Viewpoint Brief Bible Study #60 |
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JESUS calls US to be |
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The Christian religion is the worship and service of Jesus Christ. It’s not Mary we worship, but her Son. We worship neither saints, angels, a law code, nor even God’s Spirit. It’s JESUS who is to be honored. The Bible is our guide. |
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In Spirit And Truth, We Want
To Worship the True God !
Dwaine & Jane Dunning have in 1997 moved to
400 West Rio Altar, Green Valley AZ 85614.
Dwaine says he easily tired of being retired
so has answered a call to try becoming tired by
preaching again. He and Jane took time to come to Joplin
to attend the Refreshing Waters Renewal in July 1997.-- Dwaine Dunning --
Are Musical Instruments An
Impediment to True Worship?Christians are NOT commanded to sing. Not ever. Under any circumstances! James does point out that Christians who are joyful (full of joy) are very apt to burst out in song. But that's not COMMANDING all Christians to sing. We're often happy, but seldom because someone says we HAVE to be happy! We often want to sing, but seldom because someone says now we MUST sing! In fact, being urged to SING LOUDER now will almost always cause me to stop singing. Emotions are not on order.
Sorrow may strike us at any moment. Or joy may come. But it's not because we're told we MUST be happy or unhappy... The Bible does NOT demand that when saints meet they MUST sing or MUST pray or MUST listen to a sermon. We do good things for God because we WANT to do them, not because we HAVE to do them!
Singing by Christians is not a subject of law. We're free TO sing. We sing if we want to. But we are not told we HAVE to do so in order to please God.
But, you say, what about Colossians and Ephesians, Ray. You're overlooking Paul's COMMAND that those Christians MUST SING. Really? Is that how YOU read those passages? As a requirement about singing?
Paul's subject is our being filled with the Spirit and therefore BEING happy. He says we should. He says that singing may be an aid in our receiving God's Spirit in fullness. But he most certainly does NOT command that we have to be happy or sing.
Permission? Well, we didn't NEED permission, but if we had needed it, Paul surely provided it. But a command? A command is "You are to SING!" or "You must SING!" The passages speak of three types of songs, inviting us to make full use of all three types as we choose and prefer. But we're not told that we MUST use any one of the three. If we like to sing in the shower, any godly song will be good for the serenade. If we hum as we do the dishes, or dust, or sweep, or whatever, any godly song is appropriate.
That's all Paul was saying. He was NOT speaking of "in worship" (whatever THAT means) but rather of anywhere and everywhere that God's saints go any time.
And, in pointing out that there were at least three types of godly music, Paul was not limiting us to those exact songs. The New Testament scriptures just don't DO things like that, no matter how hard lawyers may look while searching for regulations they can bind on Christ's church.
Dwaine Dunning hopes to help us understand that when Paul wrote to commend the use of psalms, hymns and odes, that NONE of the three types were exclusively MINUS instrumental accompaniment, but that all three COULD BE a cappella. Paul just wasn't commenting at all on what is dear to some hearts. He had no quarrel with instrumentalists, nor any undue love for them. Whether or not vocal singing was accompanied just didn't matter to Paul. And it shouldn't matter to US!
Dunning sheds light on how the word PSALMOS (the Greek word we "translate" as psalm) was used. His line of thought seems logical and helpful. Another scholar I know has invested much of his life in seeking to prove that the word SING (at the time Paul wrote to Ephesian and Colossian Christians) was sternly and strictly limited to a cappella vocal singing. This seems a very peculiar way to spend valuable time. Paul was writing to people who could read and who had access to Old Testament scrolls. In particular, Christians of the first century had access to and made frequent use of the Septuagint translation (into Greek) of the Hebrew scriptures. Paul, in Greek, wrote to them using the verb SING. To imagine that he would use it in a different way than it was used in the Septuagint and yet not explain his DIFFERENT use is to think of Paul as either ignorant or uncaring that his readers might misunderstand him.
Paul was not at all ignorant. Paul obviously cared very much that people understand him. Yet I'm asked to believe that he used a common word in an uncommon way and I must, based on Paul's supposed uncommon use of the word, accept a prohibition on Christian use of musical instruments. I think this is asking way too much of any Christian who bases his belief and practice on what the Bible says in clear speech.
Dunning does well to point out that what we are encouraged to sing includes the three usual kinds of godly music, one of which was commonly sung to the accompaniment of stringed musical instruments. How can we imagine that Paul would demand (by use of a verb which is said to have changed its meaning just for that brief period while Paul was writing) that we NOT use musical instruments in spiritual singing, and then use nouns which imply use of musical instruments?
It's too big a stretch for logical thinkers. Those who want God to have made a law against our use of musical instruments are willing to make the stretch. Most of us can see that at best it's poor logic which calls for the stretch.
And now I've changed my mind. There's too much that has to be said to really explain Dunning's position, and too little space in any BRIEF study (as this is intended to be), for me to start quoting Dunning's good article. Interested readers can obtain it in a book by Dennis A. Brossman which he titled, "The Truth About Anti-Instrumentalism." Latest address I have for Dennis Brossman is 653 Washakie St, Lander Wyoming at zip 82520. The study by Dunning is chapter 12 in the book.
I encourage every reader to sing to and about God on any provocation. With or without accompaniment, God will be pleased to hear from you, and those who hear will be edified by learning of your love for God.
But if you for any reason believe that God will be displeased by use of musical instruments "in worship" then you should be sure to NEVER sing to or about God when a musical instrument is also singing that song. Most worship is not done in a place set aside FOR worship. It's done by PEOPLE who are set aside for worship, and it's done wherever they happen to be at any time of the day or night, whether alone or in a group.
There's not one set of rules for a "worship service" and a different set for home and play and work. In particular, Colossians 3 is calling for Christians to act wherever they are in particular ways. Paul says, in the passages some say establish a law against use of musical instruments in "worship," that we are to "set your hearts on things above" "set your minds on things above" "put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature...rid yourselves of all such (bad) things..." "do not lie" "clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other..." "forgive" "put on LOVE, which binds ... all (of us) together in perfect unity."
In particular, at verse 15 we are exhorted, "Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts...And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him."
And this is the passage some say is a COMMAND
to sing a cappella. They say what Paul had in mind
when he wrote this was to lay down the law to these folks
that they'd go to Hell if they dared play a piano or even
sing when someone else was doing so!Why would anyone ever think such a thing? That's no more what Paul was saying than it's a requirement that you must change the battery in your hearing aid. Paul's talking about our heart and life. And some brothers want it to be that he was establishing a law code by which they can create disunity in the Lord's church by driving out those who don't mind singing with musical instruments during one hour on Sunday mornings. How COULD anyone possibly so misunderstand the Word of God? Only because they WANT so badly for God to be on "their side" of an argument, that they'll clutch at any straw which might possibly be an argument FOR their "position." Let's DO what Paul says we should, and be thankful!!!
Brief Bible Study #60 from Ray Downen. To go back to Viewpoint's first page, click < here. Or here to go on to Viewpoint Study 61. For Ray's concluding remarks, click HERE.
