Thousand Oaks Baptist Church
Music in God’s Work
Introduction
Text: Ephesians 5:18-19
"...be filled with the Spirit; Speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord..."
The title of this article is Music in God's Work. This is a multipart article dealing with the place, nature, influence, and importance of good Christian music in our lives, in our families, and in our local church.
When I was somewhat younger, the pastor and people of a local church of which I was a member asked me to start a church choir. Back in those days, we usually tried to find out what it was that we were going to before we tried to do it – this is always a good plan. And so I decided to find out what the Bible says about music and singing, something I really hadn’t taken the time to do before.
The study was fruitful, and so when the choir had its organizational meeting, I took the opportunity to share with those good and patient folks the fruit of my labors. In other words, I'm afraid I bored them to tears with a message on music. Of course, all they wanted to do was to sing.
But then a strange thing happened. It seems my pastor was a member of that choir, and he asked me to share my message on music with the rest of the congregation on a Wednesday night. Well, I was happy to do it, because I love good Christian music and I also love to preach. But I was especially happy to preach this message, because music is a part of just about everybody's life, but very few people understand music for all that it is and all that it can do for us.
The message was well received by the congregation, but I noticed that the attention of my faithful and patient choir members had a tendency to wander somewhat. I think some of them may have dozed off for a while, too...! That's probably why they later asked me to put the message into print; those who liked it could read it again at their leisure, and those who didn't - well, they wouldn't have to. And that's where this study really began to take on some similarity to its present form.
Some of what I have written in this study can be easily documented in past and current literature on the subjects discussed. Much of the content of this study is simply Bible exposition, based on the literal, historical, grammatical interpretation of the appropriate passages from the Authorized King James Version of the Bible. The conclusions and value judgments regarding what I believe to be good or evil music are my own, arrived upon in the same manner that any careful and scholarly fundamental preacher of the Word of God would arrive at his conclusions in any Bible study or sermon.
And the reason this study has arrived in its present form is that some good Christian folks simply have seen a growing need to provide some objective guidance in the area of Christian music for new Christians and for new (and older) members of our fundamental Baptist churches.
That's ultimately how this little epistle came to be in your hands or on your computer’s monitor. I've tried very diligently to be Biblical, complete, clear, concise, and loving. Nonetheless, I realize that some folks may feel that I have not said enough. Others may take offense, because they like to listen to and perform the kinds of music that I have called evil. And since I cannot please everyone, I have just tried to seek the guidance of the Holy Spirit in the preparation and presentation of this study, just as any faithful preacher of the Word should do in his messages. My prayer now is that the Lord will use these efforts to bring blessing to God's people, guidance to earnest and sincere believers, repentance to willfully disobedient Christians, and conviction to unsaved sinners.
The outline of this article is very simple:
I. The Bible's commands and examples regarding the PLACE of music in the Old Testament.
II. The Bible's commands and examples regarding the PLACE of music in the New Testament.
III. The essential NATURE of music.
IV. The practical IMPORTANCE of good Christian music.
And then I’ll offer some final suggestions in the Conclusion.
Frank Garlock, a former minister of music at Southside Baptist Church in Greenville, South Carolina, and former chairman of the music theory department of Bob Jones University once said, "If you will tell me the kind of music you like to listen to, and the kind of music you like to perform, I will tell you what kind of person you are! ... Just as a hammer striking a bell reveals the bell's true tone that was there all the time, the music to which you respond shows the true tone of your life."
You see, we respond to the music to which we are tuned. If we were not in some way tuned to it, we would not sympathetically respond to it.
The composer Carl Maria von Weber said, "If a man would know me, let him find me in my music." Composer Robert Schuman wrote, "Music is to me the perfect expression of the soul."
And the Lord Jesus Christ said, "Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh" (Matthew 12:34). I am going to assume that He was referring to all that issues from our mouths through the use of our vocal chords, tongues, and lips, whether prose or poetry, monotonal or polyphonic. I am also going to assume that Jesus meant to include any form of recording those things that issue from our mouths, whether in printed words or other objective forms of communication (such as any type of musical notation), or present day audio or video analog or digital recordings. Whatever the method, the result is still just as Jesus said it: Whatever we say or sing from our hearts shows what is really in our hearts.
If the world's words and music are in our hearts, then we will have the world's problems, and we need to repent and let the Lord take out the world and put His words and music in our hearts. If the Lord's words and music are in our hearts, then the result will be peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. The purpose of this study is to help you discern the difference between the world's music and God's music, and to encourage you to choose the Lord's music.
Please click here to proceed to Chapter 1