Topic of the Month - Back Issues

Instrumental Music - Did God Exclude it?

Bro. Brian Tipton
Quartz Hill church of Christ

There are several ways God commands us. There are direct commandments and indirect commandments. Direct commandments come from commands like:

Luke 13:3 - I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.

Jesus tells us specifically, unless we repent we will perish.

Indirect commands come in a variety of forms, but the most common is the commandment by exclusion. Where God has spoken we may speak, where God has not spoken we must remain silent. To begin, let me point a couple verses.

1. 1Pe 4:11 If any man speak, [let him speak] as the oracles of God; if any man minister, [let him do it] as of the ability which God giveth: that God in all things may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom be praise and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.
   
   We are to speak as the Oracles of God, not of our own mind or intellect but do exactly what God commands.
   

2. 1 Samuel 15:22-23 But Samuel Replied, "Does the Lord delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as much as obeying the voice of the Lord? To obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed is better than the fat of rams. For rebellion is like the sin of divination and arrogance like the evil of idolatry. Because you have rejected the word of the Lord, he has rejected you as king.
   
   Immediately before this passage, Saul was instructed by God to wipe the Amelekites from the face of the earth. He was to kill everything: men, women, children, sheep, bulls, etc. He however kept Agag, the king, and some of the best bulls and rams. He kept Agag to make sport of him and the bulls and rams to offer a sacrifice to God. His intentions were noble but this is not what God commanded. Samuel told him that since he rejected the word of the Lord, God rejected him. Since we understand that God does not change, we know that if we reject (add to or take away from) the word of the Lord (Bible) God will also reject us and our worship to him.

Some of  you may say, "But God did not command against it.   So it is O.K. to use instruments in worship."   But as you can now see, the argument is not so weak. If we desire to do things bible ways and call things by Bible names, as the church of the first century did, then we must examine the bible and understand it as the first century church did. If we want to form a divisive denomination (something God abhors) then we can do whatever we want. As for me, I will do as the Lord says.

Now, there are generic commands and specific commands. For example:

Mark 16:15 And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.

The word Go is generic. It tells us to go but not how to go. We walk, fly, email, whatever. But we must go into all the world and preach the Gospel..

Now, another example:

Ge 6:14 Make thee an ark of gopher wood;. . .

Although wood is a generic word, and if God had only said wood, then Noah could have built the ark out of any type of wood. However, God told him to use gopher wood. This excluded every other type of wood that God had ever made. It did not allow Noah the freedom to use Pine, Oak, Birch, or any other type of wood because it suited him. Noah used gopher wood only because God told him to use gopher wood only.

Now we know that there are two kinds of music -- instrumental and vocal. If the New Testament tells us to make music in worship, then any kind of music will do. If the New Testament specifies a particular type of music, we are limited (in the same way Noah was limited) to the music specified.

1. Mt 26:30 And when they had sung an hymn, they went out into the mount of Olives.
   It simply says sing.

2. Mark 14:26 And when they had sung an hymn, they went out into the mount of Olives.
   It simply says sing.

3. Ro 15:9 And that the Gentiles might glorify God for [his] mercy; as it is written, For this cause I will confess to thee among the Gentiles, and sing unto thy name.
   It simply says sing.

4. 1Co 14:15 What is it then? I will pray with the spirit, and I will pray with the understanding also: I will sing with the spirit, and I will sing with the understanding also.
   It simply says sing. Here Paul uses a parallel to describe how we sing. He compares it to prayer. I don't believe anyone thinks that we can pray with instruments?!!

5. Eph 5:19 Speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord;
   It simply says sing, making melody in your heart.

6. Col 3:16 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.
   It simply says sing, making melody in your heart.

7. Heb 13:15 By him therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of [our] lips giving thanks to his name.
   When we praise God, which can be in prayer or song, the manner in which we offer the praise is to be from the fruit of our lips. This limits and excludes all other ways of giving that praise. God commands that we Praise Him with our lips, not with the fruit of our manmade
   instruments.

8. James 5:13 Is any among you afflicted? let him pray. Is any merry? let him sing psalms.
   Again, he says to simply sing.

Now we know that we must use all of the verses. For God cannot lie and, therefore, he cannot contradict himself. As you can see, God has specified the kind of music he wants us to use in worshiping and praising Him. Singing is included but instruments, after we examine all of the verses, are excluded. What God has excluded we must also
exclude. We have no authority to add anything to God's word. When we add to God's word, we transgress against his word.

2 John verse 9 --  Whosoever transgresseth, and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ, hath not God. He that abideth in the doctrine of Christ, he hath both the Father and the Son.

• Even early church history shows that the first century church never did this. I ask why do men today feel that they can add instruments to worship when they were never used in the first 6 centuries of the churches existence!!!!!

• From a historical note, it was not until the Catholic Pope Vitalian first introduced the organ into some services of the church in around 670 AD that instruments were used at all in the any form of church. In fact, the scholars say otherwise,

• Lyman Coleman (Presbyterian Scholar) wrote, "Both the Jew in their temple service and the Greeks in their idol worship were accustomed to sing with the accompaniment of instrumental music. The converts to Christianity must have been familiar with this mode of singing, but it is generally admitted that the primitive Christians employed no instrumental music in their religious worship."

• Joseph Bingham (Church of England), in his book, "Antiquities of the Church", says, "Music in the church is as ancient as the apostles; but instrumental music is not."

• The Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, in an article by J.M. Brown, page 852, adds, "That instrumental music was not practiced by the primitive Christians".

• John Calvin, Commentary on Psalms 33 "Musical instruments of worship in celebrating the praises of God would be no more suitable than the burning of incense, the lighting of lamps, and the restoration of other shadows of the law."

• John Wesley -- "I have no objection to our people having organs in their chapels, provided they are neither seen nor heard."

• Martin Luther termed the organ in worship as "an ensign to Baal"

• Adam Clarke (Methodist) -- "I have never known instrumental music to be productive of any good in the worship of God and I have much reason to believe that it has been productive of much evil. Music as a science I esteem and admire, but instruments of music in the house of God, I abominate and abhor. This is the abuse of music and I here register my protest against all such corruption in the worship of that Infinite Spirit who requires His followers to worship Him 'in spirit and in truth'." -- In his commentary on Amos 6:5

• Chas Spurgeon -- "We should like to see all the pipes of the organs in our non-conformist places of worship either ripped open or compactly filled with concrete. The human voice is so transcendently superior to all that wind or strings can accomplish that it is a shame to degrade its harmonies by association with blowing and scraping."

• Jn. Know (Presbyterian) -- This principle not only purified the church of human inventions and popish corruptions, but restored plain singing of psalms, unaccompanied by instrumental music.

• Clement of Alexandria (Considered one of the church Fathers, about 150 AD) -- "We make use of only one organ or instrument, even the peaceful word, with which we honor God; no longer with the old psaltery, trumpet, drum, or pipe."

• Emil Nauman -- "There can be no doubt that originally the music of the divine service was everywhere entirely of a vocal nature." (The History of Music, Vol. 1, p. 177)

Both the Bible and History condemn the use of instruments in worship to God. Why do men continue to add to God's word when the Word of God says that we cannot?

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