Faith On The Line - Stress, Stress Go Away Vol 19 | Page 34

by Joel Kratzke

This is the
third article
of a series.

Seeking After

a Sign

part 3

I recently had a study on the gift of tongues with a
new friend. My friend asked me to open my Bible to
Acts 1:5, which reads, “For John truly baptized with
water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost
not many days hence.”
My friend then had me turn to Acts chapter two,
where the disciples spoke in tongues. He concluded
that this tongue-speaking was the baptism of the
Holy Ghost.

rt 2

I thought for a moment and then asked if we could
go back to Acts chapter one for some context.

Let us begin with Acts 1:5-8:
For John truly baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized with
the Holy Ghost not many days hence. When they therefore were
come together, they asked of him, saying, Lord, wilt thou at this
time restore again the kingdom to Israel? And he said unto them,
It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father
hath put in his own power. But ye shall receive power, after that
the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto
me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and
unto the uttermost part of the earth.

Three-Fold Purpose of the
Holy Ghost
You will recall that the purpose of the Holy Ghost was threefold: (1) Reprove the world of sin, righteousness, and judgment; (2) Guide us into all truth; (3) Glorify Christ.
As Jesus gave His disciples a commission (you and I were also
included), He stated why the power of the Holy Ghost would

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be given: “But ye shall receive power, after
that the Holy Ghost is come upon you:
and ye shall be witnesses unto me.” This
is wonderful! It is in perfect harmony with
the rest of Scripture in regard to the work
of the Holy Ghost.
If we examine Acts chapter two a little
more closely, we find that it was not the
tongues that was amazing to the people,
but the fact that they heard in their
own languages the disciples telling “the
wonderful works of God.”
Jesus’ commission to the disciples was
to be witnesses unto Him, and this is
exactly what the disciples were. The gift of
tongues was given to provide the ability
to communicate those wonderful words of
truth to those who were in Jerusalem from
other countries.

Tongues: Ecstatic Gift
or Understandable
Language?
So then we come to another question in
our study of tongues, that being, What do
we do with the references in 1 Corinthians?