Sister Sue lived across the street from Mr. Cherill Schmid, our preacher in Mount Olive, AL. I remember the church gathering at her house, sitting all around her living room, spilling into a couple of other sections of the house, kids cross-legged on the floor, adults on couches and easy chairs and fold-out chairs. The men took turns leading songs. As soon as we finished a song someone would shout out a new number and we would all turn to it. If it was a more difficult song (with higher notes or more intricate parts), a few men would chuckle, and everyone would glance around to see who was going to lead that one.
Cross-legged on the carpet, I learned to sing bass. I had no business singing bass at 13 years old, but I thought it was the coolest part because of Mr. Cherill’s booming, vibrating bass voice.
My dad was (and still is) a good song leader, and he sang tenor. As I matured, my voice trended towards the tenor side, so I mostly sing those upper notes now. Dad taught me how to lead songs. He gave me my first pitch pipe and taught me how to find the starting note (“every good boy does fine” for the lines and “FACE” for the spaces). He taught me how to beat time in 2/2, 4/4, 3/4, 6/8 and a few other time signatures by waving a pattern in the air with my right hand (always jump over the measure lines).
The churches of my youth always used song books with shape notes, designating a different shape for each note of an octave (do, re, mi, fa, sol, la, ti, do).
People who visit us today may find our acapella singing old-fashioned. Why do we still sing without instruments while every other church in the world (it seems) has gone instrumental? Why don’t we flow with the times? We have several reasons.
ONE: Our Tradition Is Beautiful
We absolutely love blending our voices together in four-part harmony. Granted, God did not tell us to sing in four-part harmony, but this is the way we have learned, and we enjoy the beauty of it.
“…be filled with the Spirit, addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart” (Ephesians 5.18b–19).
TWO: Our Tradition Is Simple
We do not have to pay anyone to play a piano or a guitar, let alone a full-fledged band. We don’t need to wait for the instrumentalists to arrive to get started. We can sing together at the drop of a hat anywhere and at any time. This is not to denigrate the instrumentalists—we also love the beauty of those gifted at playing—but it is to enjoy and elevate the simplicity of our vocal worship.
THREE: Our Tradition Is Unifying
Have you ever joined your voice with fifty others singing the same words to the same music? Concert-goers often experience something like this. You can watch videos of people swaying and singing along to their favorite performers, sometimes weeping together at the words of the songs. Music is powerful, and actually participating in the music is even more intimate and rewarding. But participating together brings it deeper. Your brother on your left and your sister to your right are just as joyful and agreeable as they boldly declare the same truths alongside you.
May the God of endurance and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. (Romans 15.5–6)
FOUR: Our Tradition Is Consistent with the Early Church
Most early Christians did not musical instruments in worship. In fact, many Christian leaders strongly urged against the use of musical instruments.
The Christian Church rejected instrumental music in worship for most of church history except in two periods: the dark ages of Roman Catholicism in the 14th to the early 16th centuries (with a few isolated instances prior to that), and again in the 19th century to the present. It is not an overstatement to say that the legacy of the Church is largely against musical instruments in corporate worship.[1]
This is not a Scriptural argument against the use of musical instruments, but it shows that many Christians have believed it is right to worship without instruments; conversely, they believe it is wrong to worship with instrumental accompaniment. Since the reformation of the 16th Century, many have taught the “regulative principle of worship,” which says we should do nothing in worship to God except what He explicitly authorizes through His word.
Can I Biblically Defend Acapella Worship?
I certainly understand the arguments, having heard them all my life and having myself taught them. The basic apologetic goes like this: we are under the New Covenant today, and God changed the form of worship under the New Covenant. This is obvious because we no longer worship at a temple (we are the temple); we no longer sacrifice animals (Jesus is our Passover lamb); we no longer have a priesthood (all Christians are now priests); etc. Therefore, it is said, we should only worship God as we see the Christians in the New Testament (under the New Covenant) worshiping Him. If we have no command or example of Christians worshiping a certain way, we should not presume that God would be pleased with that form of worship.
Those who teach and argue that way stand upon the “regulative principle of worship,” which says God must authorize every aspect of worship to Himself. I agree with this principle. However, the trick is always in the application.
Defenders of acapella singing as the only authorized form of musical worship the church should give to God hack apart their bibles to completely separate the Old Testament and the New Testament. They believe everything in the Old is over, and we are beholden today to nothing except what we find in the New. If you look at the Bible that way, you can make a solid case for acapella-only worship because the New Testament mentions singing several times but never instructs Christians to worship with any kind of musical instrument. The case is made from Ephesians 5.19 that God did specify an instrument—the human heart.
Can I Biblically Defend Instrumental Music in Worship?
If you see the great continuity from Genesis all the way to Revelation, that God’s foundational moral law and His character has never changed (including how He loves to be worshiped), then you will see the case for musical instruments in a wholly different light, even as you steadfastly retain the regulative principle of worship.
We see throughout the Old Testament that God accepted instrumental music in worship. In fact, many of the Psalms were to be sung with specific instruments. For example, Psalms 4, 6, and 54 begin with, “To the Choirmaster: with stringed instruments.” Many of the Psalms encourage the believer to worship with musical instruments. Here are a few representative samples:
Give thanks to the Lord with the lyre;
make melody to him with the harp of ten strings!Sing to him a new song;
Psalm 33.2–3
play skillfully on the strings, with loud shouts.
My heart is steadfast, O God, my heart is steadfast!
I will sing and make melody!Awake, my glory! Awake, O harp and lyre!
Psalm 57.7–8
I will awake the dawn!
I will also praise you with the harp
for your faithfulness, O my God;I will sing praises to you with the lyre,
Psalm 71.22
O Holy One of Israel.
It is good to give thanks to the Lord,
Psalm 92.1–4
to sing praises to your name, O Most High;
to declare your steadfast love in the morning,
and your faithfulness by night,
to the music of the lute and the harp,
to the melody of the lyre.
For you, O Lord, have made me glad by your work;
at the works of your hands I sing for joy.
When Paul instructed the Christians in Ephesians 5.19 and Colossians 3.16 specifically to sing Psalms to one another, he directs us to the entire psalmody, including those with musical instruments.
Final Thoughts
While I am perfectly happy worshiping acapella (for all the reasons listed above), I cannot be biblically dogmatic and teach that God hates instrumental music in worship. I can look at the “worship” in many hip-and-happening contemporary churches and be disgusted with how they have turned it into a production and a show, drowning out the voices of the people who have become an audience instead of active participants in praise and teaching one another in song.
My wife recently met someone who said she and her husband play instruments in a denominational church nearby. She asked if they were of that denomination, and she said she was not—they go to whatever church will pay them to play. Something precious has been lost!
If you are feeling disconnected from the musical worship in your assemblies, you should consider why. Perhaps you are passively watching and listening instead of joining with all the others to actively praise God with one voice. God doesn’t want His praise to stagnate inside your heart and your head. Praise Him with your mouth.
I will tell of your name to my brothers;
in the midst of the congregation I will praise you:You who fear the Lord, praise him!
All you offspring of Jacob, glorify him,
Psalm 22.22–23
and stand in awe of him, all you offspring of Israel!
Let us receive God’s awesome gift of joyful singing and return to Him the praise due Him.
[1] https://purelypresbyterian.com/2019/09/16/the-history-of-instrumental-music-in-the-church/