I appreciated the songs that we've sung and that first one, 223 in the book, how deep the father's love for us. Certainly that third verse, I will not boast in anything, no gifts, no power, no wisdom, but I will boast in Jesus Christ, his death and resurrection. So we think about the church at Corinth. That was certainly an issue there, and it's easy to think about that's a first century problem, a first Corinthians problem, a problem at Corinth, but it's also a problem in our hearts many times. Certainly, certainly, something to consider in our own lives. And as Paul continues to address the problems that coordinates, the Holy Spirit has given us this and preserved this letter for our own edification and consideration in our own lives. So this morning we're in 1 Corinthians chapter 14. We'll consider verses one through five. Pursue love, yet earnestly desire spiritual gifts, but especially that you may prophesy. For one who speaks in a tongue does not speak to men, but to God, for no one understands, but in his spirit, he speaks mysteries. But one who prophesies speaks to men for edification and exhortation and encouragement. One who speaks in a tongue edifies himself, but one who prophesies edifies the church. but I wish that you all spoke in tongues, but even more that you would prophesy and greater is one who prophesies than one who speaks in tongues, unless he translates so that the church may receive edification. As we consider this passage, And think about it, it's a new chapter, but I'm reminded that originally this was a letter and it wasn't divided it up into chapters and verses. But Paul is indeed transitioning here. Love, love is the greatest. Love is permanent as we looked and he tells them, pursue love. But gifts, gifts are important too. The church at Corinth was guilty of lovelessness, if I can use that word. They had lost love, and that's why he spent so much time on the subject of love, so he tells them and us, pursue love. To pursue something, means to follow after. In fact, that's the way some translations have it. They say follow after love. One translation of the Bible even has it as let love be your highest goal. Let love be your highest goal. This is priority, not the love of the world, not the love found in soap operas or romance novels. Certainly, romantic love is a wonderful thing, and it does have its heights. But anybody who's been around long enough, you know that if you chase after that, you're always going to be chasing after something that's not going to satisfy. Your husband will disappoint you. Your wife will disappoint you. Your relationship won't be exactly like it was in your mind or like you thought it would be. Or like it was as we get older. and body wears out and wears down. Live together long enough you learn who people really are. He's not talking about the romantic. kind of love or lust that people think about all the time. He's talking about the godly love. That's what we pursue in life. there's satisfaction to be found there. Love in Christ, which permeates our lives and indeed our relationships with others, our spouses, our children, our neighbors, and yes, even our enemies. Pursue that love with determination and diligence. That's the love that satisfies, the love of Christ, the love of God, the love that will last, the love that is eternal. Pursue love, but there's balance. balance, pursue love, but not at the expense of everything else. Pursue love, yet earnestly desire spiritual gifts. You see, the church at Corinth, they were all kind of Like the talk of the church, if you will, was all about spiritual gifts. When they weren't bickering and arguing over whether Paul was a better preacher or Apollos or Cephas, the talk was about gifts. He had addressed some of this already. And indeed, he'll continue to address it in chapter 12 to, well, in chapter 14, I'm sorry, but he'd address some of it in chapter 12, verses 14 through 25, if you go back there for a moment. Remember when he talked about the body? And so he goes through and he talks about the body in verses 14 through 25. He says, for also the body is not one member, but many. If the foot says, because I'm not the hand, I'm not a part of the body, it is not for this reason. any the less a part of the body. And if the ear says, because I'm not an eye, not a part of the body, it is not for this reason any the less a part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? But now God has appointed the members, each one of them in the body, just as he desired. And if they were all one member, where would the body be? But now there are many members, but one body. The eye cannot say to the hand, I have no need of you, or again, the head to the feet, I have no need of you. On the contrary, how much more is it that the members of the body, which seem to be weaker, are necessary? Those members of the body, which we think is less honorable, On these we bestow much more abundant honor, and our less presentable members become much more presentable, whereas our more presentable members have no such need. But God has so composed the body, giving more abundant honor to that member which lacked, so that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another. And so there's gifts within the body such that there's diversity in the body. Not everybody's a mouth, not everybody's an eye, not everybody's an ear, and so on and so forth, but each one is important part of the body. These are for the edification of the church. Spiritual gifts are important, even though love is the greatest, love is permanent, even though the gifts will cease as he brought up in 1 Corinthians chapter 13. Gifts will cease and be done away with and all those things. This is true, but spiritual gifts are not to be discounted. Pursue love, he says, but earnestly desire spiritual gifts. Earnestly desire spiritual gifts, but especially that you may prophesy. As he goes through and he speaks about these gifts, he lays out some truth about speaking in tongues. Speaking in tongues was apparently the more exciting gift of the Spirit amongst these brethren. But he says the gift of prophecy is the one to be desired. Now to prophesy does not mean to foretell future events. That's sometimes part of it. But it means to speak for God under the inspiration of spirit so that what one says is as if God said it. And so there were prophets in the early church. There were prophets in the Old Testament. They had a word from the Lord and they spoke it. There is some sense in which the gift of prophecy may be someone who can take the Bible and be able to teach it in our day, but understand something, nobody in our day has a direct line with God that they're getting some direct revelation. Just understand that sort of thing. If somebody says, well, I've got a word from the Lord, they better have an open Bible. Because if they don't, they're lying or very much deceived. So there in verse two of Chapter 14 says for one who speaks in a tongue does not speak to men but to God for no one Understands, but in his spirit he speaks mysteries now. There's a lot of Controversy and disagreement is risen out of this passage Not necessarily in the churches that we grew up in, but in other groups. There is what we know of as the modern tongues movement. And perhaps some of y'all have been around those sorts of things, or maybe even grew up in them, or have friends who are in them. And when they write about tongues, when they speak about tongues, and when they preach about tongues, when they have The gift of tongues, I'm using air quotes here, the gift of tongues in their churches, and again, I'm using air quotes here as well, they're talking about speaking in a trance to the point that nobody knows what's being said and not even you yourself will know sometimes of what it is that you're saying. And that's what the modern tongues movement is about. But biblically, that's not what it was about at all. In fact, in Acts chapter two, Acts chapter two and verse six. Acts chapter two and verse six is the day of Pentecost. And when the sound occurred, the multitude came together. were bewildered because each one of them was hearing them speak in his own language. So when they talked about tongues in the New Testament, they were talking about each one of them was hearing in their own language. Again, it's very, very plain in the scriptures here. These were known languages. We paint the picture found in this text in a modern American setting. Here comes a Mexican speaking Spanish over there, a Somalian that only understands his native language. Shortly comes a Brazilian that only understands Portuguese. And all three of these and none of them can understand each other, but the Holy Spirit works in and through these fellows here at this church. And now all of a sudden they begin to hear the gospel in their own language. as the preachers began to speak in languages that they had never spoken in before. They began to speak Portuguese. They began to speak Spanish. They began to speak languages that they'd never spoken before for the edification of these men who have come in who don't understand English. And this is what is happening here in the Book of Acts. Now, when we consider the modern movement, it's not that way at all. It's not. It's not some known language. It's some unknown language, but then they, they come back here in, into our text in first Corinthians chapter 14 in verse two. And this is kind of the verse that they use, but one who speaks in a tongue does not speak to men, but to God, but no one understands, but in spirit, he speaks mysteries. There's a difference in this text. As we go through it, you'll see sometimes he says tongue and sometimes he says tongues. Now the King James translators caught on to this difference. And they actually put the word unknown before tongue. So they wrote there and it says, if someone speaks in an unknown tone, many of y'all grew up on the King James, you remember that, you know that. Some of us still read and study from the King James sometimes. And so we know that, that's what it says. There's a reason for that. What Paul is writing about when he writes about this unknown tone is debatable. And again, you get into different commentaries and different preachers and theologians, and you begin to get differences of opinions. There's two, primarily two different thoughts on this. And so just to give you a sample, I'll use two of my favorite commentators. to give you two different thoughts about this. It could be either one of these. John Gill from the 1700s, he believed that the unknown tongue was speaking exclusively of the Hebrew language. That's what these folks were doing, that this is what was happening here, that if someone was speaking an unknown tongue, that's what Paul is talking about. If you remember, he said, wait a minute, what does he mean about unknown tongue being the Hebrew language? Well, at the time, Hebrew was, pretty much a dead language, only understood by a very few people. You get into a church service and use the language that's understood by just a few people, there's no edification there, no edification at all. Others don't know what's being said. The Catholics used to do this all the time. They'd have their masses in Latin. There's no, didn't do anybody any good. Nobody knew what was even being said. I understand that they may have changed some of that in a lot of circles, but that's the way they were doing it for a lot of years. And so that's one thought that maybe he's talking about that. John MacArthur and others, they believed that the unknown tongue had to do with a counterfeit gift of pagan gibberish. And that's what he's talking about when he talks about tongue here. When he says, for one who speaks in a tongue does not speak to men, but to God, for no one understands, but in his spirit, he speaks mysteries. Nobody knows what's being said. So John MacArthur believed this tongue, this unknown tongue, had to do with a counterfeit gift of pagan gibberish. And indeed, when you look at the modern tongue movement and it's gibberish, it is not new at all. It doesn't go back to the, to the first century church, it actually goes back to pagan practices. And so it is possible that this had infiltrated some of the Gentile churches of that day. Wasn't the Holy Spirit at all if that's what it was that was happening then and it's not in the Holy Spirit today if you walk in on a church service and everybody's saying a bunch of gibberish that no one else can understand It's it's a spirit, but it's not the Holy Spirit But either way whether it was a Hebrew language that a very few understood a dead language at the time or a pagan ritual counterfeit gift of the spirit that was being done here. When he talks about one who speaks in a tongue, does not speak to men or to God, but to God, for no one understands. Whichever way it is, whatever it was happening, bottom line is this, no church No Christian should have anything to do with this practice of an unknown tongue. Whether it's a unknown language that no one else understands, even if it's a language that is common, but no one in the church service knows it. If you don't have an interpreter, and we'll get to that here in just a little bit. But if it's just something like that, You say, well, I'm a missionary to China, I'm gonna get up and sing a special. You get up and sing the special, but don't interpret it, and you go sit down, what good has it done? It's not done the church any good, not any good at all. We don't know what you're singing. You could be singing Amazing Grace, or How Great Thou Art in Chinese, or you might be singing something to some pagan god, we have no clue. But either way, it's not done the church any good. No edification at all. And 1 Corinthians chapter 14 does give us this primary thought that edification requires intelligibility. Edification requires intelligibility. And so when it comes to tongues, whether it's gibberish, whether it's languages, whatever it may be. The type of tongue that the church at Corinth had going on had no edifying value at all. Could not speak to men, could not give instruction or exhortation. No one understood what was going on, and so it is with the modern tongues movement. And even, like I said, when a man and his family come from a foreign field, and they come and they tell about the mission work, and then they get up and sing a special, if they don't translate it, It ought not to be in the church. They need to have a translator. Can you imagine? If we're going to let them get up and sing a special, why not just let the native come over and preach a sermon in another language and then sit down and say, oh, well, that was a good sermon preacher and go home and have no clue what's being said. I don't care whether it's three minutes, 30 minutes or an hour, if you don't know what's being said, it ought not to be in the church. It ought not to be there. And again, it doesn't matter whether it's a language or gibberish or what it is, things are to be done in order for the edification of the people. Getting ahead of myself here, but in verse three, but one who prophesies speaks to men for edification and exhortation and encouragement. You see, he's pushing these people somewhere where they're not. They're all excited about tongues, and he says, hey, the gift of prophecy. This is where you want to earnestly desire spiritual gifts, but especially prophecy. And it's interesting that this was a problem at Corinth, and indeed, in the Charismatic, in the Pentecostal world, what is it that they're saying now? Well, if you don't speak in tongues, you're not saved. As Solomon said in the Old Testament, nothing is new under the sun. Paul is telling them the purpose of prophecy is where it's at. Why? Because it speaks to men for edification, exhortation, and consolation. As John MacArthur put it, the purpose of prophecy is to build up by edification, to encourage through exhortation, and to comfort through consolation. Spiritual gifts are meant to accomplish something spiritually and practically worthwhile and are always meant to be of benefit to others, believer or unbeliever. And that's what prophecy is for. Verse four, as he writes, it seems to be dripping with some sarcasm. And again, I love how, even though this is God's word, we see Paul's personality kind of coming through here. He says, one who speaks in a tongue edifies himself, but one who prophesies edifies the church. I say that there's sarcasm here because he says, one who speaks in a tongue edifies himself, even true tongues. The true gift of tongues, which by the way, that has ceased. There is nobody in our day who has the gift of tongues. But the true gift of tongues, even the way that It operates in an orderly church like it did on the day of Pentecost. They need to be interpreted in order to be understood. There's no way in and of themselves that they can edify anybody without someone who can translate. the Pentecostals, the Charismatics, and others, they have this all wrong when they insist that tongues are for personal edification. That's not what's being taught here. Somebody falls into a trance, speaks a bunch of gibberish, and then comes out of it and doesn't know what in the world he said. There is no personal edification. Paul is referring to the value the Corinthians placed on the gift, not the actual value the gift had. One who prophesies edifies the church. He does this by using his gift to minister to others. What good would it do if someone who had the gift of prophecy back in the day received a word from the Lord and he kept it to himself. What if Paul, as he received this instruction that he's put down on paper to give to Cornuth, what if he never sent the letter? Has his gift of prophecy done any good? No. The same with tongues. If no one understands what's being said, there's no edification there. No edification. It's like trying to come back from somewhere you've never been. It just don't happen. Verse five, he says, but I wish that you all spoke in tongues, but even more, that you would prophesy, and greater is one who prophesies than one who speaks in tongues unless he translates so that the church may receive edification. He says, I wish you all spoke in tongues. Now, why would he say that if he has been warning and writing about tongues and saying that the gift of prophecy is better? Well, further, he already pointed out that there's diversity in the church and this is a good thing. Well, he writes this for emphasis. Paul wanted them to know that he doesn't despise the gift of tongues. He wants them to understand that he's not against the gift of tongues, but he wants them to understand that if you're gonna have the gift of tongues, There has to be a translator. There has to be a translator. He wants them to understand these things for emphasis. And then furthermore, he wished that the Corinthians would prophesy. Again, an impossibility that they would all have the same gift, but he writes it to make the point. If they were going to clamor for gifts, The same gift even, let it be the gift of prophecy. Greater is he who prophesies than he who speaks in tongues. And if you speak in tongues, let there be an interpreter. That's the way it's always supposed to be done in the first place. And even though the gift of tongues has ceased, even though there is nobody who has the gift of tongues, there is still principle. There is still principle in this chapter, which is laid down for us. Like I said, missionary comes and wants to sing a song in his language. Perfect. Sing it, but interpret it for us. Let us know what's being sung. There's a reason why that we don't use the Wycliffe Bible and the Tyndale Bible and so on and so forth. Why? Because those were written in languages that at the time, at the time they were, they were useful, needful even for the English speaking speakers of that day. But English has changed. They're great for the study. But it wouldn't do any good for anybody if I brought out those Bibles and began to preach and teach out of them. You see? Why? The same principle that's being laid down here. Edification requires intelligibility. This is what Paul is bringing out as he brings out this subject of love and tongues and prophecy to the church at Corinth. We can't just glaze our eyes over and say, well, gifts have ceased, meaning the sign gifts, and this was written to the church at Corinth, has nothing to do for us. There are principles here that are important for us to consider. May God add the blessing to the preaching of his word and thank you for your attention Lord willing. We'll pick this up next week Let's go and dismiss in prayer and I'll ask brother