Doctrine: Instrumental Music

1
Doctrine Instrumental Music

• Vocal Music OR Instrumental?
• Background of the problem
• Invalid arguments
• What the scholars have said
• Issues we face today

2
Background - History

• L. L. Pinkerton first instrument among churches
  of the Restoration Movement Midway, KY
  1858-1859
• Pinkerton wrote articles to defend its use.
• Issue smoldered during the Civil War
• Thorpe Springs, TX preacher insisted on using
  the instrument. His father presented a petition
  opposing the instrument. His son, the preacher,
  looked at the organist and said, Play on, Miss
  Bertha.

3
Background - History

• J. W. McGarvey It is manifest that we cannot
  adopt the practice without abandoning the obvious
  and only ground on which a restoration of
  Primitive Christianity can be accomplished, or on
  which the plea for it can be maintained.
• The actual division was long and slow in coming.
• By 1906 the division between churches of Christ
  (vocal) and the Christian Church (instrumental)
  was complete.

4
Invalid Arguments to Support1 Aid vs. Addition

• Can the instrument be authorized the same way as
  a PA system, songbooks and pews are authorized?
• Is instrumental music an aid to our singing OR
  Is it an addition to what God commanded?

5
Invalid Arguments to Support2 Used in the Old
Testament

• Psalm 149 and 150 encourage instruments
• David played the harp
• 1 Chronicles 235 four thousand were gatekeepers,
  and four thousand praised the Lord with musical
  instruments, "which I made," said David, "for
  giving praise."

6
Invalid Arguments to Support2 Used in the Old
Testament

• David played the harp
• What about Amos 65? Who sing idly to the sound
  of stringed instruments, And invent for
  yourselves musical instruments like David
• 2 Chronicles 2925 And he stationed the Levites
  in the house of the Lord with cymbals, with
  stringed instruments, and with harps, according
  to the commandment of David, of Gad the king's
  seer, and of Nathan the prophet for thus was the
  commandment of the Lord by his prophets.

7
Invalid Arguments to Support2 Used in the Old
Testament

• SUMMARY
• David praised God with instruments Psalm 149
• God approved such use 2 Chronicles 2925
• God condemned the entertainment instead of
  worship Amos 65

8
Invalid Arguments to Support3 Used in our
homes, play in band

• Many things are morally right but wrong in
  worship
• Hamburgers are not wrong in life
• In communion they are wrong
• Musical instruments are not wrong in life
• Musical instruments are wrong in worship
• It is not the piano that is wrong
• It is its use in worship that is not authorized

9
Invalid Arguments to Support4 They are in
heaven

• They had harps in heaven Revelation 152 And I
  saw something like a sea of glass mingled with
  fire, and those who have the victory over the
  beast, over his image and over his mark and over
  the number of his name, standing on the sea of
  glass, having harps of God.
• Read Revelation there are horses, frogs, and
  fruit trees in heaven But they are not part
  of our worship Horse jumping is not worship!

10
Invalid Arguments to Support4 They are in
heaven

• Revelation 142-3 2 And I heard a voice from
  heaven, like the voice of many waters, and like
  the voice of loud thunder. And I heard the sound
  of harpists playing their harps. 3 They sang as
  it were a new song before the throne, before the
  four living creatures, and the elders and no one
  could learn that song except the hundred and
  forty-four thousand who were redeemed from the
  earth.

11
Invalid Arguments to Support5 Bible does not
say Don't

• Radio listener letter - Why couldn't we have
  music with our singing? My Bible doesn't say
  don't!
• Two types of silence
• Generic commands silence allows / includes
• Build ark includes hammer
• Go teach includes the mode of travel
• Specific commands silence forbids / excludes
• Fruit of the vine excludes Dr. Pepper
• Sing excludes instruments

12
Invalid Arguments to Support6 I like it. It
makes me feel good.

• Radio listener letter - Maybe some people don't
  like music with their singing, but then, not all
  of us like peanut butter and jelly on our bread,
  but that doesn't mean it would be wrong for us to
  eat it with our bread.
• Who sets the rules (guidelines) for worship?
• What is the direction of worship us or God?
• Who is the object of our worship? (John 424)
• Is worship for my pleasure what I like?

13
What the scholars have said aboutInstrumental
Music in worship

• John Calvin (founder of Presbyterian Church) -
  It is no more suitable than the burning of
  incense, the lighting of tapers, or the revival
  of the other shadows of the law. The Catholics
  foolishly borrowed it from the Jews.
• Martin Luther (founder of the Lutheran Church) -
  The organ in the worship is the ensign of Baal.
• John Wesley (founder of the Methodist Church) -
  I have no objection to the organ in our chapels
  provided it is neither seen nor heard.

14
What the scholars have said aboutInstrumental
Music in worship

• Charles Spurgeon (famous Baptist preacher) - I
  had just as soon pray to God with machinery as to
  sing to God with machinery.
• Adam Clarke (Methodist commentator) - Music as a
  science I esteem and admire, but instrumental
  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 of the
  worship of the author of Christianity.

15
What the scholars have said aboutInstrumental
Music in worship

• Lyman Coleman (Presbyterian preacher) - The
  tendency of this (instrumental music) was to
  secularize the music of the church.
• There are many others that I could quote here.
• Notice that in the first hundred years of the
  reformation movement no denomination used
  instrumental music in worship.

16
What the scholars have said aboutInstrumental
Music in worship

• Benjamin Franklin (restoration preacher) - If
  one had told us forty years ago, that we would
  live to see the day when those professing to be
  Christians who claim the Holy Scriptures as
  their only rule of faith and practice would
  bring instruments of music into the worshiping
  assembly and use it there in worship, we should
  have repelled the idea as an idle dream. They
  turn the very worship of God itself into an
  attraction for people of the world, an
  entertainment, or amusement.

17
Issues we are facing today

• Some congregations among us
• Have 2 services 1 vocal, 1 instrumental
• Include hand clapping, praise teams, special
  musical presentations
• Have choirs, solos, quartets in worship
• See nothing wrong with making these changes in
  the worship

18
Conclusion

• Arguments made to justify the instrument are not
  valid and will not suppor their claim
• Biblical scholars (of all religious backgrounds)
  agree that the instrument should not be used in
  worship
• There was a major problem in the late 1800s.
• We are facing the same challenge again NOW!