How people have started praying in tongues:
As tongues is a gift of the Spirit there are probably many believers who have received this gift without ‘unpacking’ or using the gift.
Most people probably get prayed for by someone they know – the friend, pastor, minister, priest or bishop asks God to fill this person with the Holy Spirit – usually with one or both hands placed on the person’s head or shoulder. In some churches this is called the Sacrament of Confirmation. The writer of Hebrews considered the laying on of hands (impartation) to be one of the basic teachings (Heb 6:1).
For some people the gift of tongues does not happen as soon as they ask for it but some weeks or years after:
– Clare was reading through and praying her favourite Psalms and was suddenly overwhelmed with God’s love and started in her heavenly language
– Tanya got exasperated at her noisy neighbours and started shouting through the wall only to find she was speaking in a different language and feeling love towards the neighbours
– Steve started whilst driving and singing along to Gospel music
– one businessman started whilst soaking in a bathtub in Beirut, where nobody knew him
Val’s busy parents ran a noisy pub and sent her and her brothers and sisters to Sunday school each week. Val remembers the comfort of humming and singing in her bottom bunk bed but also her sister’s complaints from the top bunk “will you stop singing in that strange language!”. It was only when Val was a 40 year old Social worker who became a Christian that she realised that it was tongues she had been singing as a 6 year old.
In Heidi and Rolland Baker’s ministry rescuing and caring for orphans in Mozambique sometimes there are many new children who have just received Jesus and been baptised and “without anyone telling them what’s going to happen, begin to pray in tongues as they come out of the water…… They’re filled with the Spirit of the living God as they come out of those waters. It is glorious and powerful.”
Maria is a devout Catholic who had never heard of tongues but one night praying about desperate family and work situations she started speaking in a strange language. She says she felt like an electric current going through her, pleasantly, and she felt the deep peace of God’s love for her. After that her husband often said she’d been speaking in that strange language in her sleep at night. Since then Maria has seen many healings through God’s power and also received several herself.
Graham heard some strange words in his head whilst he was alone and so he spoke them out and then carried on and didn’t want to stop.
John was 10 years old when he attended a meeting along with his parents. During the talk, which was about the Holy Spirit, John found himself crying for no reason. The speaker invited those who wished to receive the Holy Spirit to come to a room at the side and John persuaded his father to take him along. The speaker prayed over the crowd and John burst into tongues along with others. John carried on all the way home in the car and at home, very happily. After a day or so he was gently requested, especially by his brother, not to keep doing it in the living room!
Grace, at 9 years old, just came into the kitchen speaking in tongues, after ‘having a chat with God’. This was a huge blessing for her parents who had gone through a series of difficult circumstances.
One man witnessed a car accident and as he prayed in compassion for those involved found he was praying in another language and in a deeper way than ever before.
Heather remembers giving her life to Jesus at 12 years old during a ‘waiting’ meeting. At 16 years she was working in a hotel during a quiet week that the hotel was closed – she was singing as she hoovered and suddenly realised she was not singing in English but in tongues!