Speaking in tongues is a good habit but doing it consistently is a challenge. There are many tips and hacks that you can apply to be consistent but more often than not they are never enough to keep you consistent.
When it comes to consistency in speaking in tongues, there is one thing that determines whether you will be consistent or inconsistent regardless of all the tips and tricks.
In this article, I will tell you the secret that is necessary for speaking in tongues consistently and give you tips to stay consistent in addition.
The Secret behind Speaking in Tongues Consistently
You will hear many strategies that people use to be consistent in speaking in tongues but the truth is that consistency in speaking in tongues begins with making God your friend and Jesus your brother.
At the very basic level, speaking in tongues is a form of communication between you and God. Like all communication, speaking in tongues heavily relies on the relationship you have with God.
If you are very close to God, you will have a lot to share with Him. That will make speaking in tongues automatic and consistency won’t be a problem.
If your relationship with God is weak, speaking in tongues is going to be a challenge. It is simple logic.
Between talking to your best friend daily for a year versus talking to a stranger daily for a year, which one would you say is easier?
You talk to your best friend out of passion but to a stranger you talk out of need. When talking to your best friend, consistency is not even a consideration but to a stranger, you have to put in effort to be consistent.
If God is a stranger to a believer, consistency in speaking in tongues is going to be difficult. If God is a friend to a believer, speaking in tongues is going to be a passionate affair.
Therefore, before you start thinking about tips to help you be consistent in speaking in tongues, ask yourself if God is a friend to you or a stranger.
We all begin our relationship with God as strangers. But as we progress, we make Him our friend. When God is still a stranger, praying to Him is hard but as He becomes a friend, praying becomes easy.
Making God your friend is simple; know Him. The more knowledge you have about God, the easier it is to make Him your friend. The bond between friends is based on how much they know each other.
Since God already knows everything about you, the task of making the friendship work is on your side.
Read the word of God, ask those who know Him questions and strive to understand His ways until He becomes your closest friend.
Tips to Speak in Tongues Consistently
Now that you know the secret to speaking in tongues consistently, it is time to learn tips to speak in tongues consistently. These tips will help you to stay consistent in speaking in tongues on days you don’t feel God is your friend.
You will feel you are far from God on some days. Jesus had such a day until He cried out “My Lord, My Lord, why have you forsaken me?”
On such days, these tips will help you speak in tongues.
1. Set a Specific Time to Speak in Tongues
There is a quote that says “If you don’t set time for it, you won’t do it”. Speaking in tongues is no exception.
If you can’t pinpoint the hour in a day you have set aside to speak in tongues, then don’t be surprised if a day ends without you speaking in tongues.
I have discussed in a previous article how the flesh hinders us from speaking in tongues. If you have not set specific time to speak in tongues, your flesh will occupy all your time with fleshly desires.
It is very difficult to bring yourself to speak in tongues. The flesh has endless desires and it will keep suggesting them to you throughout the day.
If you have set a given hour specifically to speak in tongues, when that hour comes, you will have a strong reason to resist the desires of the flesh and speak in tongues.
You may be in the middle of watching TV and then you remember it is time to speak in tongues. Because it is the hour for speaking in tongues, you have a reason to quit TV and speak in tongues.
To be consistent in speaking in tongues, you must set time for it.
2. Link Speaking in Tongues to your Existing Habits
Sometimes you may fail to remember the hour you set to speak in tongues or it may find you in an inconvenient place. That is where this second tip to speak in tongues consistently comes in.
Instead of just saying I will be speaking in tongues from 6am to 7am, you can say I will be speaking in tongues immediately I wake up.
On the day that you extend your sleep to 8am, you will easily brush off speaking in tongues if you set its hour between 6am and 7am. But if you set yourself to pray in tongues immediately you wake up, it doesn’t matter at what time you have woken up, you go straight to speaking in tongues.
Because waking up is a daily habit, if you attach speaking in tongues to it, speaking in tongues easily becomes a daily habit as well.
Another daily habit is taking a shower. You can purpose to be praying in tongues before taking a shower. This will make it easy to remember to speak in tongues. Every time you feel like taking a shower, you remember you need to speak in tongues.
After a while, speaking in tongues and showering will be inseparable and that is how speaking in tongues will become a daily activity.
3. Operate on a Light Schedule
Keeping a light schedule is hard work. As humans, there are a lot of activities that compete for our time. Cutting off many of those activities is not fun.
Some activities keep us busy but they are important for our survival. If you have a hectic full time job, finding time to speak in tongues will prove to be a challenge.
Not only will you struggle to find time to speak in tongues but you will often be tired when you finally get a chance to speak in tongues.
Balancing activities in our life such that we have sufficient time to speak in tongues is tough. If you have a new born baby to take care of, the baby will not care if you need time to speak in tongues; she will demand your attention.
While it may be hard to find time to speak in tongues right now, you can start working to ensure that you will have time to speak in tongues in the coming days.
If you have a hectic full time job, you can start looking for easier ways to make money. There are many ways to make money without selling your soul.
4. Have Strong Reasons to Speak in Tongues
You are never going to speak in tongues if you have no reason to speak in tongues. It sounds simple but you will be surprised how many people don’t speak in tongues consistently because they have no reason to do it.
Consistency in speaking in tongues heavily relies on reason. Why should I speak in tongues?
If you can’t answer that question, speaking in tongues will feel burdensome.
Coming up with reasons to speak in tongues is hard but an even harder challenge is convincing yourself to speak in tongues based on those reasons.
I can easily come up with multiple reasons to speak in tongues but usually only one of those reasons makes me speak in tongues.
I have shared before how I used speaking in tongues as therapy. During that period, there was a natural desire to speak in tongues because I needed therapy and speaking in tongues was the only viable option.
But once the season passed, bringing myself to speak in tongues became a challenge.
Ask yourself, if your life is relatively stress-free, why would you speak in tongues?
Most of the time, we speak in tongues because we need something from God. What if you don’t need anything because God has given you all you have asked for?
This was the challenge the Israelites faced for many years. They would call on God when they were in slavery but once God took them out, they didn’t have a reason to call on Him. They would turn to sinful ways until God would send them back to slavery.
When you grow in speaking in tongues, finding reasons to speak in tongues becomes a big challenge. You know you need to be speaking in tongues consistently but you can’t find a strong reason.
Most of the time, I convince myself to speak in tongues for edification or simply because God is my friend. It doesn’t sound like a very convincing reason but it is the only one I have most of the time.
5. Track your Consistency in Speaking in Tongues
In business, they say ‘If you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it’. You can’t live like a millionaire if you can’t tell you are a millionaire. Knowing you are a millionaire is what makes you live like a millionaire.
The same applies to speaking in tongues. If you can’t see how you are improving in speaking in tongues, you can’t get motivation to keep working to improve.
A believer may be consistent in speaking in tongues for 20 days in the first month and then 25 days in the second month but still gets discouraged that he was not consistent for 30 days in the second month.
We often forget the progress we are making and we get carried away by the perfect goal we want to achieve.
Being able to speak in tongues alone is a privilege that many believers struggle to get, leave alone doing it consistently.
There are believers who quit speaking in tongues all together. Several friends I used to speak in tongues with in the early days quit. Even though I struggle sometimes to be consistent in speaking in tongues, at least I am grateful that I didn’t quit.
Therefore, before you condemn yourself for not praying in tongues daily, appreciate that you have been speaking in tongues consistently for 6 months even if it was not on a daily basis.
Once you know that you have achieved something in speaking in tongues, you will be motivated to achieve more. It is called being grateful.
Track the small successes you have in speaking in tongues and let them motivate you to go for the big goals.
The Secret to being Consistent in Speaking in Tongues: Conclusion
Speaking in tongues is such a great gift that we should all strive to be consistent at practicing. But becoming consistent in speaking in tongues is not easy.
There are days you will feel like throwing up your hands. But remember that trying to be consistent is better than not trying to be consistent even if you will never achieve the consistency level you want.
God will appreciate your effort to be consistent.
Above all, focus on knowing God and making Him your friend. It is your closeness with God that will unlock the consistency you so much desire in speaking in tongues.
Peace!