Expert: John Fields - 9/17/2010

Question
QUESTION: I have read several of your post concerning instruments in
Church. I myself do not think there is anything wrong with
it. You say we should not do it because it does not state to
do it in the Bible. There are many things we do that we are
not told to do in the Bible. We drive cars but it does not
say to. Many things we do are not in the bible. So what
makes them ok? I think God gave us instruments to use. Many
people use instruments for secular music. Why would it not
be ok to use the instruments to praise God instead? It may
not say to do it, but I do not think God thinks it is wrong
when we are using it to praise him instead of playing the
instruments for secular reasons. Do you use a cell phone, a
computer, air conditioning in your house? God never told us
to use those things but we do to make us more comfortable in
our lives. Those things could be just as wrong as you saying  
instruments in Church is wrong.

ANSWER: Actually, you may have me confused with someone else since I have only addressed this once or twice that I can see or recall on this forum. Yet, I am happy to address it now.

The instrumental music issue to me is mostly a matter of the issues of precedent (biblical and historical) and love. Law enters in, but is lesser than the other two (in my opinion).

Let's look at precedent. Reputable scholars will readily admit that there is no precedent for instruments apart from the heart being used in singing to God scripturally or historically. That neither allows it or disallows it. But it DOES tell us some things.

Singing as a form of worship to God did not come from a vacuum. It did not suddenly appear as a new practice after never having been done before. We have plenty of precedent for singing with instruments having been done in Old Testament times with God's approval and sanction.

David played the harp to God. There are also many other places where instruments are used in union with worship. The angels also were shown to be using instruments in their worship. So it has been a very legitimate thing to worship God with instruments in times past. In addition to these other examples, God's Law spoke to it. It says in

2 Chronicles 29:25 He then stationed the Levites in the house of the LORD with cymbals, with harps and with lyres, according to the command of David and of Gad the king's seer, and of Nathan the prophet; for the command was from the LORD through His prophets.

We know THAT He allowed them at one point, but the question is why did He? One thing that we can appreciate about God is that He always made clear what He allowed or did not in the Old Testament. We did not have to guess. He did not ALLOW instrumental accompaniment in those days, He COMMANDED it. He commanded this along with with many other commands also. Examples are: God commanded to keep the Sabbath, to burn incense, to make sacrifices, and to have priests only from the tribe of Levi. This is by no means an all inclusive list.

ALL these things listed gave way to something that God knew to be better and truer. ALL of these things had this in common, they were ALL outward ways to observe God's laws. Yet, while they reflected outward appearance of obedience they told us nothing about the heart. Jesus dealt with this outward keeping of law in His time and took it deeper. For instance: under the law they were told not to commit murder or to commit adultery. There were MANY MORE who kept this outwardly than who did so in the heart where it mattered most. Jesus addressed this Himself in His day.

Matthew 5:21-22 (21) "You have heard that the ancients were told, 'YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT MURDER' and 'Whoever commits murder shall be liable to the court.' 22 "But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother shall be guilty before the court; and whoever says to his brother, 'You good-for-nothing,' shall be guilty before the supreme court; and whoever says, 'You fool,' shall be guilty enough to go into the fiery hell.

Matthew 5:28 but I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart

In the first passage Jesus showed that the man who treats his brother hatefully is ALREADY as guilty of murder BEFORE he kills as he is WHEN he kills. The apostle John concurs with this, pointing out (in 1 John 3:15) that whoever hates his brother IS a murderer (NOT is LIKE a murderer).

In the next verse, Jesus says that anyone who lusts in their heart is guilty of adultery.

The Old Testament is full of things just like these, outward displays that pointed to much more important spiritual things hidden from public view on the INSIDE of a person.

The Sabbath was a day in which men rested from working to rely on God. Rather than the outward display, the Sabbath was meant all along to point to the fact that we are not to be relying upon works salvation or in trying to earn their way to Heaven but to be relying upon God through His Son Jesus.

Hebrews 4:9-10 (9) So there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God. 10 For the one who has entered His rest has himself also rested from his works, as God did from His.

Incense burning represented the prayers of the saints.

Revelation 5:8 When He had taken the book, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each one holding a harp and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints.

The smoke from the ALWAYS burning incense showed our prayers were to be ALWAYS rising up to God.

1 Thessalonians 5:17 Pray without ceasing.

The sacrifices were not able to take away sins.  

Hebrews 10:4 For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.

But they did point to Jesus Christ, the one sacrifice which could.

Hebrews 10:8-10 (8) After saying above, "SACRIFICES AND OFFERINGS AND WHOLE BURNT OFFERINGS AND sacrifices FOR SIN YOU HAVE NOT DESIRED, NOR HAVE YOU TAKEN PLEASURE in them" (which are offered according to the Law), 9 then He said, "BEHOLD, I HAVE COME TO DO YOUR WILL." He takes away the first in order to establish the second. 10 By this will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

They were to have priests only from the tribe of Levi. This was a group of people called by a certain name, who were the only ones who could serve the people of God as go betweens to provide sacrifices for the people.

Deuteronomy 21:5 "Then the priests, the sons of Levi, shall come near, for the LORD your God has chosen them to serve Him and to bless in the name of the LORD; and every dispute and every assault shall be settled by them.

Now Christians are called by Jesus' name (CHRISTian) and have become priests who can approach God directly and personally through Jesus.

Revelation 1:5-6 (5) and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth To Him who loves us and released us from our sins by His blood 6 and He has made us to be a kingdom, priests to His God and Father--to Him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen.

If you notice, in the scripture above in which instruments were commanded, the strings of these instruments were plucked. Does this have a counterpart in the New Testament like ALL the others do?

Ephesians 5:19 speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody with your heart to the Lord;

Literally translated from the Greek it says, "Sing and pluck the strings of the heart." God is MUCH more interested with the beauty of the worship inside a person as a song inside the heart than He is with any of the outward sound or noise. Yet God was not "ALLOWING" instruments to be played in New Testament times any more than He was "ALLOWING" them in the Old Testament. What He wanted He commanded. What He commanded in singing was being commanded to be done by all. It was NOT an optional plucking of strings. Not all can play a literal instrument but ALL can play the heart strings whether they can sing very well or not. Only one form of plucking can be done by every person assembling and bring beauty and unity rather than chaos. That is the plucking of the strings of the heart.  

Since God has established that He has taught us in these ways and moves from an emphasis of what is on the outside to a preference of what is on the inside, on what basis would we ignore this evidence?

Similarly, we can see a change in practice in all of these things in the church of Jesus when it was first formed. There is no evidence that the early church kept a commanded Sabbath, instead they met on  Sunday. They no longer burned incense, or made sacrifices, and they did not have priests but instead were all the priests.

When Christ came He took away the false, and merely outwardly observed or expressed religion and replaced it with the heart that is seeking to do God's will.

Jesus said that the whole law and the prophets were fulfilled in the saying you shall love God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength and you shall love your neighbor as yourself.

Matthew 22:37-40 (37) And He said to him, " 'YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND.' 38 "This is the great and foremost commandment. 39 "The second is like it, 'YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.' 40 "On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets."

In love, we will seek for WHATEVER we do in word or deed to be done in the name of the Lord. We will want to see what His will is in every matter not as a matter of personal salvation or desire but as a matter of our personal love towards God. If we know His will on a matter, would we possibly or purposefully ignore His will and go it alone in anything? This would be inconceivable if we truly love Him. Jesus said if you love me you will keep my commandments.

So now we ask the important question. Can it be accidental or coincidental that when instruments had been continually used in the temple worship as formerly commanded that their use would suddenly stop with Christian worship and practice? There was a firm command and much precedent for their use. Using instruments in worship would have been very natural and comfortable for these early Christians. Yet, they did NOT use them. Why? It CANNOT be a thing of chance.

Jesus told the apostles to wait in Jerusalem until the Holy Spirit, that which was promised, had come.

Acts 1:4-5 (4) Gathering them together, He commanded them not to leave Jerusalem, but to wait for what the Father had promised, "Which," He said, "you heard of from Me; 5 for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now."

Jesus had previously told His apostles that whatever they allowed or disallowed would have Heaven's sanction and approval.

Matthew 18:18 "Truly I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven.

Jesus also said that they did not have all the truth yet but that they would have ALL the truth when the Holy Spirit came to them.

John 16:13 "But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come.

So what we see from this is that the apostles had been given ALL the truth from God via the Holy Spirit. It stands to reason that whatever form of doctrine the early church observed had Heavenly approval and sanction. It makes no sense to suppose that the apostles would not have addressed and taught on something as important as singing in worship to God. So we are safe in believing that since the apostles would surely not have left this important issue unaddressed that whatever the practice of the early church was stood as an accurate reflection of their obedience to the apostles' teaching.

There is no recorded history to indicate the use of instruments prior to the late 7th century AD. And when they were introduced by Pope Vitalian the recorded response was one of outrage. For an interesting collection of quotes from early church leaders you may follow this link: http://www.bible.ca/H-music.htm Since the early practice of the church in no way indicated the presence of instrumental accompaniment, which we remember had previously been commanded, it must have been by command that the earlier practice had been discontinued. Had they stopped using the instruments without being directed to they would have been disobedient to the previously given command.

God, directed His apostles and the apostles directed the church in the way God had directed them. The church carried on with the practices that had been allowed or disallowed by apostolic authority, heart directed and accompanied singing being one of those practices.

Since the Bible and early church history clearly shows no evidence of non-instrumentally accompanied singing, God has indicated His wishes.

Scripture is inspired but my logic is not. I cannot bind any of this on others. But in presenting this in love, I hope you will see that God's wish is that we continue in submission to the previously delivered and administered truth. Whatever we do MUST be done in love based upon what we HONESTLY feel the scriptures ALONE direct. If we place our own preference above God's, we will not be walking in the loving way He desires. Whatever we do we must be FULLY convinced that it is done according to loving obedience, NOT done in selfish desire to keep someone's version of the status quo.


---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: You still did not answer my whole question. If you believe
that God does not want us to use instruments in Church
because he did not say to. Then why do we still do many
other things that we are not told to do? Like I said in the
other message. We drive cars, use computers, cell phones,
etc. but we are not told to.

ANSWER: You obviously have some concern over whether you can or can't or I assume you would not have questioned me concerning this matter. The Bible won't stop anyone from doing what they want to do if they are going to ignore or disapprove what it says about certain pet issues of theirs. There is good and there is better. Even IF using a piano with singing in worship was shown to be allowed (which it is not) using the heart is still better. God has shown He wants us to do what's best out of our love for Him. A person who uses instruments does so without certainty that what they are doing is allowed. Using the heart as the instrument in our singing without additional instruments is commanded and okay to do with no doubts. I KNOW that singing Acappella is approved by God because that is what the early church did under His direct oversight. Also, when He specifically commanded what to use, the heart, He eliminated the other choices. He was telling us what He wanted.

Many, many people including Martin Luther, John Calvin, John Wesley and a plethora of others spoke against the uses of instrumental music in the worship of the assembled saints. That neither makes it right nor wrong. But I think it interesting that many will appeal to these same men as authorities on issues they agree with them on, such as salvation by faith alone, but then go on to ignore them when they are against something they are for, such as instrumental music. If their brilliance is acknowledged and appealed to in one area of agreement, why is it ignored in an area of disagreement. It is easy to agree with someone who agrees with you and will back up a preexisting doctrinal belief. It is much harder to honestly admit an error and learn from it and go on.

If using the ultimate authority, God's Word, to justify our actions then when our actions are not justified we must change them. Otherwise we are just fair weather followers, in when the Bible backs us up and out when it doesn't.

Now concerning the things you said I left unaddressed. Here is what you attributed to me: "You believe that God does not want us to use instruments in Church because he did not say to." To the contrary, God did command the use of an instrument. He commanded that we sing AND make melody with our heart. The making melody is the part that I mentioned is literally translated "plucking the strings of the heart."

As to cars, computers, cell phones, medical care, brushing our teeth, getting out of bed, taking a shower and others God has not addressed them so He leaves that up to us. That is a mighty long list if you want to make it exhaustive.

God has addressed singing, so instruments in singing HAVE BEEN addressed it is not an issue that He is silent on. We must be baptized, pray, study, be pure sexually, love God, love our brothers, love our enemies, have pure speech, be kind, be hospitable, and many other things. God has the right and loves us enough to tell us what to do on the things that matter to Him. When He has clearly told us what to do this overrides what we want to do. If we are His children we will follow where He directs to the best of our ability.

When God does not address an issue by command, precedent or by alluding to it in some other way He allows us to make our own choices. So drive, talk on your cell phone, type at your computer and the other things you named with His blessing.

I'm not the one you have to please or agree with, God is. If you want to KNOW you have His blessing in your singing, use the instrument that He commanded us to use as you sing, your heart.

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: You are very wrong about people when you say they don't use
their heart when they play instruments for God. I know plenty
of people that would not be playing an instrument if it wasn't
for God. So you are wrong there.  

Answer
Sir, this is not a debate forum, you asked me my views and I gave them. And it really does not help any of us get closer to truth if we are not careful to properly address what each other's views are.

You tell me I am very wrong for saying people don't use their heart when they play instruments for God. Had I said that I would have been wrong. But I NEVER said that. I said there is good and there is better. Look again and you'll see I said that. I also said that given the choice between something that is good and something that is better that we should give God what is better.

In your first contact here is part of what you said:

"It may not say to do it, but I do not think God thinks it is wrong
when we are using it to praise him."

That's the whole issue in a nutshell. He did not say to use man made instruments in worship to Him but he DID say to use a God made instrument in worship to Him. I believe that this shows His preference is the heart alone. If He had not said that we should do it and said nothing on the matter at all we would be free to approach Him in song in whichever way we wanted. But we can't say that can we? God says to use the heart with our singing. So God told us to use the heart AS instrument not the heart WITH instruments.

Don't mind me. You don't have to please me, you have to please God. As for me I purposefully try to sing without other instruments involved other than my heart. It is MY offering to God and I feel I have permission based upon God's Word to do it this way. Given that it is in in love and with reference to His Word I KNOW it is acceptable. For me to do differently would go against my convictions of what I believe God's Word to be leading me to do. You asked me what I thought and I told you what I believe and why I believe it. I naturally think this is a better way to do it than with other instruments or I would be doing it the other way. Never did I accuse or condemn in the process. You asked, I answered. God is judge and ONLY loving Him by doing our best according to His Word matters here.

I've no doubt at all that the worship of many people with instruments is heartfelt and is sincerely given. I NEVER said otherwise. But heartfelt things CAN be wrong. If scripture ever leads us to do one thing and we choose to do a different thing are we doing it for God?

Jeremiah 17:9 “ The heart is deceitful above all things, And desperately wicked; Who can know it?

The heart is not nearly as good a guide as God alone. If you remain unconvinced, by what has been presented that is a matter for you and God. God bless you and may He see His plans fulfilled in your life.