Contents
Foreword
I. Setting the Scene
II. The Biblical Position
1. Psalm Singing Commanded
2. Textual Evidence
(i) Matthew 26:30; Mark 14:26
(ii) Acts 16:25; Hebrews 2:12
(iii) Ephesians 5:19; Colossians 3:16
(iv) James 5:13; Romans 15:9
(v) New Testament "Christian Hymns"
III. The Historical Position
1. Regulative Principle
2. Early Church
3. Reformation Church
4. English Puritans
5. Scottish Presbyterians
6. Revivals
IV. Sing the Lord's Song — Conclusions
Select Bibliography
Foreword
Worship is the highest activity in which a human being can engage. Specific acts of worship are essential parts of the glorifying and enjoying of God into which He introduces His chosen people by the redeeming work of His Son and the regenerating work of His Spirit. The "singing of psalms with grace in the heart" (Westminster Confession XXI.v) is a constituent part of the congregational worship of the Church.
What should be sung in praise of God is determined by God Himself. "The Word of God, which is contained in the scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, is the only rule to direct us how we may glorify and enjoy Him" (Shorter Catechism 2). The Biblical principle which requires specific Biblical authority for the doctrine, worship, discipline and government imposed on the Church is the best guarantee that the Church's practice will conform to the will of her Lord and only Head and is the surest means for preserving the purity and liberty of the Church.
The need has long been felt for a summary, produced within the Free Church, of Biblical teaching on the content of sung praise, which can be put in the hand of one enquiring into the reason for our position. In this booklet Rev. John Keddie, converted to exclusive psalmody while a member in a hymn-singing Church, approaches the subject from autobiographical, historical and Biblical angles. The most urgent question to the genuine enquirer is "What saith the Lord?" and the structure of this work is such that a reader who prefers to do so can begin with the Biblical position. There is also value, however, in the historical testimony of the Church to the Biblical position and in the personal testimony of someone converted to that position. The author has adopted his own approach to the subject. Others might present the arguments differently, but others have not presented anything and Mr. Keddie is to be commended for making this personal contribution towards confirming the Church in this aspect of her testimony to the sovereignty of God our Saviour in the life of His Church. At a time when others are recovering Biblical principles of praise it is well that we should hold them fast.
Hugh M. Cartwright
I. Setting The Scene
The singing of praise to the Lord has been prominent in the history of the Church from Old Testament times. Before even the specifications of the Tabernacle were revealed, there was an outpouring of inspired song to the Lord. The Exodus from Egypt drew out the Song of Moses (Exodus 15:1-18) and the Song of Miriam:
"Sing to the LORD,
For He has triumphed gloriously!
The horse and its rider
He has thrown into the sea!" (Exodus 15:21).
Through to the last book of the New Testament the redeemed of the Lord have a song to sing in His praise. Indeed, the song of the redeemed in glory is the song of Moses and the song of the Lamb (Revelation 15:3). In this way a link is forged between the first inspired song of Scripture and the last! It can readily be recognised that song has always played an important part in the life of the Church of the Living God.
Until relatively recently the inspired Psalms of Scripture enjoyed a position of prominence in the praises of the Church. These Songs of Zion in one form or another have encouraged, uplifted, instructed and inspired generations of Reformed Christians. The Reformation of the sixteenth century saw a renewal in congregational Psalm singing, restoring a practice which prevailed in the early Church. Subsequently, especially in Presbyterian Churches, Metrical Psalms were more or less exclusively used in services of public worship. Today the situation is very different. The Psalms of Scripture have been largely displaced in modern Church worship. Patterns of worship are changing with baffling rapidity. Songs and hymns entirely of man's devising and composition have proliferated. It appears that anything goes in today's worship, in which there is a constant desire for something new. Worship services and evangelistic programmes devote a significant amount of time to hymn and chorus singing. The Psalms of Holy Scripture seem to have been left well behind. Churches which have maintained Psalm singing are under pressure to change on the grounds that such praise today is regarded as a hindrance to people coming in to the Church. Perhaps such restriction of praise may even be considered by some to be not "real" worship.
In all this transformation in the area of public worship of God what men desire or demand is more discernible than any serious concern to have answers to such questions as: "What does the Lord really want of us?" "Isn't the Bible clear on this?" "Do we really have to rely upon what is 'modern', however that is to be measured, or by whomever that is to be determined?" To some degree it will be unavoidable that the style of a people's music will be moulded by cultural factors. But is that to be true of the content? Does the Lord Himself not stipulate the content? Should we not be asking if God has determined the content of His Church's praise? It is to such considerations that this little study is devoted. The basic thesis is that reformation is needed in this area of worship and that a return needs to be made both to a responsible and God-centred "regulative principle" of worship in general, and to the use in worship of materials of God's inspiration and appointment in particular.
The principal concern in this booklet is to establish and maintain that in the area of public worship there is warrant for the adoption and use only of materials of direct divine inspiration. By "materials of direct divine inspiration" is meant those writings which derive their content, thought, detail, truth and authority from the fact that they are the Word of God written, that is to say, part of the Holy Scripture, infallibly and inerrantly produced under the inspiration of the Spirit of God (cf. Hebrews 1:1; II Peter 1:21; II Timothy 3:16). In other words, presupposed in this study is a high doctrine of Scripture and of the canon of Holy Scripture, as expressed for example in the Westminster Confession of Faith, Chapter 1. By "uninspired" is meant all writings not part of the canon of Holy Scripture, however true to the Scriptures they may claim to be.
It is therefore our conviction that there is no warrant in Scripture for the use of uninspired human compositions in the singing of God's praise in public worship. In principle there can be no objection to the use of inspired songs found in Scripture outside the Psalter. Our concern is to use only what has divine sanction and approval. There is certainly sanction for the Book of Psalms. Such sanction is not clear in connection with other songs found in Scripture. These may have been intended for a more temporary or personal or national use, and in any case scarcely express truths not already found in the Psalms. However, it can be argued that their use does not violate the fundamental principle that only inspired songs should be used in the worship of God.
It is granted that even within the Reformed tradition Bible materials other than the 150 Psalms, such as Scripture Paraphrases, have been used occasionally in Psalm singing Churches. To this writer there are two main objections to the adoption of such materials. First of all, there is no clear warrant in Scripture for putting into verse for singing parts of the Bible not originally recorded in the form of song; and, secondly, it is rather presumptuous for any person or group of people to take upon themselves the responsibility for selecting passages to be adapted for singing. After all, if the Lord has not caused such passages to be expressed in the form of songs nor indicated which passages should be paraphrased for singing, by what authority do men take on this responsibility?
Perhaps at this point a personal comment would be in order. The writer was brought up in a mainstream Presbyterian hymn singing tradition. This might be called the "classical" hymn singing tradition. Little thought was given, as it happens, either to the content of the hymns or the principles, if any, behind their selection as materials for praise in the Church. Not that people didn't mean what they sang or that care was not taken in their selection. But the principle of hymn singing — of the use of uninspired materials for praise — was not questioned. It was just accepted, no questions asked. Good men must have agreed this. That was good enough for me, and no doubt also for most other people. However, when I came to realise that for the greater part the Churches of the Reformation used only the Psalms of Scripture, and likewise the English Puritans and Scottish Covenanters, not to speak of most nineteenth-century Presbyterians in Britain, in the Dominions and in the United States of America, I began to question my hitherto unthinking acceptance of modern hymnals. I began to ask: "Is there not, after all, at least a good argument for using only the God-breathed songs of Holy Scripture in the formal public praises of the Lord?" The discovery and study of some expositions of this position, mostly from the nineteenth century, did nothing to quell my new-found uncertainties on this question. Indeed, in the process of time I became convinced of the "regulative principle", that only what is sanctioned by God in His word is permissible and appropriate in the public worship of God. It was then a short step to the position adopted by almost all evangelical Christian Churches at some time in their past, that in the Psalms of Scripture there is a satisfactory and sufficient manual of praise even for the Christian Church.
As I became more familiar with the Psalms, I came to see their richness in spiritual experience; their perfect theological balance; the reality that Christ is in all the Psalms as He is in "all the Scriptures" (cf. Luke 24:44). The Psalms, I came to see, produced a particular type of piety — as, indeed, unavoidably, ancient or modern human hymn compositions also do — but in the case of the Psalms a piety thoroughly God-centred and experiential in an entirely balanced way, as one would expect from materials of divine inspiration. I was convinced. This is not to say that a Psalm singing Church is, consequently, a perfect Church. It is not to say that its performance of praise cannot be improved or, for that matter, that the translations of the Psalms sung should not be revised and modernised periodically. But at least it does mean this, that one can have perfect confidence, using only songs of divine revelation, that one is always singing in public worship songs of which the Lord wholly approves, something that cannot in point of fact be said of even the best of human compositions.
Go to the next installment:
Sing the Lord's Song: Part II