et the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord (Col. 3:16).
Is it necessary for Christians to limit their singing in public worship to nothing but psalms? Many sincere Christians maintain just this position; they hold to what is called exclusive psalmody. The reason for addressing the subject in this space that because we are running a psalm in each issue, it is possible that some have inferred what our position is in that particular debate. But rather than have it done by guesswork, it is best to state our position succinctly here, and then in our next issue we will return to our practice of publishing a psalm.
The passage of Colossians above obviously plays a central role in this debate. In the debate, particular emphasis is placed upon the phrase psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, with the discussion centering on whether this phrase was given in reference to the Psalms (150 -- no more, no less), or whether it had a broader reference, and could include the singing of uninspired songs.
Before turning to that question, it is important to notice what the passage says is the result of our singing. The apostle says that in the course of our singing we are teaching and admonishing one another. It is commonly assumed by many that the teaching ministry of the church is limited to the time during which someone occupies the pulpit. But this says the time of singing is also a very important time of teaching.
Therefore, the most basic questions to ask about singing in the church are these: Is it scriptural? Is it true? This is a question which cannot be answered apart from careful reference to all of the Word of God. Moreover, it cannot be accomplished in our singing unless all the songs are carefully anchored in some way to the Word. This was not done in the last century, and there can be no doubt there was a very serious revolt against biblical doctrine and teaching in music, led by hymn writers such as Fanny Crosby. Was this the result of uninspired hymns? Surprisingly to some, the answer is no. Rather, the problem was the singing of erroneous hymns -- hymns that taught falsehood, or which taught truth out of balance.
A parallel can be seen in preaching. Since the death of the apostles, all preaching has been uninspired preaching. But God, in His inspired Word, commands uninspired men to teach His Word. Lack of inspiration means that error can creep in. Because of the possibility of erroneous preaching, we need some sort of check to keep fleshly imaginations from creeping into the pulpit. We also need a check to keep man-centered sentimentalism from wandering into the hymnbook -- thus protecting us from the nuisance of having to come to the garden alone, while the dew is still on the roses.
Exclusive psalmodists are therefore greatly to be commended for calling the church back to songs which are anchored to the mind of God revealed in a portion of Scripture. If anyone questions the value of psalm-singing, I suggest that he try it. He will find himself singing truths he has never sung before in his life. This means that what he was singing before was clearly out of biblical balance.
But does Scripture require nothing but psalm-singing? No; at this point, unfortunately, exclusive psalmodists overstate the case.
1. The words found in our passage (psalmois, humnois, and odais) have in Scripture both a narrow usage (referring to songs in the book of Psalms) and a broad usage (referring both to uninspired songs and inspired songs outside the book of Psalms). Before restricting Paul's usage here to the book of Psalms, we need some sort of contextual reason for doing so. The words themselves do not require it.
2. The Old Testament does not require it. Hezekiah, upon recovering from his illness, writes a wonderful song which is not contained in Psalms. It is found in Isaiah 38, and concludes with this: The Lord was ready to save me; therefore we will sing my songs with stringed instruments all the days of our life, in the house of the Lord (Is. 38:20). Hezekiah refers to the singing of his songs (plural) in the house of the Lord. None of Hezekiah's songs were in Psalms, and all but one were outside of Scripture. Yet they were sung in the house of God.
3. Restricting ourselves to the book of Psalms would mean that we could not sing the new song that believers sing in the presence of God. They sang as it were a new song before the throne,. . . and no one could learn that song except the hundred and forty-four thousand who were redeemed from the earth (Rev. 14:3). Why should we Christians, who are the 144,000, be unable to sing the heavenly song we have learned?
4. The exclusive psalmodist has to make a case which can be used against his own practice. Psalms put to meter in English, in order to fit a modern tune, are, at best, a paraphrase of the psalms. The singing of the first seven verses of a psalm in four-part harmony is not what David did, and not what the Colossians did. Nevertheless, because such compositions are anchored to the text, they are far better than something composed by a rootless evangelical, wandering around in his emotions.
If the standard is psalming, all modern psalters that I have seen fail the test. But if the standard is expositorial and uninspired accuracy, they are wonderful.
If God grants reformation to our ailing church, it will be soon followed by an explosion of psalm-singing. But we fear that well-meaning friends of the Psalms who claim more for psalming than Scripture warrants may unintentionally hinder that day.
