The Spirit is more than tongues, it's love, it's a changed life.
Tongues is a manifestation of the Spirit, used when God wills and given when the Spirit wills. Think about it. If you have a gift does it come and go or is it always active? The Holy Spirit is a gift that is always active, not just when you pray or in church. He is there when you read scripture and understand it, He's active when you are witnessing and rememeber scripture, he's active when you are struggling and need help, he's there when you need comfort and provides a Word from God. Tongues on the other hand comes and goes because it's not a gift but a manifestation. Point is... He is the keys! You are the car. The Holy Spirit is our power.
You know that they disciples were baptized twice by the Spirit, check out Acts 4. The point is that we are to desire more of God. The fact is in Corinthians 14 it's made clear if you speak in tongues it's unfruitful to you and everyone else if you can't interpret it.
No, tongues is both a
gift and a
manifestation as the others are, listed as we see in 1 Cor 12
1 Now concerning spiritual
gifts, brethren, I would not have you ignorant
2 Ye know that ye were Gentiles, carried away unto these dumb idols, even as ye were led.
3 Wherefore I give you to understand, that no man speaking by the Spirit of God calleth Jesus accursed: and that no man can say that Jesus is the Lord, but by the Holy Ghost.
4 Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit.
5 And there are differences of administrations, but the same Lord.
6 And there are diversities of operations, but it is the same God which worketh all in all.
7 But the
manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal.
8 For to one is given by the Spirit the word of wisdom; to another the word of knowledge by the same Spirit;
9 To another faith by the same Spirit;
to another the gifts of healing by the same Spirit;
10 To another the working of miracles;
to another prophecy;
to another discerning of spirits;
to another divers kinds of tongues; to another the interpretation of tongues:
11 But all these worketh that one and the selfsame Spirit, dividing to every man severally as he will.
So having the Spirit, we can pretty much guarantee that God will have given us one of these gifts/manifestations since we were born again, or indeed
several, dividing to every man severally as He will.
The difficulty is that if there is no manifestation of the Holy Spirit, then we are bound to assume, as the scripture says, that he who has not the Spirit of Christ is none of His.
On this thread there has been a lot of attacking of those who speak in tongues so far, except from those who do. So for the sake of peace and mutual edification, I am asking for those who do not have the gift of tongues to say what other gifts/manifestations they have been given, according to 1 Cor 12 above, really as part of a personal testimony, rather than a spiritual treatise.
I feel it would be a great comfort to those of us who have been gifted with tongues, to know that some of those here have been given other gifts of the Spirit instead. That alone would stop others from claiming that you have to speak in tongues to be saved, and comfort us that the gifts/manifestations of the Spirit (according to the above scripture) are indeed alive and well and active in the body today.