prophecy builds up

Good morning sisters and brothers,
I'd like to remind you of a workshop on visiting we're hosting at Laurelton (in the Peters Room downstairs) at 6pm. Feel free to email or call me with questions. This morning Paul continues his discussion of why tongues are a spiritual gift with limited use while prophecy, though less impressive, is more important for the church. The main idea is that no one else understands what the person is saying when they speak in tongues, so they can't be built up by it. He also turns to evangelism as a consideration for worship. Paul seems to contradict himself for a second here because first he says that tongues are a gift for unbelievers while prophecy is for believers, then he seems to say the opposite. I don't know what to make of this, and welcome your impression to help me out.

He moves on to say that if a visitor comes into worship and people are speaking in tongues the visitor will think the members of the church are crazy. On the other hand, if a visitor comes in and the church is prophesying that visitor will hear things that resonate with his or her heart. Many of us have had the impression sometime in our lives that part of a sermon or prayer or scripture passage is aimed right at us. I think that's similar to what Paul is thinking of here, though maybe more so. When the visitor feels the "thoughts of his heart disclosed" he or she will recognize that God is in that meeting and be built up in God's love.

God bless,
Sam

1 Corinthians 14:13-25

14For if I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays but my mind is unproductive. 15What should I do then? I will pray with the spirit, but I will pray with the mind also; I will sing praise with the spirit, but I will sing praise with the mind also. 16Otherwise, if you say a blessing with the spirit, how can anyone in the position of an outsider say the “Amen” to your thanksgiving, since the outsider does not know what you are saying? 17For you may give thanks well enough, but the other person is not built up. 18I thank God that I speak in tongues more than all of you; 19nevertheless, in church I would rather speak five words with my mind, in order to instruct others also, than ten thousand words in a tongue.


20Brothers and sisters, do not be children in your thinking; rather, be infants in evil, but in thinking be adults. 21In the law it is written, “By people of strange tongues and by the lips of foreigners I will speak to this people; yet even then they will not listen to me,” says the Lord. 22Tongues, then, are a sign not for believers but for unbelievers, while prophecy is not for unbelievers but for believers. 23If, therefore, the whole church comes together and all speak in tongues, and outsiders or unbelievers enter, will they not say that you are out of your mind? 24But if all prophesy, an unbeliever or outsider who enters is reproved by all and called to account by all. 25After the secrets of the unbeliever’s heart are disclosed, that person will bow down before God and worship him, declaring, “God is really among you.”