A recent video showed Deion Sanders taking a moment before a press conference and apparently speaking in tongues. I have no idea whether he was genuinely speaking in tongues. I don’t know him, I don’t know much about his life or doctrine, and I don’t know the Christian community around him. I certainly can’t look into his heart from a video clip.

What interested me more were the comments underneath the video. A lot of people were making very confident claims about what speaking in tongues can and cannot look like, and many of those claims simply don’t match what the New Testament actually says. So rather than trying to defend Deion Sanders, I thought it might be helpful to use the moment as a springboard to clear up a few common misunderstandings about tongues.

5. “If it were really tongues, somebody would understand him.”

Sometimes that is exactly what happens.

Acts 2 is probably the passage most people know. The Holy Spirit falls at Pentecost, the disciples speak in tongues, and people from many nations hear them speaking in their own languages. That is clearly miraculous speech in real human languages, and I actually think we sometimes move away from Acts 2 too quickly. I have close friends who have spoken in languages completely unknown to them, only to discover that somebody nearby recognized what was being said because it was their mother tongue. I think that still happens.

But Acts 2 is not the only passage in the Bible about tongues. Tongues appear elsewhere in Acts (such as Acts 10:44–46, Acts 19:1–6 where there is no mention of interpretation or people hearing in their own tongue) and when we come to Paul’s extended teaching on spiritual gifts in 1 Corinthians 12–14, he gives us explanation that the narrative passages do not always provide. It’s important that we use didactic texts to interpret narrative texts. The Westminster confession (1647) it gives us this helpful insight “When determining the true and singular meaning of any passage, it must be understood by comparing it with other passages that address the subject more clearly.”

Paul writes, “The one who speaks in a tongue speaks not to people but to God, since no one understands him” (1 Corinthians 14:2).

That is pretty explicit. Paul knows the story of Pentecost, and yet he describes a situation where someone is speaking in tongues and nobody present understands what is being said apart from a gift of interpretation. So I believe tongues can be a human language recognizable to somebody in the room, but Scripture does not allow us to say that this must always be the case.

4. “If there isn’t an interpreter, it isn’t biblical tongues.”

This comes from confusing the public use of tongues in the gathered church with every possible use of tongues.

Paul absolutely teaches that when someone addresses the church publicly in tongues, there should be interpretation. His concern throughout 1 Corinthians 14 is that the gathered church should be built up. He would rather have a few understandable words that actually help people than thousands of words nobody understands.

But when there is no interpreter, Paul does not say that the tongue must therefore be false. He says the person should “keep silent in the church and speak to himself and God” (1 Corinthians 14:28). In other words, stop addressing the congregation, but continue speaking to God.

Some Christians call this a private prayer language, and I think that can be a helpful phrase as long as we understand what we mean by it. Paul himself says, “I speak in tongues more than all of you” (1 Corinthians 14:18), and then later says, “I will pray with the spirit, and I will also pray with my understanding. I will sing praise with the spirit, and I will also sing praise with my understanding” (1 Corinthians 14:15).

I do not think every time the New Testament speaks about “praying in the Spirit” it necessarily means praying in tongues. But 1 Corinthians 14 certainly gives us a category where praying with the spirit includes praying in tongues. Paul describes prayer in which the mind understands what is being said and prayer in which the mind does not. His answer is not to choose one over the other. He says he will do both. Sam Storms describes the gift of tongues as not anti-rational, or opposed to reason, but trans-rational. There is just a part of the Christian life that we need to build up that is not exactly one for one connected to more information aquired and processed. This make a lot of sense when we get free from the idea that we are just brains on a stick. There are many ways to interact with the world that are beyond our minds!

3. “Tongues have to be a known human language.”

Again, I actually think tongues often may be human languages. Acts 2 certainly is, and I think it is completely possible that someone could speak a language unknown to them but recognizable to somebody else. It could even theoretically be a language no longer commonly spoken. If the Holy Spirit can enable someone to speak a language they never learned, the age of the language is hardly the difficult part of the miracle.

But I do not think Scripture gives us enough information to say that tongues can only ever be currently known human languages. Paul describes someone speaking mysteries in the Spirit while nobody present understands them, and he also speaks about a supernatural gift of interpretation.

Could the tongues in 1 Corinthians still technically be earthly languages unknown to everyone in the room? Certainly. Could there also be what Christians sometimes call a heavenly language? I am completely open to that as well.

I would not use Paul’s reference to “tongues of men and angels” in 1 Corinthians 13:1 as a slam-dunk proof text for heavenly languages. Paul is making a rhetorical point there. I simply do not think Scripture gives us enough reason to confidently rule the possibility out. Sometimes humility means being willing to say that we do not know exactly what every manifestation of a gift looks like.

2. “He repeated himself, so obviously it was fake.”

I understand why repetition can make people suspicious. If I heard someone endlessly repeating a single syllable, I might be a little more cautious too. But caution is not the same thing as dismissal.

People will sometimes appeal to Jesus’ warning against vain repetition in Matthew 6, but Jesus is not teaching that repeating words in prayer is sinful. If that were the case, we would have a problem with the Psalms, where phrases and refrains are repeated again and again. We would also have a problem with Jesus himself, who returned in Gethsemane and prayed the same thing again.

The problem in Matthew 6 is not repetition itself. The problem is the belief that we will be heard because of our many words, as though prayer were a technique for manipulating God or impressing heaven.

That is very different from a person repeating themselves because they are weak, overwhelmed, or simply do not know what else to say. I regularly pray something very close to the Jesus Prayer: “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me.” Sometimes I repeat it again and again. That repetition is not an attempt to impress God. Sometimes it is what prayer sounds like when I have run out of words. Sometimes repetition helps tear through the layers of distraction and numbness in my own heart until I am actually present to what I am praying.

So repetition by itself tells me almost nothing about whether someone’s prayer is sincere or whether a tongue is genuine. One of the realest prayer someone could say in english, could be just the single word “sorry” over and over again in tears. Why could it not be the same in tounges?

1. “If you were really speaking in tongues, you wouldn’t be able to control it.”

I think this may be one of the biggest stumbling blocks for people who have never experienced tongues. They imagine that if it were really supernatural, a person would have to enter some kind of trance or ecstatic state where the Holy Spirit takes over their mouth and they lose control of what is happening.

Tongues can certainly be ecstatic. There are moments when someone may feel overwhelmed by the presence of God. But that does not appear to be a requirement for the gift, and I would not even say it is how tongues normally function.

Listen to the way Paul describes his own practice: “I will pray with the spirit, and I will also pray with my understanding. I will sing praise with the spirit, and I will also sing praise with my understanding” (1 Corinthians 14:15).

There is intentionality there. Paul is participating in what the Spirit is doing. He can speak, he can stop speaking, he can pray, and he can sing. In the same chapter he gives people instructions about when to speak and when to remain silent. Spiritual gifts do not erase self-control.

That is actually important to Christian spirituality more broadly. The Holy Spirit does not normally possess Christians in the way pagan ideas of spiritual possession might lead us to imagine. He works in us and through us, and we participate with him. Even when Paul talks about prophecy, he says, “the prophets’ spirits are subject to the prophets” (1 Corinthians 14:32). His whole concern is that genuine manifestations of the Spirit can still be exercised “decently and in order” (1 Corinthians 14:40).

For me, speaking in tongues is often much less dramatic than people imagine. I open my mouth and begin to pray, or sometimes sing, in faith. I am not unconscious. I am not in a trance. I could stop. The fact that I am participating does not mean I am faking it.

We do not apply that standard to other ways the Spirit works. If I feel prompted by the Spirit to pray for someone, I still have to walk over and open my mouth. If I believe God has given me an encouraging word, I still choose whether to speak it. My participation does not make God’s activity less real.

Tongues can involve powerful emotion and even ecstatic experiences, but it does not have to. Sometimes it is simply opening your mouth in faith and praying in a way that goes beyond your understanding.

That may look surprisingly ordinary from the outside.

But ordinary and supernatural are not opposites.

What about discernment?

Being open to the supernatural does not mean being gullible. I think Christians sometimes assume we have to choose between skepticism and naivety. Either we decide ahead of time that God could not possibly be doing anything unusual, or we become so open that nobody is allowed to question anything.

The New Testament gives us a better way. We are told not to despise what the Spirit may be doing, but we are also told to test everything and hold on to what is good.

That is how I would approach something like the Deion Sanders video. If something similar were happening among people I actually knew, I would want to know something about the person’s life and doctrine. Are they known within Christian community? Are they accountable? If somebody recognizes the tongue as an actual human language, can that be naturally verified? If people believe there is a supernatural interpretation, do mature and discerning believers independently hear something substantially consistent with one another?

And above all, does the interpretation agree with Scripture?

The Holy Spirit will not contradict the Scriptures He inspired. The point of spiritual gifts is not spectacle, novelty, or spiritual status. The gifts are given for the glory of Jesus, for love, and for the building up of the church.

That is really the movement of 1 Corinthians 12–14. Paul talks about the gifts, places love right in the center, and then explains how the gifts should actually function for the good of others.

Why I’m grateful for tongues

I share more of my own story with speaking in tongues in a short video here

I did not grow up thinking this stuff was normal (or honestly have any category for it all, I never heard of or experienced the gift of tounges), so I understand why someone hearing tongues for the first time might think it is strange. It is strange. That’s why Paul put’s restraints on it, and asks for interpretation when it’s given space in gathering where people unfamiliar with it are present. Christianity contains plenty of things that are strange if the standard for reality is simply whatever fits comfortably inside our previous experience.

The question is not whether something feels unusual to me. The question is whether Scripture gives me reason to believe God may work this way.

And when it comes to tongues, Scripture does more than merely leave a little room for the possibility. Paul says plainly, “Do not forbid speaking in tongues” (1 Corinthians 14:39).

I am grateful for the gift. There are times when I know exactly what I want to pray and I pray with my understanding. There are other times when I am overwhelmed, distracted, burdened, or simply out of words, and I pray in tongues. There is almost no Sunday I’m not singing and praying in tounges. I just have a volume meter and keep it between myself in the Lord. Of course there are times I and others have been given space to speak in tounges and those with a gift of interpretation that have given super encouraging words. But more on that is for another day and another blog.

That does not mean I think the mind is bad. Christianity is not about escaping our minds. God gave them to us, and the renewing of our minds is part of Christian maturity. But I also do not believe my conscious understanding is the boundary of everything the Holy Spirit is allowed to do in me.

There are things God does that are not irrational or anti-rational, but that go beyond what I presently understand. So I want to pray with my understanding, and I also want to pray with my spirit.

I want both.

And if Paul could say, “I thank God that I speak in tongues more than all of you,” I do not think Christians need to be embarrassed that this gift is still part of our life with God. It also points to the possibility that you can grow in this gift, and I would encourage you to do exactly that.