Man is a spirit but he has a soul and lives in a body (1 Thess 5:23)- “May the very God of peace sanctify you completely and may your whole spirit, soul and body be preserved blameless to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
When a person is born again his spirit is recreated and God gives that recreated human spirit a new language when they receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit.
One of the things that happened when the baptism of the Holy Spirit first came was that all the people who were there spoke in tongues. Acts 2:4 says that on the day of Pentecost, they were filled with the Holy Ghost and spoke with other tongues as the spirit gave them utterance.
Consistently all the way through the book of Acts, there was a manifestation of God’s presence when the people received the holy spirit. Of course, there is much more to the holy spirit than speaking in tongues, but it is one of the important manifestations.
First Corinthians 14:13-14 says, “Wherefore let him that speak in an unknown tongue pray that he might interpret. For if I pray in an unknown tongue, my spirit prays, but my understanding is unfruitful.” When you pray in tongues, your spirit prays. Once you speak in tongues, pray that you interpret so your understanding will become fruitful.
I can give my own personal testimony that when I received the baptism of the Holy Ghost and started speaking in tongues, it changed my life dramatically. I believe when I got born again, Christ came to live inside of me and He deposited everything there, but when the holy spirit came upon me, it started to manifest to me and other people.
The first year I prayed in tongues, my mind told me it was crazy, that all I was doing was wasting time. It took faith for me to pray in tongues, which is the reason Jude 20 says you build yourself up in your most holy faith. It takes you out of natural thinking and reasoning and puts you into a supernatural realm of faith. I realized that when I was praying in tongues, I was praying with wisdom that went beyond my mental ability. My spirit that knew all things and had the mind of Christ was praying for people in ways that I could never do with my own physical understanding.
When you pray in tongues, it’s your spirit praying. Your spirit has been born again, has the mind of Christ, and knows exactly what to do. It has an unction (anointing) from God so that you know all things, and there is no limitation in your spirit. If you could walk in the power and revelation of your spirit, it would transform your physical life. One way of doing that, though not the only way, is to just start speaking in tongues. Recognize and believe that when you do, you’re building yourself up in your most holy faith, that your spirit is praying the hidden wisdom of God, and the perfect revelation of God is coming. Then, according to 1 Corinthians 14:13, pray that you can interpret.
That doesn’t mean you have to stop praying in tongues and pray in English to interpret; it just means your understanding becomes fruitful. If you give a message in tongues in a church service, you have to stop and interpret in English. When you’re praying by yourself, what I do is pray in tongues and trust that God is giving me revelation. Sometimes my attitude just changes. I don’t have a specific word, but suddenly I see things clearly and get a different perspective. It may take a week before I get the full revelation, but I believe the time spent praying in tongues and believing I interpret is a part of it.
Speaking in tongues is important for many reasons, certainly more than to prove you’ve received the Holy Spirit. It should be a part of everyday life. It is a way to communicate directly from your heart to the Father, bypassing your brain with its doubts and fears. It builds you up in your most holy faith and releases the hidden wisdom of God.
When we pray for people to receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit, we can and should expect them to speak in tongues. That is what happened when the church of the book of Acts received the Holy Spirit, and that is what happens when the church of today is filled with the Holy Spirit. It has not changed.
Now, when a person is saved, they become a part of the house of God, the family of God. They are as saved as what they will ever be. But at some point, they will experience frustration expressing their hearts when they begin to pray. They will begin to feel a noticeable limitation in their ability to pray. They just won’t be able to express their hearts fully. It is impossible to do so.
But something very powerful occurs when a person becomes baptised in the Holy Spirit.
It is as if the holy spirit cuts that string that is on their tongue and they then begin to flow out of their hearts like Jesus said in John 7:38 when he prophesied that when the holy spirit comes, rivers of living water will flow out of your belly or hearts.
When you pray in tongues, it comes out as a language but not a language taught by man. It will come as a spirit language, straight from the heart of God. That is why praying in tongues is so powerful. We call it tongues but it truly is a spiritual language imparted within us by the holy spirit. It is spiritual prayer. All of a sudden, your spirit is able to express everything it was never able to say before.
Your spirit is now equipped with the ability to communicate freely without all the hindrances of your mind, emotions or any and all other limitations. When you understand the nature of man, it is logical that God would enable us to speak in the Spirit, because we are spirits. We live in bodies but we are spirits, created in the image of God. This is Bible.
There are those who speak in tongues, and there are those who don’t. If you are born again and Jesus is your Lord, you are saved and in the family of God. But something dramatically changes when you get baptized in the Holy Spirit. The inability of your spirit to speak, is removed and suddenly, your inner man speaks, and your spirit cries out to God.
I highly encourage every believer to take advantage of the glorious benefit that comes with being filled with the Holy Spirit and praying in other tongues. If you are born again but you haven’t been filled with the Holy Spirit, the Lord wants you to receive Him today. The key issue is your desire to receive Him. He will freely baptise you with the Holy Spirit.
You just need to make a simple prayer inviting the Holy Spirit to come into your life as follows “Dear Heavenly Father I thank you for the gift of the Holy Spirit. As your child I now receive Him by faith to come and dwell in my heart. I receive Him into every fibre of my being. I am now filled with the Holy Spirit and according to your Word in Acts 2:4, I speak with other tongues as He gives me utterance, in the name of Jesus Amen”.
This Biblical experience is life altering and will cause you to grow exponentially in your relationship with God. It was for the church in the beginning, and it is for the church of the end times. If the early believers needed tongues to start the work of preaching the Gospel to all nations, how much more do we need it to finish the task they so powerfully began?