My Two Bits on Cessationism

A lot is going around the Christian blogosphere right now about cessationism vs. continualism. In other words, have the gifts, such as tongues, healing, prophecy, and such stopped, or do they continue to this day? I was raised in a Pentecostal church, so you can imagine where I was when I was a boy. And to this day I'm sure that my view of these things is jaded by what I saw and experienced when I attended a Pentecostal church in my youth.

I have gone through quite a shift in my theology however, and I now have leanings that are more of a Reformed Baptist in nature. (Although I have never looked up where the Reformed Baptist's stand on all issues, so there may be some points of contention that I don't even know about.) As much as I think I understand the arguments made by the Reformed Baptist camp on why cessationism is the correct exegesis of scripture, I'm not sure they have it all right, and here is why.

The church I attended in my formative years had two mid-week services. On Tuesday nights, we had youth service. I've never been able to figure that out. The other mid-week service was held on Thursday night, and it was Bible study for the entire congregation. We would have a short time of worship before the study began, usually two maybe three songs and then our pastor would begin.

There was a young lady in our church who was dating a Japanese exchange student that was attending our high-school at the time. I don't know if he really understood what was going on in a Pentecostal church or not, but he came to church with her often because he liked her.

One Thursday night, as the prayer over the teaching was just about to conclude, a strange hush fell on the assembled members. A lady toward the back began giving a message in tongues. This was not in and of it's self too terribly strange, except that it had never happened during Bible study on Thursday night that I could remember. Also, this particular woman, to the best of my recolection, had never given a message in tongues. It all seemed rather strange. As she began to speak, I thought I heard some words I understood. Snippets here and there. You see, there was a time in my life that my parents thought that we would be called to the foreign mission field...to Japan. So we had studied some Japanese when we were younger. That's how I got the feeling that she was speaking in a language that someone there could understand!

Sure enough, Hiro, (the student's name) looked rather surprised and even left the auditorium after a couple of minutes. I talked with him after words and he confirmed that the lady was indeed speaking in a manner that he understood. This woman in no way understood, or spoke any foreign language at all, and she was quite embarrassed that she had felt to do such a thing when it seemed at the time to be so out of order.

All highly subjective I know. It happened a long time ago. But I remember it as if it happened last week. All I can say is, don't be too quick to jump on the total cessationist bandwagon. I'm sure this sort of thing is exceedingly rare. I have only experienced it once. I have never talked to anyone else who has experienced it in this manner.