whether a job change is required at the moment or anything which is crucial. Right? Praying in tongues will help you. God will really, you know, lead you towards making the right decision. And thirdly, praying in tongues help us to bring revelation and insight into the things of God. Right? How God works. How does God work? How did he work in the Old Testament? How did he work in the New Testament? The ways that he usually ministers. The way that God, you know, right now when we look around globally as a church, how has God ministered to people? So the more we pray in tongues, we get revelation and insight into the things of God. Right? So these three are few benefits of speaking in tongues. Personal guidance, direction, understanding. Two, for decision making matters. And three, for revelation and insight into the things of God. Right? So I want to encourage each one of us. Right? Maybe some of us already flowing in the gifts of the spirit. Just build on that. Just grow, continue. It's just a drop in the ocean. Right? We have so much that we can grow. Our prayer life becomes limitless. We can just keep praying. We don't need to be in a closed room kneeling. That's not always a picture. You can be driving. You can be sitting and having a meal. You can be just spending time with your friends and speaking in tongues inside of you. So it's limitless. Right? So those who are not speaking in tongues, I want to encourage you. Just continue to pursue God. Don't be discouraged. Maybe, you know, you've been praying but continue to pursue God. God is faithful. He will release the gifts into your lives. Right? So let's move from into chapters verse 16 to 20. Verse 16. Okay. Yes, Christopher, please go ahead. Yes, Pastor, I just wanted to find out with regards to, you know, if it's a small group of people who are, you know, three to five people who are, you know, praying together and, you know, are also, you know, doing a Bible study, for example, can they have a I mean, reserve a session, part of that session for praying in tongues and, you know, can they have, you know, a particular area that they want to pray for. So, for example, you want to pray for them for the country or they want to pray for the country's leaders or something and then then those three or four or five people pray in tongues. Is that something that is good to be done? I just wanted to understand that. Sure. Right. That's a good question, Christopher. Now, there are two ways to come to that question. Now, if there are three or four people, small group, if all of them speak in tongues, then all of them can, you know, you can set aside time, hey, let's leave the last 15 minutes before we disperse. Let's leave the last 15 minutes to pray in tongues. Right. We can do that. Now, if there is maybe even one person who does not know how to speak in tongues, the good thing to do is not to make that person feel bad. Hey, I don't have the gift of tongue. So, good thing to do is as a group leader or as one of the team members, that four or five of them, you can tell, hey, you know what there are? This is what the Holy Spirit is. This is what the gift of tongues is. When we speak in tongues, we are praying to God. So, you may not understand what we are praying. It is the Holy Spirit speaking through us to God. So, you can pray with understanding. Right. So, you can encourage them and then you can pray in the team. Now, for example, you give a prayer point. You say, okay, let's pray for the nation. Right. Now, remember when we are praying in the Spirit, we are praying without understanding. Right. So, we may begin to pray in tongues, but we may not be praying for the nation. We may be praying for somebody's brother somewhere in a different country or we may be praying for you know, just something else, you know, that God, the second coming of Christ. But, here's the thing. That's why Paul says, you pray with understanding and you pray in the Spirit. So, you combine them together. So, for example, what I would do, Christopher, is I would say, okay, let's pray for the nation that we are living in, that God will touch many souls. So, the first thing I would do is, I will pray with understanding. I would say, okay, let's join together, we pray. Right. Father, bless our nation, bless the people, bless the government, bless our leaders, and bless the things that you're going to do. So, just pray with understanding and while I'm doing that, I'm asking the Holy Spirit to put words into my heart. Right. I'm asking the Holy Spirit to help me to speak with the Spirit, speak in the Spirit. Right. And so, give me these words. Now, it's not necessary. I may be praying in line with, you know, exactly for the nation. God may ask me to pray for something else. I may be praying the Spirit or something else. But, I've also prayed with understanding. Right. So, as a group, they all know, okay, we've prayed with understanding. Now, the Holy Spirit is ministering to us to pray with the Spirit. So, I've done both. I've prayed with understanding. I've prayed. I'm praying also on the Spirit. So, I'm not making that one person feel that, hey, we didn't pray for the nation at all. That was a prayer point. They know that we prayed for the prayer point. But, I'm not also grieving the Holy Spirit by saying, no, I will not speak in tongues. I will not pray in tongues. So, I'm praying with understanding. I'm also praying. Is that okay? Yes. Thank you. Yes. So, one of the things that we do is in life groups, not many of our, especially our youth life groups, not all of them will be speaking in tongues. So, what we encourage them is, first, pray. Have maybe four, five prayer points. Pray. And then you can leave the last 10, 15 minutes to pray in tongues. And so, that way, they are free to just minister what the Lord is speaking through them. Right. Okay. Right. It was 16 to 20. Otherwise, if you bless with the Spirit, how will he who occupies the place of the uninformed say, amen, that you're giving thanks since he does not understand what you say. For you indeed, you give thanks well, but the other is not edified. I thank my God, I speak with tongues more than you all, yet in the church, I would rather speak nothing. That I may teach others also than 10,000 words in a tongue. Brethren, do not be children in understanding. However, in malice we babes, but in understanding we mature. Right. So, Paul is saying like he's basically telling the Corinthian church, now don't make it like a competition I can speak in tongues, he can speak in tongues, he can't speak. He's saying that even though if I keep speaking in tongues if the other person is not edified, I would rather speak five good words of understanding so that the person can be edified. We can direct our prayer in tongues towards specific purposes, but the Apostle Paul is saying that he prayed a lot in tongues, but when in public he preferred to pray, you know, especially in the congregation it is better to pray in a known language than speaking in tongues. And why is he saying that? Because the others can say amen to the prayer and I think it's it makes so much sense what Paul is saying. He's not demeaning the gift by saying okay, don't speak in tongues pray in tongues more than any of your more than any of your but that's in my private time when I'm in public or when I'm in a congregation it's better I speak in a known language so everyone can understand and say amen to it. So Paul is telling the believers and he's inviting the believers to be mature and understanding the proper use of the gift of speaking in tongues. He's not against it but he's saying use it the right way at the right time at the right place. Next one tongues Yes, Christopher. I just had a question with that point you just narrated. So, you know, in the very first time when the apostles spoke in tongues there was also there was also if I'm clear to say there was also this speaking in different languages that could be understood by people from different different places that they came from and I just wanted to understand have you experienced that may not be personally but have you actually seen that happen where there are people who have suddenly got that power from the Holy Spirit where they've started talking in a language that they've never spoken in and is that also considered to be speaking in tongues because this is not maybe a language that sounds that doesn't sound like any language for most people but that language is understood by some people as an actual language that they've understood. So I just wanted to understand that. That's a very good question. So what happened in the book of Acts just to trade what Christopher was trying to say in the book of Acts people have come all across from different parts of the different neighboring cities they've come into Jerusalem for the Feast of the Pentecost and the Holy Spirit falls on the 120 and they began to speak in different languages languages that were unknown to them but the others could understand because they said hey they're speaking tongues they're using God in my language which is not a Jewish language right now that is speaking in different tongues yes God can again the Holy Spirit can do that I personally have not seen it with my or heard it from my own experience first-hand experience but I have read a book where this man of God had gone to another country and he was ministering and as he was ministering he began to speak in a tongue he was powerfully anointed at that time I forget which year and I forget which book it is but I just vaguely remember the instance where he began to just pray and there was a powerful anointing and he was praying and what happened he was praying in tongues and after the service a woman came and said you were speaking a very rare dialect of the Chinese and you were praising God I know a little bit of that language because my mother speaks that dialect so you were praising God in a rare one of the rural areas you know that different villages have different language different kinds of dialects of the same language so she was speaking that pastor was praying a very rare of the Chinese language and the woman in the congregation said my mother was from that village from that town speak that language and she was surprised and she wrote this encounter as well so I forget which book and I forget what the incident was but that is the only instance that I know of I haven't heard of any other instance where somebody speaking in tongues and another person was able to it was their language I haven't really come across that but again we cannot put God in a box maybe it's happened maybe I don't know about it or maybe there are many times it's happened in different places but God can do that because he did it in the book of Acts but he can still do it now all of a sudden we may speak of a dialect of a different country he can do it if he wants to do it so yeah because we be open to that but if we again we must understand that when we are praying in tongues Paul says our mind is unfruitful we are not going to understand our mind is not going to perceive but it's the spirit that is making forth intercession so as we are praying our mind should not be am I speaking this language or am I making sense or is it something that is in line with the syllables and all of those all those things should go off and our mind should be that hey my spirit is aligned with the spirit of God so yes Christopher no I haven't heard of anything any situation that's happened all right tongues assigned to the believers I think verse 21 in the law it is written with men of other tongues and other lips I will speak to this people and yet for all that they will not hear me says the Lord therefore tongues are assigned not to those who believe but to unbelievers but prophesying is not for unbelievers for those who believe now the Holy Spirit can prompt us to use prompt the use of you know speaking in tongues as assigned to the believer how the person speaking in a tongue inspired by the Holy Spirit could be speaking the language that the unsafe person can understand and deliver a message about the person or pointing people to Jesus just bringing the gospel and this is what we were just talking about that's what happened on the day of Bending Course it was assigned tongues became assigned to the unbelievers right when the 120 were praying and singing and praying to God the others didn't know about Jesus they didn't know about the gifts of the Holy Spirit but they were praying and they were glorifying God and for his great deeds in the language that they could understand what happened they immediately said hey either they are too drunk or either they are this is from God and one group of people said they are too drunk walked away but the other group said this is from God and there was 10,000 people in the church that day I'm sorry it was a 10,000 or 5,000 I'm not sure but there were thousands of people added into the church that one event so Paul is remembering that he said it can be a sign for the unbelievers but prophecy it impacts the unbelievers also in a great way it was 23 and 25 therefore if the whole church comes together in one place and all speak with tongues and there come in those who are uninformed or unbelievers will they not say that they are out of their mind but if all prophesy and an unbeliever or an uninformed person comes in he is convinced by all he is convicted by all and thus the secrets of the hearts are revealed and so falling down on his face he will worship and report that God is truly among you while tongues is a primary way or a primary means to speak to God tongues can be a sign to the believers and same way, prophecy when we are prophesying something to somebody or in a church gathering and prophesying say for example an unbeliever comes in a prophetic word about the future about things that are ahead for him that means that can really touch that person's life so prophecy serves to edify the believer the local church body but it can also be used to impact a non-believer and just exposing the sin in his or her life and leading them towards Christ so we see here Paul is not saying gifts are better, prophecy is better no, he is in bold he is giving remember the chapters before we saw he talked about the body can the head say to the leg I don't need you can the eyes say to the ears I don't need you so he is using that same kind of principle and he is saying speaking in tongues is good but doesn't mean I don't need prophecy just because I have prophecy doesn't mean I don't need speaking in tongues I need all of them because everything comes together and when we do it together we are equipping the body the church of Christ is being built up right I think we will stop here because I want to spend more time on this so we will stop here we will pick up from next class so that we can this is a very important topic and I don't want to just abruptly stop we have another five minutes so we will stop here and then we can just pick up from next class see how much is so there is quite a lot so we will stop here pick up from next week and talk about speaking in tongues and prophecy and all of that at the importance of itself alright any questions any questions or shall we close in prayer ok let's close in prayer one of us can please close Kennedy Rose anyone can close yes anyone feel free to close in prayer alright let me pray yes go ahead Heavenly Father we thank you and we bless your name we give you all the glory we give you all the adoration because you are a great God Father we thank you for this session we thank you for the word that we've had and we pray Lord that that you will take absolutely control of God have your way with God teach us your word we also got to know more of you help us with God to understand who you are and who we are in you thank you for your servant whom you've used to God to share your word and we pray that you continually keep him and go for your glory we thank you and go for APCE Bible College and I thank you for everyone that got in this class bless everyah holy man when next we gather again to listen to your word Father we pray bless the money in Jesus name Amen Thank you so much Father thank you everyone have a wonderful week ahead I'll see you next week God bless Thank you Pastor