CalvinandHodges
Puritan Board Junior
Greetings:
Musical Instruments in the Worship of God are forbidden.
Yes or No. Why or Why not?
Musical Instruments in the Worship of God are forbidden.
Yes or No. Why or Why not?
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Not forbidden, but fulfilled. We don't use instruments anymore for the same reason we don't slice open goats and cows. Because Jesus fulfilled it all. Every part of the sacrificial system was wrapped up in the cross; we continue only those parts specifically commanded in the new covenant.
So, forbidden? Yes, but by way of fulifillment.
am unsure about this doctrine. I am looking forward to seeing this thread continue.
I'm unclear about how the use of instruments are fulfilled by Jesus, and therefore no longer to be a part of the worship service. Can somebody expand upon that? Its pretty clear how the sacrificing of animals was a type of and fulfilled by Jesus, but the playing of timbrel and stringed instruments? What did they represent and how were they fulfilled by Jesus?Not forbidden, but fulfilled. We don't use instruments anymore for the same reason we don't slice open goats and cows. Because Jesus fulfilled it all. Every part of the sacrificial system was wrapped up in the cross; we continue only those parts specifically commanded in the new covenant.
So, forbidden? Yes, but by way of fulifillment.
...but the playing of timbrel and stringed instruments? What did they represent and how were they fulfilled by Jesus?
...but the playing of timbrel and stringed instruments? What did they represent and how were they fulfilled by Jesus?
Eusebius the “Father of Church History” who lived between 260 AD and 341 AD wrote
"Of old at the time those of the circumcision were worshipping with symbols and types it was not inappropriate to send up hymns to God with the psalterion and cithara and to do this on Sabbath days... We render our hymn with a living psalterion and a living cithara with spiritual songs. The unison voices of Christians would be more acceptable to God than any musical instrument. Accordingly in all the churches of God, united in soul and attitude, with one mind and in agreement of faith and piety we send up a unison melody in the words of the Psalms."
That said, worship is not a form of entertainment, neither is worship something that a few do on behalf of the congregation. Congregational singing should be something we all joyfully do together. Therefore, if our worship is to be founded entirely on the precepts of scripture, then it will not include choirs or soloists.
In the modern world, in a non-singing age, it is almost impossible to keep a large congregation made up of experienced Christians, new converts and visitors, singing in harmony without the use of an instrument.
We certainly won't be able to solve this question by appeals to experience.
As with almost any issue related to worship, the appeals to experience and pragmatics which one often hears show that the understanding and cherishing of the Regulative Principle are on a down-swing in general.
Within worship the only instruments allowed were psaltries, harps and cymbols. The timbrels were used during civil celebrations for national deliverance and were accompanied by women dancing.
Turn to 2 Chronicles 29:25-30 which reads “And he [Hezekiah] set the Levites in the house of the LORD with cymbals, with psalteries, and with harps, according to the commandment of David, and of Gad the king's seer, and Nathan the prophet: for so was the commandment of the LORD by his prophets. And the Levites stood with the instruments of David, and the priests with the trumpets. And Hezekiah commanded to offer the burnt offering upon the altar. And when the burnt offering began, the song of the LORD began also with the trumpets, and with the instruments ordained by David king of Israel. And all the congregation worshipped, and the singers sang, and the trumpeters sounded: and all this continued until the burnt offering was finished. And when they had made an end of offering, the king and all that were present with him bowed themselves, and worshipped. Moreover Hezekiah the king and the princes commanded the Levites to sing praise unto the LORD with the words of David, and of Asaph the seer. And they sang praises with gladness, and they bowed their heads and worshipped.”
Notice that the instruments were used “until the burnt offering was finished” and when the offering was over the music stopped “the king and all that were present with him bowed themselves, and worshipped” without instruments and at this time “Hezekiah the king and the princes commanded the Levites to sing praise unto the LORD with the words of David, and of Asaph the seer” i.e. acapella or without instruments. This demonstrates that the instruments in temple worship was specifically to do with the sacrifice, musical instruments were a part of the sacrificial system of Israel. Therefore with the ending of the old sacrificial system by the death of Christ the use of instruments in worship ceased and so the church did not use musical instruments for hundreds upon hundreds of years.
This is a good article as is this
These are good sermons.
We certainly won't be able to solve this question by appeals to experience.
As with almost any issue related to worship, the appeals to experience and pragmatics which one often hears show that the understanding and cherishing of the Regulative Principle are on a down-swing in general.
Well its always good to finally be someplace where I'm accused of not liking the RPW as opposed to the norm of being accused of over-venerating it. I'm new and still figuring the board out, does this kind of let me assess the condition of your heart because you aren't convinced of my position on a worship circumstance fly around a lot in here? Can I ask how you'd react if I assumed you didn't understand or cherish biblical eccelesiology because you remain in a denomination that ordains women to the office of deacon? (I don't assume that at all, but I wouldn't personally be able to stay in a denom that had female officers)
David, I would assume that we both agree that congregational singing is a commanded element of worship. You'd also have to assume that because it is singing, music is involved:
Music - "the tones or sounds employed, occurring in single line (melody) or multiple lines (harmony), and sounded or to be sounded by one or more voices or instruments, or both"
Music is therefore a necessary circumstance of singing, do you have singing without music? Not unless you have singing that is devoid of melody and harmony. Which is seldom if ever the case - even chants have a melody. The question is, in producing and organizing the music that is part and parcel of singing may we use an instrument other than simply the human voice? To me the question is akin to may I use electrical amplification in order that my relatively weak preaching voice might be heard instead of shouting myself hoarse? To which I would answer, yes as this is simply a necessary circumstance to assist with the element of preaching.
When we use an instrument to assist in singing we are not ADDING an element to the worship like say a liturgical dance routine, neither are we making the circumstance an element by having the instruments played by themselves and not simply assisting with another element as say a flute or harp solo would be.
Finally, please feel free to dismiss this out of hand as pragmatism if you wish. When it comes to visitors to conservative Reformed churches, the preaching of the whole gospel is going to be an offense to them, and a worship services that honors the RPW is going to be profoundly countercultural and weird, but those offences are necessary, and in some senses we should glory in them.
But on the other hand, my experience is that one of the reasons the majority of our visitors "don't stick" is that we add unnecessary hurdles and offenses to the necessary ones. Just one of the many we can add is not helping them to sing, they don't know the psalms and hymns we sing, and 9 times out of 10 they are embarrassed at the train wreck sound they produce trying to follow along accapella especially when they are sure everyone can hear them. Yes you can train a small congregation of committed Christians to sing accappella but you see there is far too much assumption that that is all that our congregations will ever be - the same small group of committed Christians and their kids that we started with plus perhaps a few heroic types who fought their way in. It's part of the reason why the majority of our church plants fail - we act like we are going to be working with the same group of committed Christians and do little or nothing to help or accommodate the outsiders we are supposed to want to convert.
Yes, the Broadly evangelical churches have too much milk and little or no meat at all, so the congregation remain eternal babes, but we on the other hand too often take up the reverse policy and never provide any milk and then are surprised and depressed that babies reject a steak diet.
So, again I ask, if musical instruments are but a shadow in the Old Testament, why are voices not but a shadow as well?
Where in the New Testament are we commanded to sing out loud in public worship?
Finally, please feel free to dismiss this out of hand as pragmatism if you wish. When it comes to visitors to conservative Reformed churches, the preaching of the whole gospel is going to be an offense to them, and a worship services that honors the RPW is going to be profoundly countercultural and weird, but those offences are necessary, and in some senses we should glory in them.
But on the other hand, my experience is that one of the reasons the majority of our visitors "don't stick" is that we add unnecessary hurdles and offenses to the necessary ones. Just one of the many we can add is not helping them to sing, they don't know the psalms and hymns we sing, and 9 times out of 10 they are embarrassed at the train wreck sound they produce trying to follow along accapella especially when they are sure everyone can hear them. Yes you can train a small congregation of committed Christians to sing accappella but you see there is far too much assumption that that is all that our congregations will ever be - the same small group of committed Christians and their kids that we started with plus perhaps a few heroic types who fought their way in. It's part of the reason why the majority of our church plants fail - we act like we are going to be working with the same group of committed Christians and do little or nothing to help or accommodate the outsiders we are supposed to want to convert.
Yes, the Broadly evangelical churches have too much milk and little or no meat at all, so the congregation remain eternal babes, but we on the other hand too often take up the reverse policy and never provide any milk and then are surprised and depressed that babies reject a steak diet.
Finally, please feel free to dismiss this out of hand as pragmatism if you wish. When it comes to visitors to conservative Reformed churches, the preaching of the whole gospel is going to be an offense to them, and a worship services that honors the RPW is going to be profoundly countercultural and weird, but those offences are necessary, and in some senses we should glory in them.
But on the other hand, my experience is that one of the reasons the majority of our visitors "don't stick" is that we add unnecessary hurdles and offenses to the necessary ones. Just one of the many we can add is not helping them to sing, they don't know the psalms and hymns we sing, and 9 times out of 10 they are embarrassed at the train wreck sound they produce trying to follow along accapella especially when they are sure everyone can hear them. Yes you can train a small congregation of committed Christians to sing accappella but you see there is far too much assumption that that is all that our congregations will ever be - the same small group of committed Christians and their kids that we started with plus perhaps a few heroic types who fought their way in. It's part of the reason why the majority of our church plants fail - we act like we are going to be working with the same group of committed Christians and do little or nothing to help or accommodate the outsiders we are supposed to want to convert.
Yes, the Broadly evangelical churches have too much milk and little or no meat at all, so the congregation remain eternal babes, but we on the other hand too often take up the reverse policy and never provide any milk and then are surprised and depressed that babies reject a steak diet.
So, again I ask, if musical instruments are but a shadow in the Old Testament, why are voices not but a shadow as well?
Where in the New Testament are we commanded to sing out loud in public worship?
Well, we have commands to teach and admonish one another (which implies corporate and public worship) and we are told to do it by singing. Don't the two together tell us to do it out loud?
“Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom; teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord” (Colossians 3:16).
Finally, please feel free to dismiss this out of hand as pragmatism if you wish. When it comes to visitors to conservative Reformed churches, the preaching of the whole gospel is going to be an offense to them, and a worship services that honors the RPW is going to be profoundly countercultural and weird, but those offences are necessary, and in some senses we should glory in them.
But on the other hand, my experience is that one of the reasons the majority of our visitors "don't stick" is that we add unnecessary hurdles and offenses to the necessary ones. Just one of the many we can add is not helping them to sing, they don't know the psalms and hymns we sing, and 9 times out of 10 they are embarrassed at the train wreck sound they produce trying to follow along accapella especially when they are sure everyone can hear them. Yes you can train a small congregation of committed Christians to sing accappella but you see there is far too much assumption that that is all that our congregations will ever be - the same small group of committed Christians and their kids that we started with plus perhaps a few heroic types who fought their way in. It's part of the reason why the majority of our church plants fail - we act like we are going to be working with the same group of committed Christians and do little or nothing to help or accommodate the outsiders we are supposed to want to convert.
Yes, the Broadly evangelical churches have too much milk and little or no meat at all, so the congregation remain eternal babes, but we on the other hand too often take up the reverse policy and never provide any milk and then are surprised and depressed that babies reject a steak diet.
I completely agree. Thanks, Andy! Maybe this post should make it to the blog?
Worship is in Spirit and in Truth, as Jesus says. It is the uniting of the Spirit of God with the heart of man. It is not spirit only - for that would be enthusiasm. It is not in Truth only - for that would be dead orthodoxy. It is Spirit and Truth. The Spirit does not work "outside" of the Truth.Worship predates music, for Adam worshipped God in the garden of Eden, although music is not mentioned until the birth of Jubal (see Genesis 4:21), and even king David kept music as subsidiary to worship. This very fact establishes the truth that music in itself is not worship. No musical instrument is "an instrument of worship"; it may assist the musician in his worship, but worship cannot be mechanical or inanimate. Worship is a person's spirit responding to God's Spirit, not a horn sounding musical tones throughout an auditorium. The same principle pertains to choir anthems, orchestral presentations, solos, or ensemble vocal songs sung at Christian gatherings ... Far too frequently they are artistic performances that draw more attention to the musician(s) than to God Himself. Cornwall, Judson, Elements of Worship, (Bridge Publishing, Inc., South Plainfield, NJ, 1985), pgs., 129-130.