So in this morning's sermon, we're still in the middle of the miscellaneous sermon series. I'm going to do two sermons on music and singing in the Bible. And this morning, we're just going to read two texts together to start with, although there are a lot in a sermon. Obviously, when I do a sermon like this, Studying scripture and what it says about singing and music and I'm trying to summarize it in sermon form So I can't read everything at the beginning of the sermon And if you ever want like a passage list of the ones that I reference I can send to that to you later in the week So the ones that we're going to read to start with is Exodus 15 Just the first couple verses there and then also for Samuel 18 and Just a couple examples of music in the Bible or singing in the Bible. So God's Word, first one comes from Exodus. This is a song that Moses and Israel sang after God brought them through the Red Sea and defeated the Egyptians. So God's Word, actually let's pray a moment and then we'll read that. Dear Father, bless the reading and preaching of the Word this morning, we pray. May your Holy Spirit be active and working among us and in us. We pray that even as we hear your Word preached and read, that you would touch our hearts and make us understand the truths of your precious Word. In Jesus' name, Amen. So, verses 1 through 3 of Exodus 15. Then Moses and the people of Israel sang this song to the Lord, saying, I will sing to the Lord, for he has triumphed gloriously. The horse and his rider he has thrown into the sea. The Lord is my strength and my song. He has become my salvation. This is my God, and I will praise him. My Father's God, and I will exalt him. The Lord is a man of war. The Lord is his name. That's the first part of that Song of the Sea. And then let's read a different song. or a chorus in the Bible, and it's in 1 Samuel 18. And this is right in the context of David and King Saul. I think we know these stories. You'll probably get the context right when I read these. We'll just read verses six and seven of 1 Kings 18, again, God's word. And they were coming home when David returned from striking down the Philistine. That was Goliath. The women came out of all the cities of Israel, singing and dancing, to meet King Saul with tambourines, with songs of joy, and with musical instruments. And the women sang to one another as they celebrated. Saul has struck down his thousands, and David his ten thousands." God's word. There was a neurologist named Dr. Oliver Sacks, and he has a very interesting story. His mother died, and he was grieving. He was depressed. He wasn't doing well. He said he would still go through life, even though he was grieving. He would go see his patients in therapy with him and pretend that everything was fine. But he said, Dr. Sacks said, inside, he said, I was dead, lifeless as a zombie. But one day, Dr. Sachs was working, this was in New York, I'm sorry, he was walking down Bronx Park East, and he said he felt something quick and sharp like lightning. He said it was a whisper of life. He called it a quickening of mood, joy. And then he realized he was hearing music. Just a faint tune. And he followed that song. He followed the music to a basement window there on the street, side of the street. And the sound coming out of the window was music from the Austrian composer Franz Schubert. And he said that music touched his heart and his mind. And Dr. Sachs wrote this. He said that he found himself smiling for the first time in weeks. And he was even laughing. And he finally felt alive again because he heard that music. He actually wrote about it in his book called Musicophilia. That's a pretty neat story. And I think many of you and many of us understand the power of good music, the power of music in general. Many have said so much about the power and the efficacy of music in life. And Martin Luther, who's one of his hymns we just sang, Luther, the reformer, said, he said, whether you wish to comfort the sad, encourage the despairing, To humble the proud, calm the passionate, or appease those full of hate, what more effective means than music could you find? Martin Luther, who loved music and composed German hymns and psalms, also talked about the power of music. Now, this theme of singing and music and song, I know that quite a few of you like music. and singing and song. Some of you maybe listen to music all the time. You have an earbud in or it's always on in the background. And I like it too. I'm a big fan of music and song. And for me, singing and music and song makes life more pleasant. For me, life without songs and music would kind of be like food without seasoning, just dull, kind of bland. And actually, when you think about the topic of singing and song and music, it's a huge topic in the Bible. One thing that I studied this week said there are around 400 references to music and singing in the Bible, and even around 40 commands for God's people to sing. So it's a big thing in Scripture. And so I know there's a lot of difference between music and singing, and I'm not going to get too technical with terms or dive deep into musicology and the theory of music, so I'm just going to use general terms. And we're going to take two sermons to look at this topic in the Bible. And so today the plan is to just kind of set a biblical foundation for singing and song. We'll do some general observations as I kind of walk through scripture and look what it says about singing and song. And in a couple weeks then, when we get back to this theme, we'll look at some specifics in scripture. We'll dig into some more of the details. So today is kind of a broad overview. And in two weeks, we'll do kind of a more focused study. So first of all, let's look at the first point I think we can say from scripture is that we were created to sing, to make music. All right, let's think about that. When God created people, he created Adam and Eve with voices. We're people who can talk and communicate because we're made in the image of God. He's a speaking God, and we can speak as well as image bearers. And one aspect of speaking is singing. We can use our God-given voice to say things in musical ways. And we even reflect God's image by being creative and making music and using our voice to sing. I think it's part of being an image bearer that we have music and singing. And interestingly, if we were doing some Bible trivia, and I would ask you the question, it's an interesting one. Is there any references to God singing in the Bible? There actually are. In Isaiah 5, God sings a song about his vineyard, which is Israel. But there's even a more direct reference in Zephaniah 3. God is telling his people, don't be afraid, and it says, the Lord rejoices over you with gladness. He'll rejoice over you with joyful songs. God is a singing God, and he sings over his people. How about Jesus? Did Jesus sing? Yes, he did too. We're going to look at some of the Old Testament background of music and Israel and a Jewish view of music. Jesus grew up in that context. He would have sang like the Old Testament people in many ways. It's even recorded, remember, in Mark 14, when Jesus and his disciples celebrated the Passover together, it says, they sang a hymn and went out to Mount Olives. Jesus and his disciples sang. And there's also an interesting reference in Hebrews 2. This is where it talks about Christ being the founder of our salvation. And he says, Jesus says, he's not ashamed to call us brothers. And then Hebrews 2, quote Psalm 22, where Christ says to the Father, in the midst of the congregation, I will sing your praise. So that Psalm talks about Jesus in the middle of his congregation singing the Father's praise. And of course, it's right for us to think of Jesus as the singer of the Psalms. And if you remember back a few months, or a little more than that, when we went through the Song of Songs, Song of Solomon, in a way, Jesus is the one singing that song, or part of that song, to his bride, the church. So Jesus sings in Scripture. Now, another angle of singing and creation and God's creation, back to that theme, is in the Bible, even creation is personified as singing. Do you know what I mean? Can you think of some references in the Bible where some part of creation sings? Well, the Psalms and the prophets often use language to talk about creation singing praises to its maker. So Psalm 65 says, the meadows and the valleys will sing for joy. Or Isaiah 44 talks about the heavens singing, the deep oceans breaking forth into songs, the mountains and the forests making music because God has done great things. Creation sings his praise. And we also sang that in the Psalm earlier today. And there's an interesting reference to singing in Job. In Job 38, there's this poetry that talks about the morning stars singing when God created the world. Probably the angels, many commentaries say. And of course, there's angel choirs in Revelation. The beginning of the Bible, the end of the Bible, there's singing. And speaking of the morning stars singing when God created the world, maybe that's where C.S. Lewis got the imagery of Aslan singing creation into existence in The Magician's Nephew. So one Dutch Reformed theologian several hundred years ago said, creatures have engaged in singing since the very beginning of creation. It's a musical world that God has made. And I think as Christians we can think about that and think about the world that God has made and we can say that the birds sing and the insects sing and other animals make tunes to the glory of God. There's another thing for you to think about. What other animals make music or tunes besides birds and some insects? I think if you use your Christian imagination, you can even say that the brooks and the breezes and the blue ocean make melodies that proclaim their maker's praise. So you see, that's one angle and aspect of music and singing and song in the Bible. that God made us as singing and musical beings to praise our maker. And creation itself sings the praise of its maker. So we can think about it like this. Creation is a choir that sings praise to its creator. It's good and right and fitting for us to use music and sing in a way that brings our creator praise. Let all things now living, a song of thanksgiving, to God the creator triumphantly rise. All creatures of our God and King, lift up your voice and with us sing beautiful hymns that echo the songs of creation, praising God. And so we're in the choir of creation that sings the praise of our maker. It's proper and right and fitting for us to do so. As the Shorter Catechism says, our chief end, our goal and purpose in life, is to glorify and enjoy God forever. And one way we glorify God is to sing in this choir of creation, praising our Creator. So that's one aspect of music and singing in the Bible. Now there's another angle on music and singing, or a few more angles. Shift gears a little bit. It's still thinking about creation and how God made the world musically, as it were. Music and song, we can see from scripture, are a common blessing that God has given to people. Music and song, there are blessings that God has given to people to help life, to help us enjoy life a little more. Music, we can say, is a gift of God that brings color and beauty and dimension to life. I mean, there was a fall, yes. Adam and Eve sinned, we know that, we've read the story. The curse came and made many things miserable in many different miserable ways. But God didn't, you know, immediately after Adam and Eve sinned, he didn't make the heavens and the earth pass away or cast Adam and Eve into the pit forever. But God, in his sovereignty and his mercy, God, after the fall, restrained the effects of sin. He held back the effects of the curse. And he even gave us many blessings in life. And as God restrained the effects of sin and held back the effects of the curse, he did that so he could carry out his promise to Eve that one of his descendants would crush the serpent's head. This is an aspect of common grace. that in his goodness and mercy, God, as he withholds the effects of sin, gives common blessings to all people, saint and sinner. I mean, there's sweat, I know, there's work, there's pain. You know there's frustration and even death in this world. But in God's common grace, we also have many things to enjoy. Friends and food, beauty, arts, and music. Actually, there's a place in the Bible that talks about this a little bit. In Genesis 4, if you read the chapter of Genesis 4, it's after the fall, you read there about Cain's descendants. Do you remember what Cain's descendants did? Well, they built cities, they raised livestock, they were ranchers, and they even forged metal. Some of them were blacksmiths. And one of Cain's descendants was named Jubal. This is a really hard trivia question. What was Jubal known for? It's Genesis 4 verse 21. It says, Jubal was the father of all those who play the harp and flute. So there you go. Jubal was the first legit musician in the world. And so Meredith Klein made a good point here. He said, in man's settlements would be heard the sound of the forge and of music. The biblical story traces the beginnings of the industry, the arts, and sciences in Cain's line. And so this is interesting. When you think about music and how Jubal was one of the first musicians, archaeologists and scholars have found that there were different songs and music and singing in all different cultures in the past. Remember Ur where Abraham came from? Some of the oldest remains of musical instruments were found in Ur. Same could be said of Sumeria, Babylon, and Egypt and so on. There's been music for a long time. It's one of God's common grace gifts to the world. And so that's another angle of music and song and singing. It's a gift of God to us to make life more colorful and beautiful and enjoyable. And Luther said the same thing. Luther, I don't know if you've heard what he said about music. He loved music. He said, music is the greatest gift. Indeed, it's divine. Next to the word of God, music deserves the highest praise. It's such a beautiful thing for us. Now, of course, when we think about good gifts that God the giver gives us, like singing and music, sadly, we sometimes misuse the good gifts that God gives us and twist them and use them in a wrong way that God didn't intend. So when we think about music and singing too, some people actually do idolize music and singing, right? Some people idolize singers, and some people make music their life, and they live for music. And as Christians, we don't want to do that. We want to, you know, use the gift of music to worship and praise the giver of music. We don't want to worship the gift. We don't want to idolize music. Some people have, because the world is fallen. Now there's one other thing about singing and music and song to think about. As a gift of God, not only do some people in a fallen world idolize music, other people, or some people, pervert music. And they write songs and sing songs that have sinful and evil themes. And we know this, right? A lot of popular music is full of cussing, dirty sexual references, and even violence. So think about that. Think about music from a biblical perspective like we were talking about. When someone takes music and uses it for dirty and corrupt and sinful ends, not only are these singers and artists perverting a good gift of God, but they're also using their speech to sin. It's kind of like a double evil. And so as Christians, once again, we want to avoid perverting music. We don't want to use it for ends God didn't intend it for. And we want to avoid listening to and taking in perverted music. It's not good for us to listen to bad music. We all know how powerful music is, right? Music can move your soul in good ways. But music can also move you to darkness. I don't know if you've had that before. You know, when I was younger and I listened to just random different songs, some of it would have a lot of cussing and it never helped my thoughts or speech. It just doesn't, because music gets in you. Or if you listen to twisted and perverted songs about sex all the time, it will twist your sexual thoughts and desires, because music has powerful effects. Or if you listen to dark songs with dark themes, that music has the power to cast a dark shadow in your heart and mind. So we have to remember that even though music is a good gift from God, people have perverted it, and we want to avoid that. But we can still be thankful for God's gift of music and song and enjoy the gift in the right and proper way. Okay, well, let's shift gears a little bit. That's kind of a bigger picture of music and singing from a creational, biblical perspective. I want to now give you some examples of singing and song in scripture. Again, this would be pretty fun. You can maybe do this on your own, but think right now of all the different places in the Bible where there's singing and song and music. Like I mentioned, there's a ton. I'm not going to do them all here, but I'll just give a summary. In Old Testament Israel, sometimes the Israelites sang while they worked. Isaiah 16 talks about the Israelites singing in the vineyards during harvest. Or sometimes in the Old Testament, the Israelites would sing during parties and feasts and celebrations. I don't know if you remember the story in Genesis 31. Jacob snuck away from Laban and Laban caught him and Laban was upset. And he said, why didn't you tell me you were leaving? I would have given you a feast with singing and music and harps and tambourines. We would have had a party with music. Sometimes Israelites sang for feasts. Actually, interesting, in Numbers 21, when Israel was in the wilderness, God provided water for them several different times, and the Israelites even wrote a song about it, and they sang it. Spring up, O well. That's in Numbers 21. It was celebrating. Sometimes the Israelites sang sad songs, like at funerals, ballads that were sorrowful. One great example is in 2 Samuel 1. Remember when Jonathan died and when King Saul died? David wrote a sad funeral song about it. He lamented their loss in song. You can read that in 2 Samuel 1. There were also love songs in Israel. What's the love song we have from Israel? Song of Solomon. A whole love song in the Bible. The Israelites would also sing songs and write music because of military victories. We read one in Exodus 15, remember that? After God delivered Israel from Egypt, Moses wrote the song and the people of Israel sang this huge hymn to the Lord. I'll sing to the Lord for he has triumphed victoriously. It was a hymn of praise to God. And we didn't read it, but in Exodus 15 afterwards, there was a women's choir that echoed the same hymn and Miriam was leading the music with a tambourine. singing at victory. Speaking of women in music, was Deborah a musician? She actually was. Remember, Deborah was a prophet and a judge in Judges 5 in that area. When Deborah was the judge of Israel, under her leadership, Israel defeated Sisera and his menacing army with the brave help of another woman named Jael and a tent peg. Remember that story? After that story, Deborah and Barak sing a song. And you can read the lyrics in Judges 5, because there is a victory. Or think about when David defeated the Philistines. We read this song already. Remember after David came home from defeating Goliath and the other Philistines? These women wrote and sang a song. Saul is killed as thousands. David is ten thousands. And that little chorus is repeated three times in the Old Testament, and that little chorus was actually internationally known. The Philistines knew about that song, actually, and they were talking about it. It was a victory song that was well known. In the Old Testament, music was also used for teaching. God in Deuteronomy 31, God tells Moses to write a song to teach Israel about what God had done for them. He said, write this song and teach it to them, put it in their mouths. You can read the lyrics of that song in Deuteronomy 32. So those are some different summaries. But one of the main aspects of music in the Old Testament is music and worship, singing and worshiping God. The Old Testament church used music and song to worship God. And speaking of David, you can read all these around 1 Chronicles 23 and 25, kind of in that area. It gives a ton of details about how David organized a choir and musicians for the temple that his son Solomon would build. And it goes into a lot of musical detail there. David picked 4,000 Levites to praise the Lord with instruments that he had made. And David, the choir director, appointed men from various families, like Asaph's family, to proclaim God's messages using instruments and song. In fact, there were 288 trained people from families that had different choir parts and roles. They used trumpets and cymbals and other instruments to accompany songs of praise to God. They made music at the house of the Lord. And of course, when the temple was dedicated, In Solomon's reign, there was a huge festive choir singing, praise to God, worshiping him. Or think about the Psalms. It's a hymnal in the Old Testament Israel of praise to God. Asaph was one of the great Psalm writers. David himself was one of the best musicians in Old Testament Israel. He was the sweet singer of Israel who wrote many songs and Psalms. What instrument was he well known for playing? The harp. Remember when King Saul would get into that evil mode? David would play the harp to move King Saul and calm him down. And finally, one other thing in the Old Testament is when they were rebuilding the temple later on, the Levite singers were there too. And in Ezra, you can read about how the Levite singers sang responsively. It may be something like this. Give thanks to the Lord, these Levites would sing. And then the other ones would sing, for he is good. They did that later at the rebuilding of the temple. So that's a short summary of a bigger topic in the Old Testament of singing and music. And if you can think about this, like one Bible dictionary says, the Jewish people seem to have been especially musical. Even other nations recognized Israel for their music and singing, like the Philistines, and there's evidence in Babylon as well. Men and women wrote songs in Israel. They played and sang using various instruments. And the Israelites did sing psalms. But they didn't only sing psalms, as we just learned. They sang harvest songs, love songs, party songs, funeral songs, and victory songs. They were very musical. So let's shift gears, and as we do our last point today, think about music, then, in the New Testament. Do you see kind of how we're working? I'm working broadly from creational, biblical perspective to Old Testament, now to the New Testament. When you come to the New Testament and think about music and singing, of course you have to remember it's tightly tied to the Old Testament. So many New Testament stories, as you know, have the Jewish background, so you have to remember the Jewish musical background in the stories as well. So like Peter and Paul and John and other Jewish Christians would have had a musical understanding kind of like what we just summarized, Old Testament stuff. So in the New Testament, if you do a work through on music, there's music at feasts and parties. Remember Jesus' parable of the prodigal son? That dad threw a big party and there was music for the son who was lost and then found. Or one time when Jesus went to Jairus' house in Matthew 9, his daughter died and there was music there, funeral music, lamenting her death. There were music at the feasts. Like I mentioned, Jesus and his disciples sang at the Passover meal. And there are songs of praise in the New Testament. Think of how many times the New Testament quotes the Old Testament Psalms. What did Paul and Silas do when they were in prison? They sang hymns of praise to God. In fact, Paul was somewhat musical. We'll look into some of his writing next week more. But Paul sometimes wrote about flutes and harps and cymbals. He talked about how he sang in 1 Corinthians. And in fact, if you think about music in the New Testament, almost all scholars say that in some of Paul's letters there are hymn fragments that we went over, like Philippians and Colossians and so on. I'll mention some of these again next week. But when we think about how music unfolds in scripture, there's another thing that we have to think about. This is an interesting one that I'm still kind of working with. There's a redemptive historical aspect to singing and music in the Bible. I know that maybe sounds a little ambiguous, but there's a redemptive historical aspect of music and singing. And by redemptive historical, I mean like the history of redemption. When you progress through Scripture from Genesis to Revelation, there's development in music and singing. One aspect of that is, of course, in the Old Covenant, in the Old Testament, the music is from the period of types and shadows of Israel's Old Testament feasts and festivals. But in the New Testament, all that's fulfilled. So music in the New Testament's a little different. So think like this. In the New Covenant, in a church, we don't have an earthly king like David organizing a temple choir because Christ is the king and he's the temple, God with us. And in the New Covenant, we don't have Levites or Levitical singers because Christ is the final priest. And we don't have all the festivals and ceremonies like the Old Covenant had because Christ, our Passover, has been sacrificed. So music kind of shifts with that. Now, there's still music and singing in the Church and in the Christian life, but not exactly like in the Old Covenant. In other words, maybe to put it a little more simply, many of the songs in the Old Testament prophesy about Christ the Messiah, and now he's come. Or if you want to think musically about it, music and song in Scripture crescendo up to Christ's coming, and then in the New Covenant time, the songs are allegro and triple forte. The angels in heaven sing at Christ's birth. Glory to God in the highest. Because the Messiah has come, there's that crescendo. Or again, if you want to think musically about it, if the Old Testament were a song, it would kind of in many ways be unresolved, and the resolution would come in Christ's coming. The Old Testament would be like dissonance, and Christ's coming would make it consonance, to use musical terms. Handel's Messiah got it right. You know Handel's Messiah, right? If you listen to that, it does it so well. It puts the Bible story to music, I think, that's never been equaled. And it gets this crescendo, for unto us a child is born. You can think about redemptive history musically, and Handel did it well. And so one last thing to think about in scripture and music, not just this redemptive historical aspect, but something related. In scripture, a lot of times, when God does a great thing, there's singing and music afterwards. Creation, and when God brought Israel through the Red Sea, there's new songs being written. Again, the same thing is true when God sent his son, the Messiah, the Redeemer. There's new songs because God has done a great new thing. There's new singing and celebration. That's probably where those hymn fragments in Paul's letters fit. He was manifested in the flesh. And finally, think about Revelation, the book. That's a very musical book. And we talk about the crescendo, and we talk about the fulfillment, and we talk about music and singing. There are songs of victory in Revelation because the Messiah Christ has come. You remember Revelation 5? It asks that question, who is worthy to open the scroll? Andrew Peterson wrote a good hymn based on this. And the scroll symbolizes God's plan of judgment and redemption. Who's worthy to open the scroll? And someone answers John and said, the Lion of Judah's tribe, David's son, he's won the victory. He's worthy to open the scroll. And the Lamb is standing there in all of his power and glory. And there's also a choir in Revelation 5, and a choir had harps, and it says they sang a new song. a new song to the Lord, because he had done a great new thing. And you know the new song? You are worthy to take the scroll, to break its seals, and to open it, because you were slain, and your blood has ransomed people for God from every tribe, language, people, and nation. A new work of salvation has been done in Christ, and there's new songs and choirs in heaven singing and praising the Lord for it. There's that crescendo of music. It's Christ-centered. Because God has done a great thing, we sing a new song. There's other songs in Revelation too. Revelation as well, like Revelation 15. There's an interesting one. The saints sing the song of Moses mixed with the song of the Lamb. Great and marvelous are your works. And there's also a crescendo in the singing in Revelation itself. In Revelation 19, there's this choir so big that John can't even count it. And the choir, you know what it sings with a sound like many waters? Hallelujah for the Lord God Almighty reigns. There's that crescendo of singing in the Bible because the Messiah has come and done a great thing. Praise be to the Lamb. So that's kind of a big picture. I know that there's a lot of details there, but I wanted to kind of set this biblical foundation, Genesis to Revelation, for you to think about singing and music, and it centers around Christ. We'll look at more details in a couple weeks. But just remember that God, our good creator, gave us music and singing as a common blessing to humanity to enjoy. We can be thankful for it, we can sing, we can listen to music, but we don't want to idolize it or pervert it, or listen to perverted music. And with song and music, we can praise and thank our Creator. And with song and music, we can thank God, our Redeemer, for what He has done in Christ. There's a reason people have written songs about Christ's incarnation, Christmas songs, songs about Christ's resurrection, and so on. And as we think about Jesus' great redeeming work, about how he has come and freed us from darkness and brought us life and light and immortality through his death and resurrection. How can we keep from singing? If only we had a thousand tongues to sing our great Redeemer's praise. Amen. Let's pray.