In the adult Bible class Sunday morning, I mentioned that the NT scriptures pertaining to music in worship commanded the early church to sing. For instance, Paul urged the congregation at Ephesus to address “one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with all your heart” (Eph. 5:19). The Colossians received similar instructions. “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly,” Paul wrote, “as you teach and admonish one another in all wisdom, and as you sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs with thankfulness in your hearts to God” (Col. 3:16). Such passages gave the church no authority for adding instrumental music to public worship.

       After class someone asked me how I would respond to the idea that Paul’s references to the book of Psalms justify the use of instrumental music in church worship. This is an excellent question. The Psalms do indeed promote the use of instrumental music in OT worship. The last psalm, for example, invites worshipers at the temple to praise the Lord “with trumpet sound,” “with lyre and harp,” “with timbrel and dance,” “with strings and pipe,” “with sounding cymbals,” “with loud crashing cymbals” (Ps. 150:3-5). But does Paul expect the Ephesians and Colossians to indiscriminately use the book of Psalms in church worship?

       I don’t think so. Suppose that an unbeliever is making his first visit to the local church. He comes in, nervously takes a seat, and then hears the following words (cited directly from the Psalms) sent up to heaven in beautiful four-part harmony:

                  O Lord, fight against those who fight against me,
                  I hate them with perfect hatred,
                  I count them my enemies.

                  O God, break the teeth in their mouths,
                  Let them be like the snail which dissolves into slime,
                  Let death come upon them,
                  Let them go away in terror to their graves.

                  The righteous will rejoice when he sees the vengeance,
                  He will bathe his feet in the blood of the wicked.

       Since hymnals never include imprecatory psalms set to music, the unsuspecting visitor is safe from the shock of hearing such a song in the public worship of the church. Do Christians believe that logical explanations can justify the presence of imprecations in the Psalms? Yes, but they avoid singing anything that would appear to deny the meaning of the cross—the overflowing love of Christ for even his enemies.

       Church hymnals never include songs advocating animal sacrifice either. This is because “it is impossible that the blood of bulls and goats should take away sins” (Heb. 10:4). Jesus “has appeared once for all at the end of the age to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself” (9:26). And yet, the following words (again direct quotations from Psalms) could be set to music:

                  I will come into thy house with burnt offerings,
                  I will offer to thee burnt offerings of fatlings,
                  With the smoke of the sacrifice of rams;
                  I will make an offering of bulls and goats.

       While singing the psalmists’ imprecations in the assembly would reflect poor judgment, commending animal sacrifice in worship would be absolutely wrong. Promoting participation in the temple altar denies the central truth of the Gospel: Jesus, and Jesus alone, is our atonement. Christians “are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as an expiation by his blood” (Rom. 3:24-25).

       The instrumental music of OT worship actually belonged to the sacrificial system. When King David brought the ark of the covenant into Jerusalem, Israel celebrated with “loud music on harps and lyres” and “burnt offerings and peace offerings before God” (1 Chron. 15:28-16:1). The book of Psalms itself acknowledged that instrumental music accompanied animal sacrifice. “I will go to the altar of God, to God my exceeding joy,” the psalmist said, “and I will praise thee with the lyre, O God, my God” (Ps. 43:4).

       Did Paul urge the singing of “psalms” because every line of the inspired poetry was appropriate for the church? No. Was he commending the instrumental music that belonged to the temple’s elaborate sacrificial system? No. The only instrument to be plucked in the church is the human “heart” (Eph. 5:19). The apostle commended the use of the Psalms because the book was a rich resource of devotional material well suited for Christian worship.