I First Heard Speaking in Tongues During a Healing Ritual. I Did Not Feel Healed.
When I was 11, my family began attending a new church: “The Vineyard,” which I later learned was also the name of the denomination.
The people there got really into the worship service — clapping, sweating, dancing in the aisles, and the music was deafening. At the Presbyterian church we used to frequent, the adults never did more than raise one palm at shoulder level and sway a little. But at The Vineyard, even the kids closed their eyes and put their arms up all the way.
When the worship service ended, us kids were usually shuffled into the back of the building for Sunday School (K-5th grade) and Youth Group (6th-12th grade).
Sunday school began in the late 1700s as a way to teach poor working children to read and study religion on their only day off, according to Encyclopedia.com. By the 1830s, churches had expanded the model to their own children, helping establish the tradition of children receiving separate religious instruction on Sundays. A similar shift followed the Industrial Revolution: The YMCA, founded in London in 1844, created Christian spaces for young men seeking community and structure outside the dangers of city life. The model reached the United States seven years later and became an early template for organized Christian youth groups.
I remember the Sunday when my two older sisters began staying behind with our parents; I knew they would outgrow the kid’s church someday, but I still felt caught off guard. Now when our parents asked what I learned today, I’d have to give an answer myself. It felt like I’d been cheating on this weekly test my whole life, and it was only a matter of time before I would finally be caught.
I wasn’t even a teen yet, but I’d had that feeling for a while — that my life was a test I was doomed to fail. I had yet to confess this to anyone, but I had never heard the voice of God.
Writing in my journal was the closest I could get to what it seemed like everyone else was feeling. But when I looked around at all the people genuinely worshipping with their whole hearts, I felt like the only one in the fairy tale who couldn’t see the “Emperor’s New Clothes.” Even then, I wondered: am I the crazy one, or are they?
When the 40 or so kids and I got to the back auditorium, a Sunday School teacher shut the door behind us. A handsome man in a purple sweater made his way to the stage; I vaguely recognized him as the guy who did the morning announcements.
“Good morning, children of Christ!” he said excitedly. “And welcome to Maranatha. You don’t have to wait until you’re a grown up — we can heal one another right now, through the power of prayer!”
Everyone immediately began organizing themselves into little groups, and I once again felt like the only kid in the game who didn’t know the rules.
A sweet girl with exceptionally long hair slid her hand into mine, and smiled up at me. I smiled politely back, but inside I was screaming: “I don’t know you! I don’t know anyone! I don’t want to do this!”
We were joined by a tiny girl with bright blue eyes, and a pair of twin brothers. They instinctively put their hands on the smallest girl’s shoulders, and began to quietly pray. I stared at the floor.
Slowly, the room filled with the sound of children weeping. I’d seen this happen a couple of times, with the adults in my parents’ Bible studies — but this was the first time I saw kids my age behave this way.
Then I heard a new sound, one I didn’t recognize. I strained to listen, but it was gibberish. I looked around the room, and realized in horror that the noise was getting louder. There were repeating phrases, like a chant, but the words weren’t in any language I could understand. Although the sound filled me with dread, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was missing out on something terribly important.
“Lay your hands on her,” a voice said.
I opened my eyes, and saw the man in the purple sweater standing next to me. “Oh, I don’t really know her,” I said quietly.
“We are all children of God’s family!” Then he dropped his voice, and added: “Put your hand on her stomach. You can feel the Holy Spirit moving.”
Before I could say anything, he grabbed my wrist, and flattened my hand out on the girl’s bellybutton.
“Tell us what you feel,” he demanded.
“Um … warm,” I said, hoping that was the correct answer. “Her stomach is warm?”
“That’s the Spirit, can’t you tell?” He seemed irritated that it was taking me so long to figure this out. “When your hands get hot, that means you’ve been given the gift of healing.”
There are a number of “spiritual gifts” listed throughout the New Testament, specifically in 1 Corinthians 12 and Romans 12. Some of the more referenced ones in Christian circles include: faith, healing, prophecy, discernment, serving, leadership, and speaking in tongues.
According to a 2021 EBSCO Research Starter by Richard Sheposh, speaking in tongues, or glossolalia, is the practice of producing language-like speech that does not correspond to a known language. Christians trace it to the New Testament account of Pentecost, though Acts describes the disciples speaking recognizable foreign languages — a phenomenon sometimes distinguished today as xenoglossy — rather than the unintelligible speech more commonly associated with modern Pentecostal worship.
Speaking in tongues became especially prominent in the United States through 19th-century Protestant revivalism and the rise of Pentecostalism. Widely reported episodes in Topeka, Kansas, in 1901 and the Azusa Street Revival in Los Angeles in 1906 helped popularize the belief that tongues were a sign of baptism in the Holy Spirit, spreading the practice through Pentecostal churches across the country.
Evangelical Christians have a particular fondness for recognizing and assigning these gifts to others, although Jesus never specifically mentioned them. The one time I took a spiritual gifts quiz as a kid, my result was “discernment.”
The irony is not lost on me.
“Children,” the man announced, now back onstage. “For those of you who want to be anointed in the Lord, close your eyes and hold your hands out. If there is any sin in your heart, ask for forgiveness now. God so badly wants to overwhelm you with His love!”
A young boy nearby stood with his arms outstretched, his round little face smiling up at the ceiling. The man locked eyes on him, approached, then tapped his forehead with two fingers — and like a marionette who’s had his strings cut, the child instantly collapsed.
Suddenly all the kids were clamoring for their turn, as if our fun uncle was tossing us into a swimming pool. He wove gracefully through the crowd, whispered prayers, tapped foreheads, and knocked each child down with alarming precision. They all looked so peaceful, laying there on the stained carpet, their eyes never so much as fluttering open.
Soon, there were more bodies on the floor than there were standing.
The man was only a few kids away from me now. He was getting closer. A part of me wanted to laugh, or scream, or run away. But another part of me desperately wanted this to be real. I didn’t want to be the only one in the room who wasn’t in on the joke.
I was nervous. Questions flooded my mind: “Would it hurt? What if I did it wrong? What if I didn’t have enough faith? What if having so many questions means I don’t have enough faith?”
He stood before me. I looked into his eyes, desperately searching for an answer. “Close your eyes,” he commanded.
I nodded, but my eyes stayed open. Two fingers pressed my forehead, much harder than I was anticipating. Instinctively, I pushed back a little.
“Remember to search your heart for sin and ask for forgiveness,” he added, “So you may receive Him inside you.”
He repeated, “Now close your eyes.”
This time, I obeyed.
The man put a heavy hand on top of my head, and another one just below my neck, right on my heart. I wondered if he could feel how fast my heart was beating. He pushed my forehead again, much harder than before, time with his whole palm.
“Did it work?” I thought. “Did I finally do it right?”
I opened my eyes.
I was still standing.
I don’t remember the service ending, or leaving the sanctuary, or if I spoke to anyone. The car ride home was quiet. My mom and sisters sniffled, with an occasional murmur about “good and healing” the service was for them.
According to a 2019 article in The Yale ISM Review by liturgy scholar Lizette Larson-Miller, Christian healing rituals developed from New Testament practices of prayer, laying on of hands, and anointing the sick with oil. The tradition draws on Jesus’ healing ministry and passages such as James 5, which instruct church elders to pray over and anoint the sick.
Those practices later developed in different directions across Christianity. In traditions that emphasize charismatic healing, prayer and the laying on of hands may be treated as channels through which God can directly heal physical or “spiritual” illness, rather than primarily as formal sacraments.
But at the time, I had no words for what I had just lived through, but I knew something about it was wrong. Or worse, something about me was wrong. As I stared out the window, I returned to the words of the man in the purple sweater:
“God so badly wants to overwhelm you with his love!”
It would take another decade or so for me to admit this to myself — but if that was what God’s love looked like, then I wanted no part of it.
