Can God give us a new language? Well the answer to that is a big yes. I became a born again Christian in 1981 through Y.W.A.M. (Youth With A Mission) England. In March 1983 God sent me to a Y.W.A.M. base in the middle of a forest near a city called Contagem in Brazil.
One month later on my birthday 17 April I was sent on an outreach with some 20 students and an interpreter. One day the group leader asked me through my interpreter Tony if I could preach at a house that afternoon and at a church at night I said okay and went to my room praying to see what the Lord wanted me to preach. At the appointed time to go to the house I discovered that my interpreter had gone back to base. I asked the Lord what to do, he said that it was He that would do the talking and not me. So I went in obedience and to my surprise when I opened my mouth out came perfect Portuguese, the same happened at night and since that day I have spoken and written perfect Portuguese without taking one single lesson. God showed me and the people who were witnesses of this miracle that He give us the means to get his will done.
Hope this can be of some encouragement to someone.
Who are we to believe? God or man.Mar 4:23 If any man has ears to hear, let him hear. http://bible-truths.com/tongues.htmHAS THE GIFT OF LANGUAGES CEASED?
I have heard the argument used that if speaking in languages, as a gift from God is not for us today, then neither is "prophecies" and "knowledge." But as both the gifts of prophesying and knowledge are still in use in the church, so also is the gift of languages. Ahhh, but, there is a mystery revealed in these verses if we have the spiritual mind to see it:
"Charity [love] NEVER FAILS [Gk: ekpipto, never become inefficient]: But whether there be prophecies they shall fail [Gk: katargeo—be rendered useless, vanish away, make void, nullify, be discarded, etc.]: whether there be languages, they shall cease [Gk: pauo—to stop, quit, desist, come to an end]; whether there by knowledge, it shall vanish away [Gk: katargeo—same as for prophecies]… and now abides faith, hope, charity [love], these three; but the greatest of these is charity" (I Cor. 13:1,8,13).
Love = never fails (ekpipto) [never lapses]
Prophesying = shall fail (katargeo) [be discarded]
Languages = shall cease (pauo) [will cease]
Knowledge = vanish away (katargeo) [be discarded]
What can we learn here? Well we can eliminate the first one, Love, for it will never fail. But notice the next three, prophesying, languages and knowledge do come to an eventual end, but apparently in different ways. And this is clearly seen by the use of different Greek words. Paul obviously said that prophesying would katargeo, and knowledge would also katargeo, but had a different take on what would happen to languages, as he said they would pauo rather than katargeo.
Why is that? Why do prophesying & knowledge come to one kind of an end, but languages comes to a different kind of a end? It is because God has two different purposes for prophesying & knowledge, and languages.
The answer is found in the usage of the two words: katargeo and pauo. The King James Translators partly saw the answer, but they were not consistent (obviously so, they translated the very same Greek word, katargeo two different ways in the very same verse). They rightly stated that languages shall cease, but they saw how katargeo is used many times in Scripture, hence they said that "knowledge shall vannnish away" rather than "cease."
Notice that both prophecies and knowledge are said to "fail and vanish away," as the same Greek word is used for both—katargeo. But when it says that languages shall cease it is a different word—pauo. Why is this? Do they not all meet with a similar fate? No, no they don’t, and that’s why a different word is used to describe their ending.
Remember that it is "usage" that determines the real meaning of words. Dictionaries and the study of etymology can be big helps, but in the end it is usage which gives us the best definition. And, the more and different ways that we can see a word used, the more precisely we can see its true meaning.
HOW KATARGEO AND PAUO ARE USED IN SCRIPTURE
The Greek word katargeo has the connotation of coming to an end, falling into disuse, annulling, discarding, growing old, useless, and being done away, etc.
Sometimes it can be used in a situation where something comes to an end rather quickly, but many many times it is used to describe something that is fading into disuse. That is why I drew out the word used by the KJV Translators in: "shall vannnish away," as I wanted to show the feel of it stretching out over a period of time, and not something that comes to an abrupt end as in the word "cease." Here are some examples of how katargeo is used to represent something that expires or is discarded over a prolonged period:
"Then said he unto the dresser of his vineyard, Behold, these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and find none: cut it down, why cumbers/encumbers [Gk: katargeo] the ground" (Luke 13:7 — "…make even the ground useless," Rotherham).
Here we are told that this katargeo was rendering the ground useless for 3 years.
"Meats for the belly, and the belly for meats: but God shall destroy [Gk: katargeo)] both it and them" (I Cor. 6:13—"…will be discarding it and them…," Concordant Literal New Testament).
In this verse we see that the process of God "…discarding [katargeo] it and them…" is still going on after two thousand years.
"Then comes the end, when He shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when He shall have put down [Gk: katargeo] all rule and all authority and power. For He must reign till he has put all enemies under His feet. The last enemy that shall be destroyed [Gk: katargeo] is death" (I Cor. 15:24-26).
From the above we see that katargeo can take three years until something ends, or two thousand years and still counting till something else ends, or even throughout the entire reigning of Jesus Christ until all enemies including death itself is abolished. So here is Scriptural proof that anything that is a katargeo consummation can take as long as man is still in the flesh to come to a final end. And prophesying & knowledge are specifically said to come to a katargeo end. But NOT SO WITH LANGUAGES.
Here is how we are told that languages will consummate: "…whether there be languages, they shall cease [Gk: pauo—‘stop, quit, end, cease’]…’ (I Cor. 13:
. But is there a difference in the "time" it takes for something that is katargeo to end, and something that is pauo to end? Yes there is. Here is how the word pauo is used in Scripture:
"Now when He [Jesus] he had left [Gk; pauo] speaking, He said unto Simon, Launch out into the deep, and let down your nets for a draught" (Luke 5:4).
How long do we suppose it was between the time Jesus stopped speaking and Jesus commanded Peter? A few minutes? It was very quickly, not years.
"And they came to Him, and awoke Him, saying, Master, master, we perish. Then He arose and rebuked the wind and the raging of the water: and they ceased [GK: pauo], and there was a calm" (Luke 8:24).
How long did it take to cause the wind and raging water to cease? A few minutes? Certainly not hours or days.
"And it came to pass, that as He was praying in a certain place, when He ceased [Gk: pauo], one of His disciples said unto Him, Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples. And He said unto them. When ye pray, say…" (Luke 11:1-2).
Jesus ceased praying in an instant. Or do we believe Jesus went hours, or days between praying. To stop something by use of the word pauo is to end it very quickly.
"…and when they saw the chief captain and the soldiers, they left [Gk: pauo] beating of Paul. Then the chief captain came near, and took him…" (Acts 21:32).
As soon as they left beating of Paul the chief captain came. Not hours or days later, but right then. The word pauo does not linger for centuries as does the word katargeo.
When Paul teaches us that languages will end by way of pauo, he is telling us that languages will end very quickly as compared with prophesies & knowledge which will fade out over centuries and eons of time.
Therefore, we still have prophesies & knowledge, whereas the gift of languages is never ever mentioned again after I Cor. 14 for the remaining years of Paul’s ministry. Nor is the gift Of languages every mentioned by any other New Testament writer. Truly languages did CEASE.
And what we see today is a weak shameful counterfeit sham of the original Gift of languages in the early New Testament Church. The instruction of the Apostle Paul regulating the use and practice of speaking in languages is completely book-ended. There is no room for personal interpretation on this subject. The truth of this doctrine is found in I Cor. 14, and nowhere else.
If it isn’t a real genos language,
if it isn’t spoken one by one,
if it isn’t interpreted,
if it isn’t a sign to an unbeliever,
if it isn’t understood by the mind,
if it doesn’t edify the whole church,
then it is a counterfeit and a sham.Peace...Mark