“When God is Truly Among Us”
(1 Corinthians 14:20-25)
Series: Chaos & Correction (1 Corinthians)
Rev. Todd A. Linn, PhD
Henderson’s First Baptist Church, Henderson
•Take your Bibles and open to 1 Corinthians, chapter 14 (page 774; YouVersion).
While you’re finding that, we want to say thank you to those who are praying for us in the prayer room. We’re encouraged while we’re worshiping out here that they are praying for us in there.
If you are visiting, we have been preaching our way, verse-by-verse, through the book of 1 Corinthians. This is what we do here, preaching and teaching through books of the Bible. Our series is entitled, “Chaos and Correction.” There was chaos in Corinth, chaos in the church that the Apostle Paul planted during his second missionary journey, this in the 1st Century, around the years AD 51-54.
Shortly after Paul founded the church, the church became fraught with division, disorder, and difficulty. So Paul writes this letter of 1 Corinthians around the year AD 55, writing the letter in order to correct the chaos at Corinth. And just as the Word of God brings correction to the Corinthians, so may the Word of God bring correction to the Kentuckians. The Bible is alive and like a sword sharp enough to penetrate the depths of our hearts, performing a kind of “spiritual surgery” that brings about necessary correction to our lives.
For the last couple weeks we have been studying the spiritual gifts of prophecy and speaking in tongues. We have defined speaking in tongues as, “Prayer or praise spoken in words generally not understood by the speaker.” It is a form of speech directed upward to God in a private setting, such as in one’s prayer closet or, in a public setting, such as worship, when used with interpretation. Paul’s requiring that an interpreter be present in the worship service is a necessary correction that Paul brings to the use of this gift. We have been noting that and will note it again this week and next week, Lord willing.
The gift of prophecy is the “Proclaiming of what one believed that God had brought to his or her mind suddenly or spontaneously.” This gift is used in the context of public worship where a speaker says something like, “I sense the Lord leading me to say thus and such” and the speaker shares God’s truth to the congregation. If that sounds a bit dangerous to some of us, we are encouraged by Paul’s instructions found at the end of chapter 14 in a passage we will study carefully next week, Lord willing, where Paul calls for the necessary “judging” of these kinds of prophetic utterances. The church is to “judge” the prophecy to determine whether it is consistent with the character of God and whether it squares with Scripture.
So before we read our passage this morning we are helped by remembering that Paul has been teaching that the gift of prophecy stands a greater chance of strengthening the church than the speaking of tongues where there is no interpretation of tongues. Keep that in mind as we read today’s passage.
•Please stand in honor of the reading of God’s Word.
20 Brethren, do not be children in understanding; however, in malice be babes, but in understanding be mature.
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.
22 Therefore tongues are for a sign, not to those who believe but to unbelievers; but prophesying is not for unbelievers but for those who believe.
23 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 you are out of your mind?
24 But if all prophesy, and an unbeliever or an uninformed person comes in, he is convinced by all, he is convicted by all.
25 And thus the secrets of his heart are revealed; and so, falling down on his face, he will worship God and report that God is truly among you.
•Pray.
Introduction:
We said at the outset of our study that we would attempt to do our very best to lay aside any preconceived notions about the spiritual gifts of speaking in tongues and prophecy. We’ve endeavored to allow the Bible to speak to us in a simple and straightforward fashion.
And so we’ll continue to do this, picking up at verse 20 and simply studying a verse at a time, making our way verse-by-verse through the passage and then, at the end of our verse-by-verse study, we’ll consider a few implications that rise up out of the passage.
So with our Bibles open we look again at the text, this time a little more closely as we read again verse 20:
20 Brethren, do not be children in understanding; however, in malice be babes, but in understanding be mature.
The sense is, “Don’t think like children here!” Don’t think like immature children when it comes to tongue speaking. Your preoccupation with speaking in tongues is so childish!” He adds, “If you’re going to act like an infant, act like an infant with respect to evil.” A tiny baby doesn’t get into as much trouble as a full-grown adult. He adds, “But in understanding (that is, in your thinking) be like an adult; grow up.”
Applied to the Corinthian situation, the idea seems to be, “When you gather together for worship, don’t gather together and speak in tongues without interpretation. That would be to think and act like a self-centered child. Act like grownups by caring about others, caring about all the others who are present!”
21 In the law (here a reference to the OT in general) 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.
Verse 21 is a loose reference to Isaiah 28, verse 11. Some of you may have a study Bible that tells you that. Paul is paraphrasing Isaiah 28 and applying it to the Corinthian context.
If you turn later to Isaiah 28 you will read about God’s judgment upon the Israelites. He judges His people’s sin by using the Assyrians. So this judgment comes to them through these Assyrians who speak their own foreign language, speaking in a tongue that is indiscernible, an unintelligible language.
Interestingly the region of Assyria consisted largely of what is now Northern Iraq, where our US military only yesterday launched fresh air strikes in an effort to dismantle the terroristic activity of the ISIS or ISIL militants. As I understand it, this is part of the area that was known in the Old Testament times as Assyria. That’s just an aside if you’re following the news.
So these Assyrians invaded Israel and as they came they spoke in a tongue that was unknown to the Hebrews. The Israelites, of course, spoke Hebrew and Aramaic, but these Assyrians spoke a foreign language, a different tongue.
22 Therefore tongues are for a sign, not to those who believe but to unbelievers; but prophesying is not for unbelievers but for those who believe.
So “tongues are a sign” says, Paul. Were we to ask, “What kind of sign,” or, “Is this a positive sign or a negative sign, would tongue speaking be a sign of God’s blessing or a sign of God’s judgment?” Paul’s citing Isaiah 28 tells us straightaway that tongues were understood to be a “negative sign,” or a “sign of God’s judgment” because God was using the Assyrian army to punish His disobedient people, judging them for their idolatry and infidelity. There were a few among them who were faithful to the Lord, but the majority were not. They were unfaithful and unbelieving.
This is why Paul says in verse 22, “Therefore tongues are for a sign, not to those who believe but to unbelievers.” God used the Assyrians to judge unfaithful, unbelieving Israel.
Now it is ironic that this is quite the opposite of the way many of our Pentecostal friends understand tongues to be a sign. In the main they tend to regard tongue speaking as a sign of God’s blessing. In other words, they say that the evidence that a Christian has been so-called “baptized in the Holy Spirit,” is his or her ability to speak in tongues. So they regard tongue speaking as a sign of God’s blessing.
Just the opposite of what Paul is actually teaching here in this passage! Verse 22 again, “Therefore tongues are for a sign, not to those who believe but to unbelievers.” Tongue speaking is a sign of God’s judgment upon those who do not believe and trust in Him.
It seems clear enough what’s going on in the Isaiah 28 passage. Unbelieving Israel is being judged by God, God who is judging them by using a people who speak in a foreign, indiscernible tongue.
But how does Paul mean for us to make the connection to Corinth? He means for us to understand it in much the same way, but especially with regard to the result or effect that tongue speaking has upon unbelievers. So he says in verse 23:
23 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 you are out of your mind?
That makes sense to most of us. You picture a congregation gathered together for worship and, Paul adds this element in verse 23, saying, “if the whole church comes together in one place, and all speak with tongues,” Imagine that! I mean you’ve got a congregation of say, 150 or 200 and all 200 of them are speaking in tongues.
Then Paul adds in verse 23, “and there come in those who are uninformed or unbelievers.” That is, they are not regular attenders, they’re outsiders. They’re not Christians, they’re unbelievers. So for whatever reason, they’re coming in to the worship service on this particular Sunday morning—maybe someone invited them and they decided to come that day—and so in the door they come and they hear so much babbling of syllables and words that are foreign and unfamiliar. And they look around and everyone is doing this and they don’t understand the first word of it.
What will these “first time guests” conclude about this particular church? Paul suggests at the end of verse 23, “Will they not say that you are out of your mind?” And the implied response is, “Yes! They will say that these Christians are—in the Phillips translation—“insane!” What a strange bunch of mumbo jumbo!
Now, this gift of tongues is contrasted with the gift of prophecy and Paul’s point is that in the gathered assembly, in the church, in public worship, a congregation does better to allow the use of the gift of prophecy rather than tongues—unless the tongue is interpreted. But where tongues are not interpreted, there is simply no benefit to anyone in the entire assembly except for the individual tongue speaker. No one understands what is being spoken and unbelievers who by chance may be present on that day will conclude that the church folks are simply “out of their minds”—and—they may leave the church, never to return again. So Paul is teaching here that when it comes to edification, to strengthening others, to building up the church, prophecy is by nature a greater gift than tongues. And furthermore, prophecy has an impact that reaches beyond the believer to the unbeliever. Unlike tongues, prophecy is far more likely to be used of God to impact the heart and mind of an unbeliever who may be present in a worship service.
And it makes sense, doesn’t it? Because when prophecy is taking place, what language is the speaker using? He is using the language in which everyone else speaks. So in Corinth, for example, he or she was prophesying in Greek. And because everyone in the congregation spoke Greek, just as everyone in our congregation speaks English—I think; there may be one or two of you in here who doesn’t know English!—when everyone speaks the same language, then everyone understands what the speaker is saying.
So Paul has just said in verse 23 that when someone comes into the assembly and he hears folks speaking in tongues, because he doesn’t “speak the language” or “understand the language,” he will conclude you are “out of your mind.” Contrast that scenario now with verse 24:
24 But if all prophesy, and an unbeliever or an uninformed person comes in, he is convinced by all, he is convicted by all.
In other words, this outsider, this unbeliever, understands what is being spoken. He understands and the Holy Spirit, working through that prophetic word—just as the Holy Spirit does through preaching or teaching a passage of Scripture—the Holy Spirit works through those spoken words of the person using the gift of prophecy.
And what may happen to this unbeliever? Last part of verse 24, “He is convinced by all (that is spoken), he is convicted by all (that he heard).” Wow.
Tongues are not likely to have that same effect upon an unbeliever. The outsider, interested inquirer, this person who does not yet know Christ, he or she is not likely to be won to Christ by watching or listening to someone speaking in a tongue.
It’s not to say God can’t do that. He is sovereign. He does as He pleases. But Paul is saying that this unbeliever has a greater chance of being drawn to God, coming to repentance, and fully committing himself to Christ when someone in the church is speaking a prophetic word of truth in a language the unbeliever understands.
So we hear again the Apostle saying as he did at the end of last week’s passage, in verse 19, “Yet in the church I would rather speak five words with my understanding, that I may teach others also, than ten thousand words in a tongue.”
Or back in verse 5, where Paul says, “I wish you all spoke with tongues, but even more that you prophesied;”
Imagine a church full of people who are prophesying at one level or other. Remember from our previous studies: while prophecy includes preaching, not all prophecy is preaching or teaching a passage of Scripture. Preaching and teaching Scripture is, without a doubt, the best kind of prophecy, but prophecy in its broadest form, included that which was being done here at Corinth. Remember our definition of prophecy, the: “Proclaiming of what one believed that God had brought to his or her mind suddenly or spontaneously.”
We’ll talk even more of this next week when we reach the final passage of Chapter 14 where Paul teaches very pointedly how this all works out in the typical worship service. He stresses that there is a way in which these gifts are to be used, speaking in tongues and prophesying are to be done in an orderly fashion.
But for now, Paul asks us in verse 23 to “Imagine (that) all prophesy.” Imagine everyone in the church is proclaiming God’s truth in one way or another. So he says in verse 23, “But if all prophesy, and an unbeliever or an uninformed person comes in, he is convinced by everything (he hears), he is convicted by all (that he hears or all that has been spoken),” convinced by all, convicted by all—and—verse 25:
25 And [thus] the secrets of his heart are revealed; and so, falling down on his face, he will worship God and report that God is truly among you.
So while prophecy is a gift given primarily for the benefit of believers, God also uses prophecy to convict the hearts of unbelievers. An unbeliever present hears a prophetic word of truth and “the secrets of his heart are revealed;’ that is, “the dark corners of his heart where he has hidden his sin, this is revealed to him.” So “the secrets of his heart are revealed; and so, falling down on his face (in conviction and repentance), he will worship God and report that God is truly among you.”
Theologian Wayne Grudem provides an example of this sort of thing taking place today. He writes:
I have heard a report of this happening in a clearly non-charismatic Baptist church in America. A missionary speaker paused in the middle of his message and said something like this: “I didn’t plan to say this, but it seems the Lord is indicating that someone in this church has just walked out on his wife and family. If that is so, let me tell you that God wants you to return to them and learn to follow God’s pattern for family life.” The missionary did not know it, but in the unlit balcony sat a man who had entered the church moments before for the first time in his life. The description fitted him exactly, and he made himself known, acknowledged his sin, and began to seek after God [Grudem, Wayne. Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Biblical Doctrine (pp. 1056-1057)].
Hear again verses 24-25:
24 But if all prophesy, and an unbeliever or an uninformed person comes in, he is convinced by all, he is convicted by all.
25 And thus the secrets of his heart are revealed; and so, falling down on his face, he will worship God and report that God is truly among you.
More so than the gift of tongues, the gift of prophecy stands a far greater chance of regenerating the hearts of unbelievers, bringing them to repentance, and leading them to fully commit themselves to Jesus Christ.
Paul concludes his line of reasoning in verse 25 with the glorious truth that this previous unbeliever or uninformed will, “Report that God is truly among you.”
I’ve thought a lot about that statement, “that God is truly among you” and asked the question, “When God is truly among us, what does that look like? What do we see? What should we see? What should others see? What are the evidences that God is working in a congregation?” So let me give you these three things to write down.
**When God is “Truly Among Us,” We See:
1) Evangelism of Souls
One of Paul’s chief concerns in this passage is his concern for lost souls. He writes of the very real possibility of an outsider entering into the worship experience, a person whom he describes in verses 23 and 24 as the “uninformed” or “unbeliever.”
So there is at least the expectation that Christians are inviting lost people to be with them at the worship service.
Do you regularly invite folks to be with you in worship and Sunday school? Did you know that research indicates that more than 80% of the unchurched say they would come to church if someone sincerely invited them? Yet more than 80% said that they had never been invited to church.
Invite someone to be with you next week. Just ask them. Don’t worry about offending them. Satan is the father of lies and he wants you to believe the lie that the unchurched will be offended if you talk to them. It’s simply not true. This week make it your goal to invite at least one person to be with you in worship or Sunday school next Sunday.
Furthermore, the worship service should be sensitive to those who are present and are not saved. This does not mean that we design the entire service around the so-called “felt needs” of the uninformed, of the unbeliever. Worship is about God’s people praising God and hearing from His Word. But the church must also be thinking about unbelievers who are present in the assembly and be sensitive to how they are taking in what is going on.
A good Sunday school class, for example, is one in which the teacher and others are ready for outsiders, non-regulars, and unbelievers. A good Sunday school class seeks to make such folks comfortable as visit and continues to keep such folks in mind during the teaching and even casual conversation that goes on in such groups. Again, this is not about “dumbing down” what is being taught or somehow laying aside the truth of God’s Word in an effort to win over these outsiders. Quite the opposite!
Remember the response to the person whom Paul says may enter the Corinthian setting and hears truth being shared? He is, verse 24, “convinced by all (that he hears) he is convicted by all (that has been spoken),” verse 25, “And thus the secrets of his heart are revealed; and so, falling down on his face, he will worship God and report that God is truly among you.”
What does a church look like where God is truly at work? God is truly among us where there is regular and ongoing evangelism of souls.
Some of you may be considered outsiders. You have not yet been saved. I don’t mean that you have not yet joined the church. It is always possible to be a church member in an official sense without being truly saved. Jesus warns in Matthew 7:21, “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord’ shall enter the Kingdom of Heaven.”
Saving faith is active and ongoing. Salvation is not just a decision you made once in the past, it is ongoing. We continue to follow after Christ. John 3:16, “Whosoever believeth in Me,” believeth—goes on believing, continually—whosoever believeth in Me shall not perish, but have everlasting life.”
If you are not a Christian and God is stirring your heart this morning to repent from your sin and turn to Christ and be saved, then come in a moment during our invitation hymn and share with me or another minister, “I’m coming this morning trusting Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior! I want to flee the wrath to come! I want my soul to go to heaven and not to hell.”
God is truly among us where there is regular and ongoing evangelism of souls. Secondly, God is truly among us when there is:
2) Edification of Saints
We have noted in our previous studies that the theme of edification is found throughout the chapter. The word occurs in one form no less than seven times:
3 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.
Last part of verse 5, …that the church may receive edification.
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.
17 For you indeed give thanks well, but the other is not edified.
Last part of verse 26, a verse we’ll study next time, last part of the verse, “Let all things be done for edification.”
The reason Paul extolls the gift of prophecy as being better than the gift of tongues that are uninterpreted is because in prophecy people are hearing a clear truth from God in a language they understand and the Holy Spirit changes hearts and minds of believers through God’s truth.
Now if God’s people are “built up” or edified or strengthened by the gift of prophecy as that gift was being used in Corinth, think of how more greatly people may be “built up,” or edified and strengthened by the prophetic preaching and teaching of the Word of God! Unlike prophecy in the way it was used at Corinth, the Bible does not need to be weighed for truth; it IS truth!
The Bible speaks to both saints and sinners. The Bible changes us. God’s truth is that which changes us forever. Do you read it? Daily? We really have no right to say, “Well, I’m just not hearing from God,” if we don’t allow Him to speak to us through His Word.
This is why our mission statement begins with the phrase, “We cherish the Word.” It’s a convictional statement. We believe it is not the preacher’s winsome personality and funny jokes that change people. A preacher or teacher may know how to hold an audience spellbound with folksy anecdotes or popular humor and so forth, but that which changes lives is the simple proclamation of the powerful Word of God. So a church where God is “truly” among the people is a church where there is regular and systematic proclamation of the truth.
There is evangelism of souls and there is edification of saints. And all of this so that the third element takes place. When God is truly among us there is, thirdly:
3) Exaltation of the Savior
This is our ultimate aim in public worship, lifting high the One True God! Again, see how verse 25 ends where it describes the effect God’s truth has upon a person: “The secrets of his heart are revealed; and so, falling down on his face, he will worship God and report that God is truly among you.”
This is our ultimate aim in gathering together, to “worship God.” We are not here to be entertained or to watch a show. We are here to “worship God” and to enjoy and revere the presence of the God who is truly among us.
The Corinthians needed that reminder. They were guilty of using their gifts in ways that drew attention to themselves and away from the One True God. We need the same reminder. We are here to worship the One True God!
Here is here this morning. He is present in a unique way when God’s people assemble for worship. Do you know Him, truly know Him?
Turn to Him this morning and trust Him with your life! Trust Him with your health. Trust Him with your job, with your school, with your family. Trust Him with your finances. Trust Him with your future. Trust Him with your soul.
•Stand for prayer.
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