TONGUES is a precious gift from God

Heaven_Bound · Jan 9, 2022

John 14:12 Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father.

Theoretically speaking here, what is happening today is Greater than what happened in the Book of Acts.

Heaven_Bound · Jan 9, 2022

Aidan1 said:

Speaking in Tongues can be traced back from the Apostles till now. There's written Documentation from the time of the Apostles till now. Clearly, John Wesley, from England/U.K. in the 1700's Documents speaking in Tongues. That was less than 150 years before the 1900's. You just choose to ignore the facts.

JTB · Jan 9, 2022

Aidan1 said:

I've seen miracles of the likes Peter and Paul saw.

And the gifts given as well.

The Giver never changes, just the potential recipients do.

Blain · Jan 9, 2022

JTB said:

I won't lie I kind of got mad at God today. I have waited I have prayed I have given him my faith I have believed for so long without ever recieving and yet I still can't have just one miracle. I shouldn't have done it but I was so angry that I told him to prove his promises saying to him how obviously I am not able to have a miracle and then said prove me wrong other wise don't tell me to believe and have faith because I have given you everything I can

maybe some people just can't have miracles......

Rosemaryx · Jan 9, 2022

Blain said:

I have to be honest , I just cannot imagine getting mad at God , the fact that He has saved me fills me with plenty...
I am in awe of His goodness , kindness and mercy , and His amazing love that He would ever even look at a wretch like me and save me...
...xox...

Blain · Jan 9, 2022

Rosemaryx said:

Yes I have not had a good day and I keep praying for my eyes to be healed I keep giving him my faith I have even told him he can have everything I have if I could just have this one miracle just show me one time that your promises are true.

Rosemaryx · Jan 9, 2022

Blain said:

But you know His promises are true...
Just look at the pit He has pulled you from

We all have something wrong with us , more than others , but when you are home with the Lord , you will see like you have never seen before...

My heart breaks sometimes for God...He is so good to us in the broken world , yet we moan and groan...
Come Lord Jesus Come...
...xox...

Heaven_Bound · Jan 9, 2022

Blain said:

My Bible tells me to Ask, Seek, and Knock and it shall be given, be found, be opened. That is a promise from God. A Promise for All Believers. And when I Ask, Seek, and Knock and get no response, I keep reminding God of His Promise found in Matthew 7:7 Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you:

God made us so, like we read about King David, who would get mad and tell God, gut them, kill them, why don't you do this, I asked for this...The Bible claims, David, in all his multitude of Sins we have documented, was considered by God as a Man after God's Own Heart.

Don't apologize, God made that Promise in Matthew 7, and God has to honor what He claims. Stand Firm, You are One of His, He does want to Heal You, sometimes, He wants to know that we expect Him to keep his Promise. David, the Man after God's Own heart, reminded Him constantly!

Blain · Jan 9, 2022

Rosemaryx said:

Yes is a good and loving father and I should not have lashed out at him but life has been one major storm after another for me most of my life has been suffering and a show of how unfair life can be and sometimes it really gets to me and I am always honest with him even in my anger but I just don't understand why some people can recieve miracles while others just can't it isn't like I haven't believed for years or haven't given him my faith. honestly this is just a bad day and a lot of this has been getting to me but he wanted me to seek greater faith so regardless if I recieve it or not I will continue on the path he has me on

Blain · Jan 9, 2022

Heaven_Bound said:

My Bible tells me to Ask, Seek, and Knock and it shall be given, be found, be opened. That is a promise from God. A Promise for All Believers. And when I Ask, Seek, and Knock and get no response, I keep reminding God of His Promise found in Matthew 7:7 Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you:

God made us so, like we read about King David, who would get mad and tell God, gut them, kill them, why don't you do this, I asked for this...The Bible claims, David, in all his multitude of Sins we have documented, was considered by God as a Man after God's Own Heart.

Don't apologize, God made that Promise in Matthew 7, and God has to honor what He claims. Stand Firm, You are One of His, He does want to Heal You, sometimes, He wants to know that we expect Him to keep his Promise. David, the Man after God's Own heart, reminded Him constantly!

TheLearner · Jan 9, 2022

Absolutely said:

I once visited Happy Church of Marilyn Hicky and they wanted to teach me to pray in tongues. They called it priming the pump. The Holy Spirit does not need to be primed.

TheLearner · Jan 9, 2022

Heaven_Bound said:

Speaking in Tongues can be traced back from the Apostles till now. There's written Documentation from the time of the Apostles till now. Clearly, John Wesley, from England/U.K. in the 1700's Documents speaking in Tongues. That was less than 150 years before the 1900's. You just choose to ignore the facts.

what book gives the facts?

Heaven_Bound · Jan 9, 2022

TheLearner said:

There are more extensive Documentations, but for someone like you, this is good for beginners.

https://www.grunge.com/492353/history-of-speaking-in-tongues-explained/

CS1 · Jan 9, 2022

FYI

ENGRID BARNETT of GRUNGE

Engrid Barnett is a Nevada-based writer, geographer, and musician with a serious passion for strange history and weird science. She's written numerous books and articles for Ripley's Believe It or Not, as well as pieces for Rova, American Trails, Nevada Magazine, and more.

Read More: https://www.grunge.com/author/engridbarnett/?utm_campaign=clip

She is not a Christian at least a professing one. In addtion she is doe not have a theological dgree. Her writting on tongues is taken from secular humanistic postion and unbiblical. Becafre who you seek to discredit the word of God and recieve counsel from.

LOL these professing chritians who hate pentacostels will seek those in the secular to defend thier unbiblical postion.

Heaven_Bound · Jan 9, 2022

CS1 said:

FYI

ENGRID BARNETT of GRUNGE

Engrid Barnett is a Nevada-based writer, geographer, and musician with a serious passion for strange history and weird science. She's written numerous books and articles for Ripley's Believe It or Not, as well as pieces for Rova, American Trails, Nevada Magazine, and more.

Read More: https://www.grunge.com/author/engridbarnett/?utm_campaign=clip

She is not a Christian at least a professing one. In addtion she is doe not have a theological dgree. Her writting on tongues is taken from secular humanistic postion and unbiblical. Becafre who you seek to discredit the word of God and recieve counsel from.

LOL these professing chritians who hate pentacostels will seek those in the secular to defend thier unbiblical postion.

I did not think he was ready for this, but since you desire to be interfering

https://www.bible.ca/tongues-history.htm

Heaven_Bound · Jan 9, 2022

Encyclopedia of Pentecostal History

70
Didache

Didache says, "For the Father desireth that the gifts be given to all" and also describes prophets who speak "in the Spirit." ("Charismata" ERE, III, 371. See The Teaching of the Thrive Apostles, 1.5 & 11.7; ANF VII, 377 & 380.)

100
Clement of Rome

Clement of Rome (died 100?) reminded the Corinthians that "a full outpouring of the Holy Spirit was upon you all." (Clement of Rome, First Epistle to the Corinthians, 2, ANF, I, 5)

107
Ignatius

He also admonished Polycarp to pray so that he might "be wanting in nothing, and... abound in every gift." (Ignatius, Epistle to Polycarp, 2, ANF, I, 99.)
Ignatius wrote to the church at Smyrna: "Ignatius... to the Church of God the Father, and of the beloved Jesus Christ, which has through mercy obtained every kind of gift, which is filled with faith and love, and is deficient in no gift, most worthy of God, and adorned with holiness... Be ye strong, I pray, in the power of the Holy Ghost." (Ignatius, Epistle to the Smyrnaeans, superscription & 12, ANF I, 86 & 92.)
Irenaeus (A.D. 115 to 202) a pupil of Polycarp (A.D. 70-155), who was himself a disciple of the Apostle John, wrote: "in like manner do we also hear many brethren in the Church who possess prophetic gifts, and who through the Spirit speak all kinds of languages, and bring to light for the general benefit the hidden things of men and declare the mysteries of God, whom also the apostle terms 'spiritual', they being spiritual because they partake of the Spirit".

110
Justin Martyr

Justin Martyr wrote, "For the prophetical gifts remain with us, even to the present time... Now it is possible to see amongst us women and men who possess gifts of the Spirit of God." (Justin, Dialogue with Trypho, 82 & 88, ANF, I, 240 & 243)

120-205
Irenaeus

Irenaeus "[T]he perfect man consists in the commingling and the union of the soul receiving the spirit of the Father... For this reason does the apostle declare, 'We speak wisdom among them that are perfect,' terming those persons 'perfect' who have received the Spirit of God, and who through the Spirit of God do speak in all languages, as he used [h]imself also to speak. In like manner we do also hear many brethren in the Church, who possess prophetic gifts, and who through the Spirit speak all kinds of languages... whom also the apostle terms 'spiritual,' they being spiritual because they partake of the Spirit." (Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 5.6.1, ANF, I, 531.)
Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons, wrote, "[T]hose who are in truth His disciples, receiving grace from Him, do in His name perform (miracles). It is not possible to name the numbers of the gifts which the Church (scattered) throughout the whole world, has received from God, in the name of Jesus Christ." (Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 2.32.4, ANF I, 409.)
Irenaeus mentions tongue speaking in his writing. He cited Acts 2 with no comment and applied it to the ability to speak a foreign language with no prior knowledge. He alluded to Paul's statement, "we speak wisdom among them that are perfect" (I Corinthians 2:6) and said "perfect" meant those who "have received the Spirit of God" and affirmed that they "do speak in all languages, as he (Paul, DRS) used himself to speak, in like manner." (Neander, famous ecclesiastical historian, Church History, Volume II, page 6, 1)
Irenaeus refused the abuses and fakery of those who sought to exercise the gift with no divine right. He related how a man named Marcus, an early Gnostic, seduced gullible women of their means by promising them the gift of prophecy. Irenaeus says Marcus began his pitch like this: ""I am eager to make thee a partaker of my Charis (spiritual gift), since the Father of all doth continually behold thy angel before His face." ... "Now the place of thy angel is among us: it behooves us to become one. Receive from me and by me Charis. Adorn thyself as a bride who is expecting her bridegroom, that thou mayest be what I am, and I what thou art. Establish the germ of light in thy nuptial chamber. Receive from me a spouse, and become receptive of him, while thou art received by him. Behold Charis has descended upon thee; open thy mouth and prophesy." [If the woman protested even slightly] Marcus would continue by saying, "Open thy mouth, speak whatsoever occurs to thee, and thou shalt prophesy." Irenaeus added, "She then, vainly puffed up and elated by these words, and greatly excited in soul by the expectation that it is herself who is to prophesy, her heart beating violently (from emotion), reaches the requisite pitch of audacity, and idly as well as impudently utters some nonsense as it happens to occur to her, such as might be expected from one heated by an empty spirit ... Henceforth, she reckons herself a prophetess, and expresses her thanks to Marcus for having imparted to her of his own Charis." (Neander, famous ecclesiastical historian, Church History, Volume I, 13, 3)."
Commentary on 1 Cor 13:8-13: "And Paul declares: "Not that I have already attained, or that I am justified, or already have been made perfect. For we know in part, and we prophesy in part; but when that which is perfect has come, the things which are in part shall be done away." As, therefore, when that which is perfect is come, we shall not see another Father, but Him whom we now desire to see (for "blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God" )" (Irenaeus, Chapter IX, Roberts, Alexander and Donaldson, James. Ante-Nicene Fathers: Volume I. Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1997.)
Scriptures complete: True knowledge is [that which consists in] the doctrine of the apostles, and the ancient constitution of the Church throughout all the world, and the distinctive manifestation of the body of Christ according to the successions of the bishops, by which they have handed down that Church which exists in every place, and has come even unto us, being guarded and preserved without any forging of Scriptures, by a very complete system of doctrine, and neither receiving addition nor [suffering] curtailment [in the truths which she believes]; and [it consists in] reading [the word of God] without falsification, and a lawful and diligent exposition in harmony with the Scriptures, both without danger and without blasphemy; and [above all, it consists in] the pre-eminent gift of love, which is more precious than knowledge, more glorious than prophecy, and which excels all the other gifts [of God]. (Irenaeus, Chapter XXXIII, Roberts, Alexander and Donaldson, James. Ante-Nicene Fathers: Volume I. Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1997)
Irenaeus (d. c. 200) served his age as Bishop of Lyons. A student of Polycarp (who, in turn, had been a disciple of the Apostle John), he had spent his youth in Smyrna and later represented a significant link between the East and the West. His major work, Against Heresies, was an attack on Gnosticism with a defense of the Christian faith drawn from those theological and canonical traditions at his disposal. Irenaeus conspicuously associated tongues with the Last Days. Referring to the latter-day outpouring promised in Joel 2:28, 29, he wrote: "For God who did promise by the prophet that He would send His Spirit upon the whole human race, was He who did send." (Irenaeus, Against Heresies, III, xii, 1, ANF, I, 430.) Irenaeus went on to relate the events of Pentecost to his own experience: "In like manner, we do hear many brethren in the Church, who possess prophetic gifts, and who through the Spirit speak all kinds of languages " Those who exercised this gift of tongues were spiritual people who through their gift revealed "for the general benefit the hidden things of men" and declared "the mysteries of God" in the diverse, living languages of mankind. (Irenaeus, Against Heresies, V, vi, 1, ANF, I, 531.) (The Charismatic Movement, 1975, Michael P. Hamilton, p 66)

Heaven_Bound · Jan 9, 2022

150
Gnostics

During the middle of the second century, however, two movements arose alongside or within the main body of Christians, presenting a major crisis in polity, theology, and the interpretation of the Old Testament, which did have glossolalia. The older movement was Gnosticism, of which there are clear adumbrations in the New Testament. The other, a somewhat later reaction to the structural hardening of main-line Christianity, was Montanism. ... Among Gnostic groups, glossolalia of the type requiring interpretation was common, and there exist several transcribed Gnostic prayers in the Coptic tongue in which are included several lines of ejaculated glossolalic syllables or single vowels and consonants. There are also instances of nearly unintelligible utterances in some Gnostic texts in which Aramaic words or other nom na barbara can be recognized in somewhat distorted form. In the second Book of Jeu, a glossolalic prayer of Jesus of some six lines is preserved in garbled Greek within a Coptic text. The Gnostic sect of Marcosians apparently preserved Greek glossolalic phrases which, however, may have merely a formulaic or routinized character. In the recently discovered Nag Hammadi Gnostic library in The Three Stelaes of Seph, unintelligible syllables seem to be merely nomina barbara; but in The Gospel of the Egyptians, though there are many nomina barbara, there are some passages that look more like glossolalia, i.e., distorted Greek formulations in Coptic context. (The Charismatic Movement, 1975, Michael P. Hamilton, p 64)

140-230
Tertullian

Tertullian "Let Marcion then exhibit, as gifts of his god, some prophets, such as have not spoken by human sense, but with the Spirit of God... let him produce a psalm, a vision, a prayer - only let it be by the Spirit, in an ecstasy, that is, in a rapture, whenever an interpretation of tongues has occurred to him ... Now all these signs (of spiritual gifts) are forthcoming from my side without any difficulty." (Tertullian, Against Marcion, 5.8, ANF, III, 446-47.)
Tertullian wrote against the heretic Marcion shortly after A.D. 200: "the Creator promised the gift of His Spirit in the latter days; and... Christ has in these last days appeared as the dispenser of spiritual gifts." (Tertullian, Against Marcion, 5.8, ANF, III, 446.)
Tertullian, "Therefore, you blessed ones, for whom the grace of God is waiting, when you come up from the most sacred bath of the new birth, when you spread out your hands for the first time in your mother's house with your brethren, ask your Father, ask your Lord, for the special gift of His inheritance, the distributed charisms, which form an additional, underlying feature [of baptism]. Ask, He says, and you shall receive. In fact, you have sought, and you have found: you have knocked, and it has been opened to you." (Tertullian, c. 160 - 225, On Baptism 20; Sources Chretiennes 35:96, in his pre-Montanist phase)
Took the view that Gifts would cease prior to second coming: based upon 1 Cor 13:8-13 "Charity endures all things; tolerates all things; "of course because she is patient. Justly, then, "will she never fail; " for all other things will be cancelled, will have their consummation. "Tongues, sciences, prophecies, become exhausted; faith, hope, charity, are permanent: "Faith, which Christ's patience introduced; hope, which man's patience waits for; charity, which Patience accompanies, with God as Master. (Tertullian, The Five Books Against Marcion book 5, Chapter 12, Roberts, Alexander and Donaldson, James. Ante-Nicene Fathers: Volume III. Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1997.)
Tertullian, one of the leading church fathers, converted to Montanism in the latter years of his life, and he wrote this description of a Montanist church service: "We have among us now a sister who has been granted gifts of revelations, which she experiences in church during the Sunday services through ecstatic vision in the Spirit.... And after the people have been dismissed at the end of the service it is her custom to relate to us what she has seen.... "Among other things," says she, "there was shown to me a soul in bodily form, and it appeared like a spirit; but it was no mere something, void of qualities, but rather a thing which could be grasped, soft and translucent and of etherial colour, in a form at all points human." (Cited in Henry BeKenson, ea., Documents of the Christian Church (London: Oxford, 1963), 77.) Sound familiar? Tertullian sounds like he might have been describing a twentieth-century charismatic church. (Charismatic Chaos, John F. MacArthur, 1991, p. 74)
The most illustrious follower of Montanus was Tertullian of Carthage (d. c. 220). ... When he wrote his defense of orthodoxy with respect to the Godhead and Christology against Marcion (after c. 207), Tertullian had himself become a Montanist. He challenged Marcion to produce from among his followers any "such as have not spoken by human sense, but with the Spirit of God, such as have both predicted things to come, and have made manifest the secrets of the heart." Utterances, inspired "by the Spirit, in an ecstasy, that is in a rapture, whenever an interpretation of tongues has occurred," were "forthcoming" from his side "without any difficulty" and, according to him, attested to the orthodoxy of his experience and his theological dicta. (Tertullian, Against Marcion, V, viii, ANF, III, 447) (The Charismatic Movement, 1975, Michael P. Hamilton, p 66)
"Heaven knows how many distinguished men, to say nothing of common people, have been cured either of devils or of their sicknesses." [Specific examples follow, of persons named and known to his readers.] (Tertullian, "To Scapula," chap. 4, written between A.D. 196-212)

Heaven_Bound · Jan 9, 2022

175
Montanus

There is said to be a certain village called Ardabau in that part of Mysia, which borders upon Phrygia. There first, they say, when Gratus was proconsul of Asia, a recent convert, Montanus by name, through his unquenchable desire for leadership, gave the adversary opportunity against him. And he became beside himself, and being suddenly in a sort of frenzy and ecstasy, he raved, and began to babble and utter strange things, prophesying in a manner contrary to the constant custom of the Church handed down by tradition from the beginning. 8 Some of those who heard his spurious utterances at that time were indignant, and they rebuked him as one that was possessed, and that was under the control of a demon, and was led by a deceitful spirit, and was distracting the multitude; and they forbade him to talk, remembering the distinction drawn by the Lord and his warning to guard watchfully against the coming of false prophets? But others imagining themselves possessed of the Holy Spirit and of a prophetic gift, were elated and not a little puffed up; and forgetting the distinction of the Lord, they challenged the mad and insidious and seducing spirit, and were cheated and deceived by him. In consequence of this, he could no longer be held in check, so as to keep silence. 9 Thus by artifice, or rather by such a system of wicked craft, the devil, devising destruction for the disobedient, and being unworthily honored by them, secretly excited and inflamed their understandings which had already become estranged from the true faith. And he stirred up besides two women, and filled them with the false spirit, so that they talked wildly and unreasonably and strangely, like the person already mentioned. And the spirit pronounced them blessed as they rejoiced and gloried in him, and puffed them up by the magnitude of his promises. But sometimes he rebuked them openly in a wise and faithful manner, that he might seem to be a reprover. But those of the Phrygians that were deceived were few in number. "And the arrogant spirit taught them to revile the entire universal Church under heaven, because the spirit of false prophecy received neither honor from it nor entrance into it. 10 For the faithful in Asia met often in many places throughout Asia to consider this matter, and examined the novel utterances and pronounced them profane, and rejected the heresy, and thus these persons were expelled from the Church and debarred from communion." (Roberts, Alexander and Donaldson, James, Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series: Volume I, Oak Harbor, WA: Logos, 1997, Book V. Chapter XVI. The Circumstances Related of Montanus and His False Prophets)
Eusebius says of Montanus "According to the description of Apollinaris, Bishop of Hierapolis ... Montanus 'became beside himself, and being suddenly in a sort of frenzy and ecstasy, he raved, and began to babble and utter strange things, prophesying in a manner contrary to the constant custom of the Church'." (Eusebius, Church History, Volume 16, second series, I, page 231). "He fell into certain states of ecstatic transport, in which, no longer master of his own consciousness, but made the blind organ, as he fancied, of a higher spirit, he predicted, in oracular, mystical expressions, fresh persecutions of the Christians..." (Neander, famous ecclesiastical historian, Church History, Volume II, page 206.)
Montanus and his followers claimed to receive revelation from God that supplemented the Word communicated by Christ and the apostles. They believed the Holy Spirit spoke through the mouths of Montanus and the two prophetesses. Montanus believed he was living in the last days immediately before the return of Christ. He taught that God's kingdom would be set up in his own village of Pepuza in his lifetime, and that he would have a prominent role in it. Those and other false prophecies were among the chief reasons the rest of the church considered his movement heretical. Montanus opposed formalism in the church and boldly intimidated Christians by claiming his followers were more spiritual than those who had only the "dead letter" of the Scriptures. In most respects, Montanists were orthodox. But the movement was schismatic, believing only themselves to be the true church. The rest of the church branded Montanism as a serious heresy to be rejected. Augustine wrote against the movement, and the Council at Constantinople decreed that Montanism was tantamount to paganism. (Earle E. Cairns, Christianity Through the Centuries (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1954), 110- 11.) (Charismatic Chaos, John F. MacArthur, 1991, p. 74)
The contemporary charismatic movement is in many ways the spiritual heir of Montanism. In fact, it would not at all be unfair to call today's charismatic movement neo-Montanism. At least one leading charismatic writer, Larry Christenson, even claims the Montanist movement as part of the charismatic historical tradition. (Larry Christenson, "Pentecostalism's Forgotten Forerunner," in Vinson Synan, ed. Aspects of Pentecostal-Charismatic Origins (Plainfield, N.J.: Logos, 1975), 32-34.) (Charismatic Chaos, John F. MacArthur, 1991, p. 75)
During the middle of the second century, however, two movements arose alongside or within the main body of Christians, presenting a major crisis in polity, theology, and the interpretation of the Old Testament, which did have glossolalia. The older movement was Gnosticism, of which there are clear adumbrations in the New Testament. The other, a somewhat later reaction to the structural hardening of main-line Christianity, was Montanism. ... Among Gnostic groups, glossolalia of the type requiring interpretation was common, and there exist several transcribed Gnostic prayers in the Coptic tongue in which are included several lines of ejaculated glossolalic syllables or single vowels and consonants. There are also instances of nearly unintelligible utterances in some Gnostic texts in which Aramaic words or other nom na barbara can be recognized in somewhat distorted form. In the second Book of Jeu, a glossolalic prayer of Jesus of some six lines is preserved in garbled Greek within a Coptic text. The Gnostic sect of Marcosians apparently preserved Greek glossolalic phrases which, however, may have merely a formulaic or routinized character. In the recently discovered Nag Hammadi Gnostic library in The Three Stelaes of Seph, unintelligible syllables seem to be merely nomina barbara; but in The Gospel of the Egyptians, though there are many nomina barbara, there are some passages that look more like glossolalia, i.e., distorted Greek formulations in Coptic context. (The Charismatic Movement, 1975, Michael P. Hamilton, p 64)
The founder of Methodism, despite his brother's protest, knew that the gift of tongues was frequently dispensed in his day; and he, for his part, believed that it had had authentic existence in other post-Apostolic centuries. In fact, he regarded Montanists as "real, scriptural Christians" and Montanus himself as "one of the best men then upon the earth." The reason for the early withdrawal of the charismatic gifts was that "dry, formal, orthodox men" had begun to "ridicule" those gifts they did not themselves possess and to "decry them all as either madness or imposture." ( Wesley, Journai, III, 496; Wesley, Works, ed. John Emory (New York, 1856), VI, 556. Wesley frequently extolled the early Christians and urged others to follow their example. George Whitefield, too, as he journeyed to the American colonies in 1739, wrote to the societies in England and Wales: "Take then, my Brethren, the Primitive Christians for your Ensamples; and while you endeavor in all Things to follow them as they did Christ, no Power upon Earth can lawfully forbid or hinder you." Quoted from Whitefield, A Letter to the Religious Societies, lately set on Foot in seueral Parts of England and Wales (London, 1740), p. 5.) (The Charismatic Movement, 1975, Michael P. Hamilton, p 80)

Heaven_Bound · Jan 9, 2022

Montanus was a second-century heretic from Phrygia who believed he was a prophet sent by God to reform Christianity through asceticism, the practice of glossolalia, and continued prophetic revelation. He believed he was inspired by the Holy Spirit in all his teaching. Two so-called prophetesses, Priscilla and Maximilla, were instrumental in the spread of Montanism. The church father Eusebius wrote, "[Montanus] stirred up two women and filled them with the bastard spirit so that they uttered demented, absurd and irresponsible sayings." (Cited in Henry BeKenson, ea., Documents of the Christian Church (London: Oxford, 1963), 77.) Some historians have taken that to mean that those women spoke in tongues. (Charismatic Chaos, John F. MacArthur, 1991, p. 73)
Hippolytus wrote of the Montanists, "They have been deceived by two females, Priscilla and Maximilla by name, whom they hold to be prophetesses, asserting that into them the Paraclete spirit entered.... They magnify these females above the Apostles and every gift of Grace, so that some of them go so far as to say that in them there is something more than Christ.... They introduce novelties in the form of fasts and feasts, abstinences and diets of radishes, giving these females as their authority." (Cited in Henry BeKenson, ea., Documents of the Christian Church (London: Oxford, 1963), 77.) (Charismatic Chaos, John F. MacArthur, 1991, p. 73)
Eusebius described the birth and early growth of the movement: "Montanus, they say, first exposed himself to the assaults of the adversary through his unbounded lust for leadership. He was one of the recent converts, and he became possessed of a spirit, and suddenly began to rave in a kind of ecstatic trance, and to babble jargon, prophesying in a manner contrary to the custom of the church which had been handed down by tradition from the earliest times. ... Some of them that heard his bastard utterances rebuked him as one possessed of a devil ... remembering the Lord's warning to guard vigilantly against the coming of false prophets. But others were carried away and not a little elated, thinking themselves possessed of the Holy Spirit and of the gift of prophecy." (Cited in Henry BeKenson, ea., Documents of the Christian Church (London: Oxford, 1963), 77.) (Charismatic Chaos, John F. MacArthur, 1991, p. 74)

Heaven_Bound · Jan 9, 2022

176
Celsus

Celsus, a pagan, wrote near the end of the second century that Christians in his day spoke in tongues. The theologian Origen preserved his testimony. (Origen, Against Celsus, 7.9, ANF IV, 614, quoting Celsus, The Discourse. Origen, Commentary on John, 2.6, ANF; X, 329.)
A pagan philosopher, Celsus, well acquainted with Christianity and its heretical aberrations, unwittingly provides us with significant observations among the Christians as seen from the outside. It was toward the end of the second century that he wrote his True Discourse, which survives in the pages of Origen's Contra Celsum. Origen (d. c. 254), an Alexandrian biblical scholar and a prolific writer, quotes Celsus as testifying that people spoke in tongues in his day: "To these promises are added strange, fanatical, and quite unintelligible words, of which no rational person can find the meaning: for so dark are they, as to have no meaning at all; but they give occasion to every fool or impostor to apply them to suit his own purpose. (Origen, Against Celsus, VII, ix, ANF, IV, 614.) (The Charismatic Movement, 1975, Michael P. Hamilton, p 67)

200-258
Cyprian

Cyprian (A.D. 200-258), his contemporaries, give the same testimony as Origen that gifts ceased

214-218
Origen

"[W]e can clearly show a countless multitude of Greeks and Barbarians who acknowledge the existence of Jesus. And some give evidence of their having received through this faith a marvellous power by the cures which they perform, invoking no other name ... than that of the God of all things, and of Jesus ... . For by these means we too have seen many persons freed from grievous calamities, and from distractions of mind, and madness, and countless other ills, which could be cured neither by men nor devils" (chap. 24). (Origen (185-254), "Against Celsus," chapters 2, 6, 24)
Origen, " ... the vestiges and traces [of the charism of healing] continue to manifest themselves in the churches." (Origen: "Preface to Commentary on the Psalms" 2; Patrologia Graeca 12:1078-79 (written c. 214-218)
Origen interprets 1 Cor 13:8-13 saying the Old Covenant was in Part and the present knowledge of Christ was the Perfect come: "Christ the Pearl of Great Price. Now you will connect with the man seeking goodly pearls the saying, "Seek and ye shall find," and this—"Every one that seeketh findeth." For what seek ye? Or what does every one that seeketh find? I venture to answer, pearls and the pearl which he possesses, who has given up all things, and counted them as loss; "for which," says Paul, "I have counted all things but loss that I may win Christ; " by "all things" meaning the goodly pearls, "that I may win Christ," the one very precious pearl. Precious, then, is a lamp to men in darkness, and there is need of a lamp until the sun rise; and precious also is the glory in the face of Moses, and of the prophets also, I think, and a beautiful sight, by which we are introduced so as to be able to see the glory of Christ, to which the Father bears witness, saying, "This is My beloved Son in whom I am well-pleased." But "that which hath been made glorious hath not been made glorious in this respect by reason of the glory that surpasseth; " and there is need to us first of the glory which admits of being done away, for the sake of the glory which surpasseth; as there is need of the knowledge which is in part, which will be done away when that which is perfect comes. Every soul, therefore, which comes to childhood, and is on the way to full growth, until the fulness of time is at hand, needs a tutor and stewards and guardians, in order that, after all these things, he who formerly differed nothing from a bond-servant, though he is lord of all, may receive, when freed from a tutor and stewards and guardians, the patrimony corresponding to the very costly pearl, and to that which is perfect, which on its coming does away with that which is in part, when one is able to receive "the excellency of the knowledge of Christ," having been previously exercised, so to speak, in those forms of knowledge which are surpassed by the knowledge of Christ. But the multitude, not perceiving the beauty of the many pearls of the law, and all the knowledge, "in part," though it be, of the prophets, suppose that they can, without a clear exposition and apprehension of these, find in whole the one precious pearl, and behold "the excellency of the knowledge of Christ," in comparison with which all things that came before such and so great knowledge, although they were not refuse in their own nature, appear to be refuse. This refuse is perhaps the "dung" thrown down beside the fig tree by the keeper of the vineyard, which is the cause of its bearing fruit." (Origen, Roberts, Alexander and Donaldson, James. Ante-Nicene Fathers: Volume X. Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1997)

TONGUES is a precious gift from God

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