What Is the Gift of Tongues in the Bible? (Part 1 of 3) The Beginning of Tongues

Approximate Reading Time: 5 minutes

This article was requested by a generous donor. If you’d also like to support Onward in the Faith financially, or request a topic you’d like to read about, check this link.

When Pentecostalism started taking off in the early 1900s, the entire topic of supernatural gifts became a big discussion in Christianity. Today, some have supernatural experiences on a regular basis. Others insist that these gifts have completely ceased and that any claims to the supernatural are driven by emotion, delusion, or even the demonic.

In the midst of all of this, we have the topic of tongues. The Bible clearly talks about these as a spiritual gift, which means that it’s important for us to understand what it is, what purpose it served, and whether it still exists in the church today. Further, it’s important to understand whether the biblical teaching of tongues is in line with the modern-day usage of “glossolalia,” also known as the tongues of angels or ecstatic utterances. 

The beginning of tongues

These signs will accompany those who have believed: in My name they will cast out demons, they will speak with new tongues; they will pick up serpents, and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover. (Mark 16:17-18)

Christ’s final words in the book of Mark are a promise that those who believe will be followed by incredible wonders. In addition to protection from natural and man-made poisons, the confirmation of their salvation would include things like casting out demons, healing the sick, and speaking in “new tongues.”

But what would these “new tongues” look like? Are they brand new tongues never uttered on Earth before then, or were they simply tongues that were new to the speakers (i.e. a person who only spoke Greek would suddenly find himself speaking Chinese as well)? 

When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. And suddenly there came from heaven a noise like a violent rushing wind, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting. And there appeared to them tongues as of fire distributing themselves, and they rested on each one of them. (Acts 2:1-3)

Shortly after Christ ascended to Heaven, Acts 2 shows us the Day of Pentecost when the Holy Spirit is poured out on a gathered group of believers. One evidence of this is that these believers begin speaking in these “new tongues” that Christ had promised. As we keep reading, we can see exactly what this means.

And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit was giving them utterance. Now there were Jews living in Jerusalem, devout men from every nation under heaven. And when this sound occurred, the crowd came together, and were bewildered because each one of them was hearing them speak in his own language. They were amazed and astonished, saying, “Why, are not all these who are speaking Galileans? And how is it that we each hear them in our own language to which we were born? Parthians and Medes and Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the districts of Libya around Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, Cretans and Arabs—we hear them in our own tongues speaking of the mighty deeds of God.” (Acts 2:4-11)

It’s clear what these “new tongues” actually were. The comments of the crowd clearly show that these were earthly languages, yet were “new” to the speaker. And it makes sense when we consider the context of when this takes place:

Christ had just paid the penalty for our sin, rose again, and revealed the majesty of salvation through Him. At the same time, people from all around were gathered in Jerusalem to celebrate the Jewish “Feast of Weeks,” also known as Pentecost, which required Jews to visit the temple of Jerusalem if they were able. 

First, let’s be in awe of God’s perfect planning. Before creation, God knew He would take the wrath we deserve and pour it out on His Son. He knew this salvation was meant for the whole world, and that He would use human feet to spread this good news across the globe. And this plan to spread the gospel came together when Christ cleansed us of our sin at the same time Jews from around the world had gathered in one place.

Why is this significant? Because those same Jews who would soon believe on the name of Christ were the ones to take that gospel back to their homes around the world and continue spreading it. And as we see (and not without some growing pains), this gospel quickly spreads beyond the bounds of Jews and is given to Gentiles as well. At Pentecost, God’s will for the gospel to be preached to all people was set into motion.

But how would this happen? How would God take this small group of Jews who understood the truth of Christ and spread this message globally, especially since few of them likely spoke more than a single language? Such a task would require thousands of people that were able to take this message everywhere.

In Acts 2, we see exactly how God planned to use His people to spread the good news of Christ. When the Holy Spirit came upon people, it was done with one purpose: to give the gospel to those Jews from around the world who otherwise would have no idea what was being said. Not only do they hear the truth of God, but the God-given nature of it is confirmed in their minds when they realize that there’s no reason they should be hearing about Christ in their own language. They are convicted not only by the words being spoken, but by the clear sign that God was enabling these people to speak it.

(To read an even deeper discussion on Acts 2, check out this article)

To summarize, the initial purpose of these “new tongues” was to give the gospel to those who needed it immediately. Yet without the intervention of the Holy Spirit, they would have been waiting months or years for the gospel to travel to them in a language they could understand. But how does God continue using tongues after the very early beginnings of the church? We’ll discuss that in Part 2.