Tongues or Not to Tongues, That is the Question

I am part of a Pentecostal church. I attend a Baptist seminary. Two contentious sides of a highly debated subject about the relevance of speaking in tongues in today's society. So, for a theology course, I decided to write a paper on the topic. (Hey, I don't wimp out. Last semester I wrote a paper on theodicy, how a good God can allow evil, if you didn't know...I didn't until seminary!)

I will post the entire paper once I am done, but let me share some views.

1. Even the Pentecostals can't agree that speaking in tongues is an absolute necessity or the end all-to-be-all expression that a person is filled with the Holy Spirit.
2. Baptists can't agree on accepting tongues or rejecting it. They banned anyone associated with their North American Mission Board from speaking in tongues publicly but then reversed the decision.
3. The Catholic and Orthodox churches deny the existence of tongues in today's society in their official doctrinal stance, yet both have congregations which are admittedly Pentecostal.
4. One big obstacle the Pentecostals have to overcome is the historical lineage of the tongues movement. Simply stating that in 1901 a group of people from Topeka, Kansas decided that they wanted a deeper experience with God that resulted in revival doesn't constitute lineage. Even their modest appeals to the Holiness movements of the 1800's are weak historical links. Understand that I do not believe that we must have a successionist view to accept all biblical truth. For example, I believe absolutely in the baptism of adults (or children capable of fully understanding the symbolic act and confession of belief in Jesus Christ that accompanies the act) who profess a faith in Christ. However, from a historical lineage perspective; adult, believer's baptism did not become a predominant view until the 16th century. But the key to this belief is that dissent can be traced throughout history and the biblical record supports it with little room for debate. The view of infant baptism is a view perpetuated by the church in an effort to explain what would happen to them if they died very early in life which was much more common at that time.
5. I predict a coming split in the Pentecostal church. A brief survey of church history will reveal that doctrinal issues have divided the Methodists, Baptists, Presbyterians, and others. Pentecostals are next and it is in large part because there is an immobility of heart by some that will not allow for a reasonable dissent on a secondary issue. The Assemblies of God, for example, holds 15 fundamental truths and they call 4 of them "Really Important". Should we have absolute doctrines--emphatically, YES! However, are there issues that hold back the missional purpose of the church (to seek and save the lost, to see the gospel spread throughout the world) that have no bearing on the core values of scripture?--again, I say emphatically--YES!

I could go on, but I have 15 pages of paper to bore you with at a later date. I guess this whole thing just frustrates me because I don't ever see how divisiveness over the "minors" can mobilize the church to impact the world. We are being overtaken by the secular culture not because we serve a God of limited power but because we limit God's power in our individual lives and our corporate churches by choosing the wrong fights. If we were as committed to defeating the enemy as we are to proving our views right in the eyes of others, if we worked as hard to prove to the postmodern world the relevance and absolute truth of the Gospel message as we did defending our "correctness"; I think we would be a lot further ahead.