Speaking in Tongues at Spirit Baptism
Bro John,
Several years ago, in the morning, while getting ready for work, I heard the Spirit of God start preaching in my inner man. It wasn’t audible in the room, but was very loud and clear to me. This is what I heard:
What was it that convinced the Jews that the Gentiles had been grafted in to Christ?
It would have been an impossibility, in the minds of even faithful Jews. Jesus called us Gentiles dogs (Mt. 15) and continually sent His disciples only to the house of Israel. Those Israelites – all Israelites! – KNEW that we Gentiles did not belong to God, and we didn’t.
With that understanding, if Gentiles had suddenly started claiming to belong to Jehovah (the God of only the Jews), they would have been laughed at, at the very least, and possibly worse might have befallen them. The Jews knew that the notion of a Gentile belonging to God was altogether absurd.
No Gentile, or “dog”, as Jesus clearly stated, would have ever persuaded a devout Jew that he was in covenant with God by simply claiming that he “got saved” or that he “accepted Jesus as his personal Lord and Savior”. Who would have believed such heresy? When God grafted Gentiles into His New Testament family, into His Son, He had to send a convincing witness from heaven to the Jews that such a thing had taken place. Otherwise, what Jew on Earth would believe such a thing? He had to send a sure “testimony”, a “sign” from Himself that no one could refuse, an irrefutable sign that His children, the Jews, could not refuse.
Peter was sent to Cornelius’ house to preach the Gospel of Christ. We read in Acts 10:44, “While Peter yet spake these words, the holy Ghost fell on all them which heard the word. And they of the circumcision (Jews) who believed were astonished, as many as came with Peter, because that on the Gentiles also was poured out the gift of the holy Ghost. For they heard them speak with tongues, and magnify God.”
Something happened that astonished those Jews; something happened that caused Peter to confess in verse 47 that THE GENTILE, TOO, HAD AS WELL RECIEVED THE HOLY GHOST. Something occurred there which proved that the impossible was possible! Because what happened WAS impossible and would have been altogether unbelievable. Something made those Jews believe what was impossible for them to believe!
The scriptures tell us that “tongues are a sign for unbelievers”. Who could have been in a state of unbelief more than those faithful Jews with Peter on that day, at that moment? But God sent them a sign, an irrefutable sign that their God had been there, so that they would not stumble in their faith at the mercy poured out on us poor Gentiles.
God poured the sign out on them (the Jews) first, at the day of Pentecost, when they staggered under the power of God, in Acts 2. And then, after the Jews had a good measure and were quite full, He then did the impossible in the sight of the Jews. He touched us Gentiles and sent us that same sign, in love, to help us all to believe and understand. Oh God, how we need the type of conversion today that would convince and astonish even an unbelieving Jew. God taught me that in my kitchen, bro. John. I can tell that truth; it is my testimony.
Jerry