God has commanded the church to be a singing family, but she is not left alone to figure out how to do it. The Bible teaches us how to sing together as a congregation. In this message Scott Brown seeks to explain what the Bible says about congregational singing. 

God has set His people aside to sing, as David said, “sing the glory of His name; make His praise glorious.” Ps 66:2. Congregational singing ushers every true believer to the battle lines for the defense of the true church. This is why the Bible makes singing a sacred event. 

When we gather to sing we are declaring what kind of people we want to be, what kind of God we worship, what kind of messages we want to proclaim to one another, what kind of gospel we are proclaiming to the lost among us, and even what kind of family and church we are becoming. Isaac Watts described one element of this in his hymn, Jesus Shall Reign, 

“People and realms from every tongue Dwell on His love with sweetest song And infant voices shall proclaim Their early blessings of His name" Isaac Watts, 1719 

This message covers the following four matters to bring us up in the training and admonition of the Lord regarding congregational singing, 

1. The church is a singing family, Psalm 66:2 
2. The Bible teaches us how to sing, Eph. 5:17-19; Col. 3:16 
3. Handling matters of discernment and differences, John 4:24 
4. God teaches us to pursue beauty, Psalm 33

Well Abraham, you couldn't have chosen a better passage of Scripture than Isaiah 12 to introduce this time together on the whole doctrine of singing. Our objective is to bring one another up in the training and the admonition of the Lord, and particularly to speak about our singing together. That's the focus of this. I'd like to bring what the Bible teaches about singing, because we do need to be taught as a congregation. God actually has set His people aside for many things, but one of those things is to sing.

And that's why David said in Psalm 66 verse 2, Sing the glory of His name, Make His praise glorious. This is one of the great occupations that God has called His people to do, to have times, many, many times of doing that very thing. And you know, congregational Singing is a sacred event. Maybe you've known people who've maybe decided they weren't going to show up at church until the preaching starts. That's actually really wrong thinking, because singing is a sacred, God-commanded, God-ordained thing for the Church.

It's holy and it's pivotal. Now, when we gather to sing, we're declaring what kind of people we are and what kind of people we want to be and what kind of God we worship, and what kind of messages we want to proclaim to one another, and what kind of gospel we're proclaiming, and even what kind of family we are, what kind of church we are. Every time we sing, we're representing all those things. And I think, you know, singing is one of the battle lines for the defense of the true church. Luther believed that.

He believed that singing was battling against the devil. He believed that you should just keep throwing arrows of songs to the devil to belittle him. And you know we sang this morning Jesus Shall Rain, which was written by Isaac Watts in 1719, and these words are so precious to me. Whenever we sing them, I just want to hang on them. People in realms from every tongue dwell on his love with sweetest song, and infant voices shall proclaim their early blessings in His name.

The sound of singing is so precious to me. I'm especially affectionate to the sound of children singing. It's one thing I love about our church, the children sing with us. We're not putting them off somewhere else to do that by themselves. When we sing, we are, as Peter said, we are as living stones being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.

And you know, singing is very powerful. It's powerful to the heart. It's powerful to the Church. It's powerful to the family. And it's also powerful to the community because it not only affects us here and transforms our hearts, not only it refocuses families and churches, but it also has an effect in the world as we work.

Do you ever catch yourself singing the great songs of the faith while you're working? It affects your work. Singing is designed to affect everything in your life. So I have an outline that I'd like to share with you. There are four points that I want to try to make here during our time.

And the first point is that the Church is a singing family. And Psalm 66, verse 2 helps us think about that. Secondly, the Bible teaches us how to sing. And I'm going to bring two pivotal passages of Scripture along with lots of others to give you a sense of the contours of what the Bible says about singing. Singing in the Bible, You can almost picture it like a great piano where the keys, there are all kinds of keys stretched out.

They're the high notes and the low notes. The Bible presents singing like that. There are many, many purposes and qualities of singing. And then thirdly, I'd like to speak about handling matters of discernment and differences briefly from John 4 24 and then number four How God teaches us to pursue beauty Through our singing so that's the basic outline. Let's start with the first.

The church is a singing family. The church is a family and it is a singing family. The sound of our voices teaches many things. I've begun to think, you know, in the last few years that the sound of the singing church is the sweetest sound in the whole world to me. I love the singing voices.

But here's what singing does. Number one, it teaches truth. Number two, it's a means of unity. Number three, It puts us in a disposition of praise. 4.

It casts us into a sea of hope. 5. It helps us deal with our hurts and our cares. And then finally, God speaks to His people tenderly when they sing. And I'll get to that a little bit later, how it is that God has commanded us to speak tenderly and truthfully toward one another as we sing.

There's this idea that you know when you're singing that you're singing to an audience of one the Bible doesn't teach that. The Bible teaches that there's a big audience when we sing, and one of the categories of that audience is us, one another, as we sing to one another. And there is God, of course, in the midst of that. I think I just want to mention something that you most of you can relate with the songs and the hymns and the spiritual songs Of the church often become markers in your life You're going through something and there's a song and that song carries you through that time. It's happened to me many times and there's such a blessing to sing the songs heartfully and thoughtfully because they are they really are designed to carry you through the various seasons in your life.

All you have to do to prove that is to go to the Psalms and see how David wrote songs in order to carry him through the trials and tribulations that he had. One of the things about singing, one of the things about being a singing family, which is so good for us, is that it teaches us that we're not alone in this world, And we're with one another in unison singing. But also the Bible says that Jesus is also there. He's walking among the lampstands of the church. And in Hebrews chapter 2 verses 10 through 13 there's something even more astonishing, and that is that it says that Jesus is singing with His church.

And as He is bringing many sons to glory, He's standing in the congregation. That passage says he's not ashamed to call us brethren. He's not ashamed to call us brethren as he's in the midst of the congregation while we're singing. And, of course, he recognizes our imperfections, but he's singing praises to God in the midst of the assembly, and he's declaring the goodness of God to us, his brethren. And I would just encourage you to read that passage of scripture, Hebrews chapter 2, verses 10 through 13.

Here's what he says. I will declare your name to my brethren in the midst of the assembly. I will sing praise to you. And again, I will put my trust in him and again here I am and the children whom God has given me Jesus Christ When we sing is in the midst of the congregation and he says here I am Here I am in the midst of the children that you gave me. What a blessing it is to sing.

The church is a singing family. The second point is that the Bible teaches us how to sing. You know, The disciples said, Lord, teach us to pray. It's appropriate for us to say, Lord, teach us to sing, because the Bible does have much to say about it. And God is good.

He doesn't leave us on our own to create our own ways. And the instructions that He gives us create a happy church and a unified church. And they tell us what kind of church we should be, what kind of church members we ought to be, and what kind of singers we want to be. This is why the beginning of singing is a command. There are over 50 direct commands in scripture to sing and over 400 references in the Bible to sing.

We are commanded to praise God with one another. And as God has designed His Church, He prioritizes public corporate gatherings of His Church. He wants His people to gather and sing. And so He commands them, Psalm 96 verses 1-3 speak of it, Oh, sing to the Lord a new song, sing to the Lord all the earth, sing to the Lord, bless His name, proclaim the good news of His salvation from day to day, declare his glory among the nations, his wonders among all peoples. And there is the Lord Jesus Christ with us, with the ones that God has given him in this world.

You find reports of the singing church in extra-ribical literature, Pliny reports on the singing that he observed in the church. He said it like this, they're in the habit of meeting before dawn on a stated day and sing alternately a hymn to Christ as to a God, and that they bound themselves by oath that they should abstain from theft and robbery and adultery." But he's speaking about this fact that the church gathered together early in the morning to sing and they would sing alternatively. You know, Duane has led us in this from time to time where he would have one side sing to another like that, but that's what Pliny observed. So the third point I want to make here is that the Bible... No, no, I'm sorry, I just jumped.

We're still on the Bible teaches us how to sing, the second point. Now, The very first song in the Bible is a song of rescue, and it's in Exodus 14, 30-15, 19. And the heart of this song of Moses is, the Lord is my strength and my song. He has become my salvation. We learn in Genesis 15 that we will also sing this very song of Moses and the song of the Lamb at the end of the age.

This song of Moses, the first song in the Bible other than the songs of the stars and the heavens, is a song of victory and salvation. In Numbers 21 verses 16 through 18 there's the Song of the Well, where God provided water just before they were attacked by King Sihon, the king of the Amorites. And remember what that song, one of the lyrics in the song was, Spring up, oh well. Then there's the song of Moses in Deuteronomy 32. Moses in the last month of his life, probably in the last few days of his life, God commanded him to write a song.

He wrote the song and taught it to Israel right away. And he penned this song. In Psalm 92, there's a song for the Sabbath day. In Joshua chapter 10, there's a song when the sun stood still. In the book of Judges, there's a song of deliverance when the children of Israel were delivered after 20 years of oppression by the Canaanites.

That's the song of Deborah. There is the song of Hannah when the Lord spoke to her in 1 Samuel 2 verses 1 through 10. There's the Song of Solomon. There's Isaiah 9 and Isaiah 26, the Song of the Messiah and His captives who are set free. There is the Song of Joy at the return of the Ark in 1 Chronicles 15 where these words, give thanks to the Lord, for His love endures forever.

There's the song of restoration of what was lost in Ezra 3, verses 10 through 13. The foundation of the temple was laid after 70 years of captivity and they sang. There is the song when you're sent out by the Lord to declare His mercy in the world where the mountains and the Hills break forth into singing in Isaiah chapter 55. There's the song that when you're with the Saints in Psalm 100 where you read these words, Make a joyful shout to the Lord all you lands, serve the Lord with gladness, come before his presence with singing, enter into his gates with thanksgiving." David talked about singing his whole life long. In Psalm 104, He said, I will sing to the Lord as long as I live.

There's singing when you're in a horrible pit in Psalm 40. David says it like this, I waited patiently for the Lord. He inclined to me and heard my cry. He brought me up out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my steps. He has put a new song in my mouth.

Praise to our God." singing is worth more than counseling sessions, it's worth more than money, it's worth more than friends. Singing is worth more than books, and it's the very best antidote to your pride, it's the very best antidote to sin and hurt feelings. Singing is a blessing. And there's so many places we could go. One of my favorites, one of my favorite singing is the song of the prisoners in Acts chapter 16.

You can sing anywhere in any conditions. Paul and Silas are in the Philippian jail, and they sing. And then there's the song that James talks about when you're full of joy in James 5, verse 13. Is anyone cheerful? Let him sing psalms.

And then you have songs of deliverance like the song of Moses and the song of the Lamb in Revelation chapter 15. We read this, they sang the song of Moses the servant of God and the song of the Lamb sang Great and marvelous are your works, Lord God Almighty. Just and true are your ways, O King of the saints. Who would not fear you, O Lord, and glorify your name? For you alone are holy." And the song goes on.

There are songs to be sung in the Bible that speak of proclaiming the promises of God to unbelievers. In Romans chapter 15 verse 9, we learn that actually the Gentiles will sing because they've heard the good news and they will sing. Maybe you can remember when you were first converted and you didn't sing, and then when you were brought into the church and you did. Do you remember that? It was kind of odd, wasn't it?

You know, and now it's just second nature, and it's a beautiful thing. In Romans 12 we read this, For I will confess you among the Gentiles, and sing to your name. When we sing in this church, we are confessing the name of Jesus to the Gentiles that are among us. We should lift up our voices so heartfully to sing with all of our hearts to the Gentiles that are among us. We shouldn't let one note be lost.

Let it rip, brothers and sisters. Sing to the Gentiles. Let them see that his praise is glorious, that he is such a healing salve to every soul that's without him. Sing, brothers and sisters. You know, it's one thing for a song leader to stand up and say, now let me really hear it, forget that.

Let it come from your heart, let it come because you love your fellow believers and the unbelievers that are among you. Sing for the Gentiles when you come together and sing. It's such a beautiful thing. There's the song, In Your Darkest Hour, in Matthew 26, verse 30. Jesus, in the garden of Gethsemane, after the Lord's Supper, took the cup and gave thanks, and instituted the Lord's Supper.

And then in verse 30, in Matthew 26, we read this, and when they had sung a hymn they went out to the Mount of Olives to the most agonizing moment in the earthly life of Jesus Christ they sang together as brothers and you can sing in your darkest hour. You know the Lord Jesus Christ cried out, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Sing in your darkest hour. Sometimes when people hit their darkest hour, they stay away from the singing and the preaching. It's the biggest mistake they make.

Come and sing. Sing in the hardest time of your life and let the songs carry you. So, all this to say, singing teaches you, it corrects you, it comforts you, it mobilizes you, it sustains you your whole life long through the ups and downs of your life, through every season of your life, through the happy times, through the sad times, God gives a singing church to help her people through all of those different kinds of times. I'm so thankful for that. Time would fail me to tell you of some of the songs that have carried me through over the years in times of miscarriages, times of reversals in business, times of troubles in church.

God carries his people through singing. There are two pivotal instructions in the New Testament that teach the New Testament Church how to sing. I do believe that the things in the Old Testament are critical, they're helpful for us, they are principial, they are shadows, and they also give us a general equity of how we ought to gather together and sing. You know, the ceremonial law has been abolished, but the ceremonial law still has something to teach us principally about how we ought to sing. But the New Testament brings us to tremendous clarity on exactly what this singing thing is all about.

And the first is Ephesians 5, 17 through 19, and the Apostle Paul in Ephesians 5 begins a discussion of what it looks like to be filled with the Holy Spirit and he says he says therefore do not be unwise but but wise and understand what the will of the Lord is and do not be drunk with wine, which is a dissipation, but be filled with the Holy Spirit. So this category of filling with the Holy Spirit is then by the Apostle Paul explained. And the very first thing that he speaks about is the speaking, the use of our voices with one another in the Church. That's the very first manifestation of the Holy Spirit. And speaking to one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, and I take the majority view on this, that those are different kinds of songs.

Some are theological songs that exalt Jesus Christ. Some are actual hymns out of the Psalter, out of the Book of Psalms. And there are various kinds of songs, Psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord, giving thanks always for all things to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, submitting to one another in the fear of God." So there's this picture of speaking to one another and singing to one another and making melody in our hearts. There's melody in our hearts and we verbalize it in our singing. The second passage is Colossians 3 16.

It's very much like Ephesians 5. And he's speaking here in Colossians 3 16 of the elect of God who are holy and beloved that's verse 12 in Colossians 3 and he he urges them to put on tender mercies and humility and meekness and longsuffering, bearing with one another. And then he gives instruction about singing. And the foundation for their singing is the word of Christ. Let the word of Christ dwell richly within you.

In all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another, how? In psalms and hymns and spiritual songs singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. So we learn here that singing is admonishing one another. It's teaching one another. Those two things.

We are teaching one another, we're admonishing one another when we sing. We're not just singing to an audience of one. This isn't just exclusively about you or about me. It's about us. It does include us personally.

But the foundation of our singing is the wisdom of God that's derived from the reading and the meditating on the Word of God. This is the foundation for all of our singing, meaning all of our songs must be tied to the express statements that are in the Word of God, whether they are theological, maybe not even exactly using every biblical word, but they're theological, they speak of the glory of Jesus Christ and the power and the goodness of God, or they are actual quotes from scripture as in the Psalms or any others. And so he says, let the word of Christ. So This is a corporate gathering to the saints in Colossae, and he's speaking there, and he's wanting to shape the way that we sing. First of all, the word let.

In the Greek language, the word really indicates that the word of Christ must dwell richly. Let it. In other words, it must. It must dwell richly for the singing to be right. And then it's the word of Christ.

This is the entire testimony of the Word of God. God spoke in time passed through the prophets. Every word of the Old Testament is a word of Jesus Christ, and we think his thoughts after him, so our singing should reflect the words of Jesus Christ. And we sing the word of God. Now you might recognize that a minority of the songs that we sing are the exact words of the Bible.

Now we sing many that are. Those actually are probably some of my favorite ones that we sing. Duane's written a couple of them for us and I just love singing them. And in his songs he just cleaves to the Word of God in that. But we sing the Word of God.

The Psalter contains paraphrases, hymns are poetic representations of doctrine, that's good. We don't have to sing just the exact words of Scripture. We don't, and it's a blessing to sing the doctrines of the faith. And then notice the word dwell. Let the word of Christ dwell.

He's talking about inhabiting the house, governing the house. That it's sound doctrine and theology inhabiting the house. Mark Jones speaks of it this way. He says, him singing is no different than confessing the Apostles Creed or the Nicene Creed. They are essentially the same thing.

We're able to look at truth that has stood the test of time and confess it before God. We are not confessing in our singing the words of man but the truth of God. And he says, singing holy, holy, holy provides the church with an excellent tool to convey, state, defend, and enjoy the truth of God's word in a manner that even preaching and praying cannot. And then he says that the Word of God should dwell richly. So in the singing we saturate our hearts and our minds with the Word of God.

And what this means is that the Quality of our worship is a direct result of the richness or the poverty of the word of God in our hearts. Often our worship is dead because our hearts are empty. They're empty of the word of God and we're not ready. The Puritans talked about kindling the fire, warming up the fire of your heart on Saturday night so that you were ready with coals, which all they need is just a little bit of breath to ignite them into flame. So the focus of our singing is to God and to one another.

And so to sing is to teach and admonish one another. Teaching, it's the word didasko, and it has to do with reminding one another. Our souls need correction. Singing is meant to correct us, and our thinking and our feelings need to be modified. And then admonishing, Admonishing one another.

This is one of the one-anothers in the Bible. Admonishing. It's the word nuthateo where we get our term, nuthatic counseling. The biblical counseling movement picked up this term, Nuthatic Counseling, and coined that term from this word, and it means to advise, to warn of some danger, to correct one another. It's actually an action that seeks to move a person from one position to another.

That's what admonishing is. When we sing, we're admonishing one another to start going in the same direction. This mind is straying off there. That heart is broken over there. There's worldliness over there in that heart, and we're trying to bring everybody, we're trying to admonish one another to nathatically counsel one another in our singing because our hearts need redirection.

But it's more than that, singing is also praying to God, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. We're singing with a gracious, open-heartedness toward the Lord and toward one another. Now the letting of the Word of Christ dwelling richly within you is the greatest preparation for singing, so that we're really prepared to preach the Word of God to one another. Now you know I marked out a number of songs, just to give you the contours. Some of our songs are heavier on proclamation of doctrine about God, and some are heavier on the personal matter.

My view is that we need both in the church. We live in an environment right now where everybody's so interested in their own personal condition and not so much the condition of one another. So lots and lots of songs are very personal that are sung in most churches today. I think we would like to have a mix. We sang a song this morning, Ferris Lord Jesus, which I take most of it to be personal.

Ferris Lord Jesus, ruler of all nature, O thou of God and man the Son." That's like singing to one another. And then, thee will I cherish, thee will I honor, thou my soul's glory, joy, and crown. Starts out with theological instruction toward one another, and then it moves to the person of the heart. And it's possible that it stays that way, because the personal, This person is speaking of how fair the meadows are, how fair is the sunshine, beautiful Savior, Lord of the nations. When I read this song I feel like I could sing it both ways.

I could sing it in my own heart and I could also sing it to one another in that way. You know, his robes for mine, that's theological. It goes back and forth. But there are various, some songs are exclusively proclamation and doctrine-oriented and some are more personal. We should sing both kinds.

I would just encourage you as you're singing to recognize what you're doing. Who are you singing to? Are you singing to yourself or are you singing to the church? Because you do both in that. But be conscious, recognize what you're doing and be thoughtful about it and be very intentional in your heart to sing to your brother, his name is wonderful, right?

Or, you know, my joy, my crown. Either way, sing those. The Bible makes it very clear that singing can be lifeless. You know, this people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. There are many ways that singing can be dead.

I wanted to make some just really quick comments about handling matters of discernment and differences regarding music. Singing and music has always been a controversial matter in the church. Paul Westermeyer talked about singing in church history, and here's how he says it. Luther recovered it, Zwingli denied it, Calvin restricted it. That's kind of the history of the Reformation music, and it's controversial.

It's going to be controversial, and it's just, it's so critical that we find ourselves in the heart of the matter of worship that's communicated in John 4.24, that those worshippers worship Him in spirit and in truth. That's the heart of the matter. There are many debatable matters outside of that, but at least those two things should be the things that we prioritize when we think about our interacting with God and with one another in spirit and in truth. Now one of the most helpful things I think about singing is that it unifies the generations. The church is visibly unified when it's singing together.

The generations are there. The devil, I believe, would like the generations singing different songs. God brings His people together to sing one song. It's good for the younger generation and it's good for the older generation to come and sing one song together. It declares their unity with one another.

We live in a generation right now where youth is worshiped to such a degree that everybody has their own songs. But the Church is one body, and we need to protect the unity of the body of Christ by bringing one another together to appreciate the same songs. You'll notice we sing songs that are, some are new and some are old. It's right to sing the historic songs of the church. It's right to bring young people to appreciate the doctrine and the help that exists in older songs.

We're committed to doing that. You've seen that. We've sung, even this morning, some very old songs, and we sang at least one very new song. But we want to unite the generations with one heart and one soul along these matters. Let's talk about voices.

Our view is when the music overwhelms the words, it ceases to be helpful. So we want the sound of the voices to be the most prominent thing. Obviously, we think instruments are okay in worship, but we would never want in our singing, but we would never want an instrument to overwhelm the words of the song. There are matters of style. There are matters of change in music.

Musical styles change. By the way, musical styles didn't change very much until really until radio recently and then you know singing became so fragmented among the generations and among various personal preferences. There are lots of issues to speak about subjectivism, associating songs with with ungodly personalities or people who wrote beautiful songs then they fell away. Those are just difficult matters to deal with. But you know God has called his people to worship him in spirit and in truth.

Now the final point I want to make, the fourth point, is that God teaches us to pursue beauty. I'd like you to open your Bibles to Psalm 33. And I want to just close with this Psalm, which I think helps us to capture a lot of what we've already covered here. Psalm 33, verse 1. And I pray that God fulfills these things in our singing together.

That this kind of unity, this kind of joy, this kind of healing, this kind of proclamation takes place among us when we sing, and that we really carefully, intentionally sing to one another and call one another into the beauty of holiness. Rejoice in the Lord, O you righteous, for praise from the upright is beautiful. Praise the Lord with the harp, make melody to him with an instrument of ten strings. Sing to him a new song, play skillfully with a shout of joy, for the word of the Lord is right and all his work is done in truth. He loves righteousness and justice.

The earth is full of the goodness of the Lord. By the word of the Lord the heavens were made and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth." And then drop down to verse 17, "...a horse is a vain hope for safety, neither shall it deliver any by its great strength. Behold the eye of the Lord is on those who fear Him, on those who hope in His mercy, to deliver their soul from death and to keep them alive in famine. Our soul waits for the Lord. He is our help and our shield, for our heart shall rejoice in Him Because we have trusted in His holy name, let your mercy, O Lord, be upon us, just as we hope in You.

I pray that God fulfills that among us as we sing. Sing it out. Sing it with a whole heart. Sing it to one another. Sing it to the Gentiles, sing it to the Lord.

God is creating a singing family. What a blessing. Let's pray. Lord, we thank you that you have made us a singing family and that you call your church to be unified around things that are true and good and that your word would be the heart of it all, your beautiful, perfect word, which converts the soul and makes wise the simple. We thank you that all of your statutes are right and they all rejoice the heart and let our praises to you be founded upon these things.

Amen.