Mechanical Instruments of
Music in Worship
Letters
from listeners encourage me to work even harder at my reading and studying, at
preparing lessons for the International Gospel Hour and at delivering them in the
most effective way of which I am capable.
That is especially true when my correspondents disagree with some point
I have made in a radio lesson. I am
grateful that my listeners feel free to disagree with what I have
preached. Their objections to my radio
sermons do not embarrass or trouble me in the least. I take all questions and disagreements
seriously and strive to deal with them to the best of my ability. Because of my busy schedule, I cannot answer
every letter I receive, but I do try to respond on the radio to many of the
ideas my listeners express in their letters and in e-mail.
A
few weeks ago I received a letter expressing concern for my opposition to
instrumental music in the worship of the church. I shall read as an introduction to this
discussion of “Mechanical Instruments of Music in Worship” two brief paragraphs
from the letter. “I have heard it stated
by some persons that it was commanded in the Bible that musical instruments not
be played in a church service while singing hymns. I would greatly appreciate it if you would
write to me and tell me what book, chapter and verse (where) it states ‘Thou
shall not play any musical instruments in a church while singing religious
songs.’ While I do agree some musical
instruments are not in good taste, and should not be played, I am of the belief
that it is more or less a personal preference.”
I
must say as plainly as I am able that I do not for one second question the
honesty and sincerity of my correspondent.
His views are in agreement with those of millions and millions of people
worldwide. In fact, the vast majority of
those who call themselves Christians see nothing wrong with using mechanical
instruments of music in worship to God almighty. But religious differences are not settled by
counting noses. If I can show from the
scriptures that instrumental music in worship is wrong, it does not matter how
many people disagree with that view. Our
position on any biblical topic must be, “Who is on the Lord’s side?” You probably heard preachers quote these
words: “One on the Lord’s side is a majority.”
My correspondent says he has “heard it stated by some persons that it was commanded in the Bible that musical instruments not to be played in a church service while singing hymns.” I believe I know what he is seeking to convey, but frankly, I never heard anyone use that kind of language. I have heard dozens of sermons and have read some of the most scholarly books on the unscripturalness of mechanical instrumental music in worship, but I never heard anyone say the Bible commands people not to play instruments in a church service while singing hymns. So if the Bible does not command people to refrain from using mechanical instruments of music in worship, why do churches of Christ and some other religious groups object to their use?
My
correspondent kindly asks me to provide book, chapter and verse that state:
“Thou shalt not use any musical instruments in a church while singing religious
songs.” I need to ask him and you: “May
we engage in any activity in the work and worship of the church that the Bible
does not specifically forbid?” Will you
join me in our investigation of what God authorizes and what he forbids?
Please
think about the following question: When the Lord specifies what we must
do, does he have to delineate what we must not do? Do you remember the Lord’s instructions to
Noah? “And God said to Noah, The end of
all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through
them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth. Make an ark of gopher wood; rooms shall you
make in the ark, and you shall pitch it within and without with pitch” (Gen.
6:13-14). Do you believe Noah understood
what the Lord wanted him to do? Would
Noah’s use of some other kind of wood have been a “more or less personal
preference?” “Thus did Noah; according
to all God commanded him, so did he” (Gen. 6:22).
When
God instructed Noah to use gopher wood in the construction of the ark, would it
have been permissible for Noah to have used any other kind of wood? The Lord did not say and did not have to say,
“You shall not use pine or oak or hickory or walnut.” Those other kinds of wood may have been just
as good, from a human viewpoint, but the Lord specified what Noah was to
use. My friends, Noah recognized the law
of inclusion and exclusion. When God
included gopher wood, he excluded all other kinds of wood. Noah understood that principle even though many
modern theologians do not and have no intention of doing so, especially on matters
they like.
The
apostle Paul outlined what Christians are to do in taking the Lord’s
supper. “For I received of the Lord that
which also I delivered unto you. That
the Lord Jesus the same night in which he was betrayed took bread: and when he
had given thanks, he broke it, and said, Take, eat: this is my body, which is
broken for you: this do in remembrance of me.
After the same manner also he took the cup, when he had supped, saying,
This cup is the new testament in my blood: this do, as often as you drink it,
in remembrance of me” (1 Cor.
Most
people believe the Lord’s supper consists of the bread which symbolizes the
Lord’s body and the cup or the fruit of the vine which symbolizes the blood of
the Lamb of God. For us to be able to
partake of the Lord’s supper in a manner well pleasing to the Lord, was it
necessary for the Lord to say: “You shall not have steak and eggs on the Lord’s
table” or “You shall not have buttermilk”?
When the Lord included the bread and the fruit of the vine, he excluded
all other possible elements. Why did the
Lord specify those two elements and no others?
That was what the Lord wanted his people to eat as a memorial
feast. If we respect his will, we are
not going to add to nor take from nor substitute for what he has authorized.
There
are two kinds of music--vocal and instrumental.
The Holy Spirit included singing in our worship to God. “And be not drunk with wine, wherein is
excess: but be filled with the Spirit: speaking to yourselves in psalms and
hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord”
(Eph.
Did
my correspondent know that instrumental music is never mentioned in the New
Testament? Vocal music and only vocal
music is specifically authorized? Was it
an oversight on the Lord’s part to mention vocal music and not instrumental
music? Did the Lord have to say, “You
shall not use instruments of music in worship to me under the new
covenant?” When he included singing in
worship, did he not exclude instrumental music?
Did he have to specifically exclude dancing, stripping, wrestling,
lifting weights and breaking concrete blocks?
Are these activities more or less matters of personal preference? Is it possible to have unity among the
professed followers of Jesus Christ when churches add whatever they like to
their worship services?
In
1888--over a hundred years ago--Dr. John L Girardeau, a professor of theology
at Columbia Theological Seminary in Columbia, South Carolina, wrote an
outstanding book with the title, Instrumental Music in the Public Worship of
the Church (Wiggins, Mississippi: Apologia Press, reprinted in
2000). Dr. Girardeau, a Presbyterian
scholar, opposed the use of mechanical instruments of music in worship. His students asked him to explain his reasons
for his opposition to instrumental music.
The book I have just mentioned was his response to their questions. I do not have time to examine the full text
of Dr. Girardeau’s book, but I do want to read some statements from the
book. Included in this small volume is a
review of the book by R.L. Dabney.
Before I read some statements from Dr. Girardeau, please listen to a few
observations from Dabney. Dabney affirms
that Dr. Girardeau was “supporting the identical position held by all the early
church fathers, by all the Presbyterian reformers,” by Chalmers, Mason,
Breckenridge, Thronwell and Spurgeon, the famous English Baptist preacher. According to Dabney, Dr. Girardeau argued:
“God is worshipped only in the ways appointed in his word” (p. ii of the
review).
Under
the section, “The General Argument from Scripture,” Dr. Girardeau wrote: “A
divine warrant is necessary for every element of doctrine, government and
worship in the church; that is, whatsoever in these spheres is not commanded in
the Scriptures, either expressly or by good and necessary consequence from
their statements, is forbidden” (p. 1).
That is the point I have been stressing in our study today. Dr. Girardeau further argues: “This truth
operates positively to the inclusion of everything in the doctrine, government
and worship of the church which is commanded, explicitly and implicitly in the
Scriptures, and negatively to the exclusion of everything which is not so
commanded” (pp. 1-2). I hope you noticed
Dr. Girardeau’s use of the terms “inclusion” and “exclusion.” Time will not allow a full examination of Dr.
Girardeau’s arguments and examples, but it is significant that he mentions Cain
and his offering, Nadab and Abihu, Korah, Dathan and Abiram, Moses’ smiting the
rock, Saul’s offering a burnt-offering at Gilgal and Uzza and the ark as
examples of those who engaged in unauthorized practices and had to suffer the
consequences (pp. 3-7). I close our
reference to Dr. Girardeau’s book with this excerpt: “The jealousy of God for
the principle of a divine warrant for everything in his worship is most
conspicuously illustrated in New Testament times, by the tremendous judgments
which befell the Jewish people for perpetuating, without such a warrant, the
typical ritual of the temple-service.
Until the great atoning sacrifice was offered, they had a positive
warrant from God for the observance of that order. But when that sacrifice had been offered, the
veil of the temple had been rent in twain, and the Holy Ghost had been
copiously poured out at the inauguration of the new dispensation, the positive
warrant for the temple-worship had been withdrawn” (p. 8). When the divine warrant was withdrawn, no one
was free to worship God according to the dictates of the law of Moses. Incidentally, the Mosaic covenant allowed the
use of mechanical instruments of worship, at least, on some occasions; the new
covenant under Christ does not.
The
man who wrote the letter to me lists a number of passages which, at least, in
his mind, seem to justify using instruments of music in New Testament
worship. I cannot read and examine each
of these passages, but I shall discuss some
of them briefly. He records these
words from Isaiah: “The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of God
shall stand forever” (Isa. 40:8). Does
that verse mean that whatever the Jews practiced under the old covenant we must
include in our worship? If that were
true, we would have to burn incense, offer animal sacrifices, keep the sabbath,
observe the Passover, the feast of Pentecost, and other Jewish rituals. The law that authorized these practices has
been taken out of the way and nailed to the cross (Col. 2:14-17).
My
correspondent also quotes: “I know that, whatsoever God does, it shall be forever:
nothing can be put to it nor anything taken from it: and God does it that men
shall fear before him” (Eccl.
Every
serious student of the word knows that God cannot change. But we also know that he has changed his
laws. Otherwise, it would be foolish to
speak of the gospel and the law of Moses.
The apostle John wrote concerning Jesus: “For the law was given by
Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ” (John
One
of the favorite verses of those who imagine that God has not changed any of his
laws is Hebrews 13:8 which reads: “Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and today
and forever.” If God and Christ are the
same yesterday, and today, and forever, does that mean no laws have been
changed? If they approved of
instrumental music under the Jewish covenant, does that mean they approve of it
under the Christian dispensation? If you
listened to the verses I have read to you from the book of Hebrews, you know it
does not mean that no laws have been changed.
There have been hundreds of changes in the law from the time of Moses
until today. No, man has not changed
those laws; God did. For example
Christians’ worship must be on the Lord’s Day--the first day of the week--not
on the Jewish sabbath. And Sunday is not
the sabbath! As I have already stated,
we do not keep the Passover, the feast of Pentecost and other Jewish feasts and
festivals. They had great meaning under
the law of Moses. Their meaning today is
purely historical. But we are not to
observe those regulations.
My
correspondent makes reference to these words from the Old Testament: “You shall
not add unto the word which I command you, neither shall you diminish ought
from it, that you may keep the commandments of the Lord your God which I
command you” (Dt. 4:2). There is no
doubt the principle applies to the new covenant, but this is the wrong verse to
use in trying to justify the use of mechanical instruments of music in worship
under the new covenant. Instruments of
music are not mentioned one time in the New Testament. Who has the right to add any act to the
worship that God has authorized in his word?
In
a letter to the editor of The Tennessean (Wed. July 25, 2001), a
man from Nashville responded to an article about music that had appeared earlier
in the same paper. I did not read the
original article, so I have no way of knowing exactly what it said. He asks, “When will these people understand
that things will not always be as the so-called conservative members think they
should be” (p. 14-A)? What if the
conservative members think they should follow the teaching of the scripture,
would that make a difference? He asserts
that as more young people become members of the church, the church will have to
accept the change that comes along with it.
No church has to accept unscriptural doctrine or practice, regardless of
who the members of the church are. We
should not be trying to please the members.
We should strive to be like Jesus Christ and do always those things that
please God (John 8:29).
The
author of the letter says he cannot understand what is so bad about music in
the church. “Can they show me a
scripture where music should not be played in the church?” He accuses those of us who oppose musical
instruments in the worship as being narrow-minded, “not to mention a lack of
respect for the wishes of others” (p. 14-A).
I confess to being narrow-minded, that is, as narrow minded as the
Bible. I believe we ought to respect the
wishes of others so long as those wish are in harmony with the word of almighty
God. Should we respect the wishes of others if they want to introduce dancing
into the worship? Where do we draw the line in our respect for others’ wishes?
We must not fall in with the fleeting fashions of world, even if our young people
demand it (Rom. 12:2). That truth should
be too plain for anyone to deny.
Winford
Claiborne
The International Gospel Hour
P.O. Box 118
Fayetteville, TN 37334
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