NINE GIFTS OF THE SPIRIT 8 | DIVERS (OR DIFFERENT) KINDS OF TONGUES

1. Nine Spiritual Gifts 

a) There are nine gifts of the Spirit mentioned by Paul in 1 Corinthians chapter twelve:

i) Word of Wisdom.
ii) Word of Knowledge.
iii) Faith.
iv) Gifts of Healing.
v) Working of Miracles.
vi) Prophecy.
vii) Discerning of Spirits.
viii) Divers (or different) kinds of Tongues.
ix) Interpretation of (different) Tongues.

b) Paul tells us that “There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit distributes them” (1 Corinthians 12:4). No two gifts are the same and generally no two believers have exactly the same gifts but always these gifts are given for the good of the church (1 Corinthians 12:7).

c) Here is one of the nine gifts of the Spirit.

2. Divers (or Different) Kinds of Tongues

a) The next gift is the ability to speak in different tongues (1 Corinthians 12:10). This has been one of the most controversial and most misunderstood gifts of all. When the original outpouring of the Holy Spirit came on Pentecost, there were many speaking in tongues. Paul wrote about tongues extensively in 1 Corinthians, chapters twelve through fourteen, but he was reproving the Corinthians for misusing the gift. 

b) It’s very difficult out of this passage to get any kind of mandate to speak in tongues, to get any kind of affirmation that this is something to be sought, because what you have here are primarily corrective orders given to the Corinthians. They had actually prostituted the gift of tongues into something pagan that wasn’t even representative of the work of the Spirit. 

c) All you need to do is to go back to Acts 2 and read verse 4, “They were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other languages”. The literal translation in Greek is “glossa” and means tongues. This same word “glossa” (language) is used again in Acts 2:11. This means it is a known language not some unknown tongue. 

d) Then it says (in Acts 2:5-11) that there were unbelievers present at Pentecost and were hearing God’s message in their own “dialektos” dialects or language: “Now there were staying in Jerusalem God-fearing Jews from every nation under heaven. When they heard this sound, a crowd came together in bewilderment, because each one heard their own language being spoken. Utterly amazed, they asked: “Aren’t all these who are speaking Galileans? Then how is it that each of us hears them in our native language? Parthians, Medes and Elamites; residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya near Cyrene; visitors from Rome (both Jews and converts to Judaism); Cretans and Arabs—we hear them declaring the wonders of God in our own tongues” (dialektos or dialects)! So there were unbelievers present at Pentecost hearing God’s message in their own languages and their own local dialects.