The oldest Baptist theology of SINGING

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Caleb: 00:00

In 1742, the first Baptist association in America gathered in Philadelphia to affirm the 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith. However, they found it to be incomplete. So they decided to write two additional chapters of their own. One of these chapters is titled On Singing Psalms, Hymns and Spiritual Songs. So what does this chapter say?

Caleb: 00:31

Why did they think it was so important? And should you adopt it for your church today? I aim to answer these questions in this video. But first, if you're excited to learn more about this, please leave a like on this video, subscribe to my channel and leave a comment with your thoughts on this below. Also, if you want to learn how to write a theology of worship for yourself, click the link in the description below to enroll in your first free theology of worship course.

Caleb: 01:02

Alright, let's get into it. Part one, God requires singing. We believe that singing the praises of God is a holy ordinance of Christ and not a part of natural religion or a moral duty only, but that it is brought under divine institution, it being enjoined on the churches of Christ to sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs. Now, if you're like me, the first time you read this, the word that jumps out is ordinance. Because don't Baptists believe there are only two ordinances, the Lord's Supper and baptism?

Caleb: 01:44

Well, it's understandable that you might think that because the word ordinance is often synonymous with the word sacrament. But sacraments and ordinances are not the same. A sacrament is an outward and visible sign of an inward and invisible grace. But early Protestants rejected the name sacrament because it had too many connotations associated with Catholic theology and the Catholic practice of baptism and the Lord's Supper. In its place, these Protestant churches put the name ordinance signifying that these rites were ordained or instituted by Christ himself.

Caleb: 02:28

So when the Philadelphia Baptists say that singing is an ordinance of Christ, they're not saying that it's a special sign of the inward and invisible grace of God. Not that it doesn't show God's grace, but that's not what they're meaning by using the term. When they say singing is an ordinance of Christ, all they're trying to say is that singing is commanded by Christ. It's something that we ought to do because he has told us to do this. And then they go on to say that singing is not a part of natural religion, or a moral duty only.

Caleb: 03:10

And by this, they mean the reason we sing is not simply because it's a reasonable thing to do, or a morally good thing to do. The reason Christians sing is because God calls them to sing. And he empowers them to sing by the Spirit. So it's not as though Christians decided, you know what, singing would be a good thing that we should do. On Sundays, there's a good benefit that it provides us, or this is just a morally good thing to do.

Caleb: 03:42

No, we sing because God calls us to sing. And of course, it's also reasonable and good to do. Part two: Singing must accord with Scripture. And that the whole church in their public assemblies, as well as private Christians ought to sing God's praises according to the best light they have received. Now, in this part of the statement, the Philadelphia Baptists, of course, affirm that churches ought to sing publicly and Christians ought to sing privately.

Caleb: 04:19

But the interesting thing about this portion is that they say, we ought to sing God's praises according to the best light that we have received. So what do they mean by best light? I think the best way to answer this is to look back at an earlier part of the confession when they talk about the word light. So this actually comes from the very first chapter in the Philadelphia Confession of Faith. It reads, The Holy Scripture is the only sufficient, certain and infallible rule of all saving knowledge, faith and obedience.

Caleb: 04:56

Although the light of nature and the works of creation and providence do so far manifest the goodness, wisdom and power of God as to leave men inexcusable, yet they are not sufficient to give that knowledge of God and his will which is necessary unto salvation. So here we hear the word light being used to refer to the knowledge that nature and the works of creation and providence reveal to us. And it's contrasted with the Holy Scripture or the knowledge that Holy Scripture gives us. So in the singing chapter, when they say singing according to the best light that we've received, I think what they mean is that our singing ought to be in accordance with the best knowledge that we've received about God. And I think this has potential to be a controversial statement, because the Philadelphia Baptists are not saying that we should sing just any song in worship, that anything flies, any lyrics are okay.

Caleb: 06:06

They say that what we sing ought to accord with the best understanding of God that we have. And I completely agree with this. The church should not settle for singing wimpy worship songs. Our songs should accord with our best understanding and insight and knowledge of who God is, and how He wants to interact with us on a weekly basis. Now, I'm not saying that every song needs to be so theologically dense, that the common churchgoer has no idea what we're singing about.

Caleb: 06:42

But I do believe that the corpus or the canon of our worship songs should fill the breadth of our understanding of God. The knowledge of God is so incredibly vast that our worship songs should act like minds digging deep into every facet of who God is and bringing out the all the riches of his nature and his character. Part three: singing reminds us of God's redeeming love. Moreover, it was practiced in the great representative church by our Lord Jesus Christ with his disciples, after he had instituted and celebrated the sacred ordinance of his holy supper as a commemorative token of redeeming love. Now, in this final part of the chapter, the Philadelphia Baptists don't give us any imperatives like, you know, singing must be done because God has told us to or singing must be done in a particular way in accordance with Scripture.

Caleb: 07:45

Instead, here, they're giving us kind of a nature or the benefits that come from singing, and they give us Jesus as the primary example. So they argue that Jesus sang a hymn at the end of or after instituting the Lord's Supper as a reminder to the disciples of God's redeeming love for them. And so they're kind of saying that in that act, he showed us that when we sing, that singing itself acts as a reminder of God's love toward us. I completely agree with this. And let me just give you one example why.

Caleb: 08:22

Even I, as a worship leader, come in some Sundays not in the spirit or in the mood to sing praises to God. But if I connect my singing hymns to Christ's singing of hymns before going to death on a cross for my sake, then me singing hymns on a weekly basis serves as a reminder of Christ's redeeming love for me. And therefore it stokes my spirit within me to do what has been called for me to do, which is to sing praises of God and who He is and what He's done for me in Christ. So I believe that this is a really insightful way to view singing, and would be beneficial for all of us to see our weekly rhythms of singing as directly connected to Christ himself singing after he instituted the Lord's Supper. I also think that this just gives us a good reason for always singing after we partake of the Lord's Supper together, because it unites us to Christ in that way, which is the intent of the Lord's Supper anyway.

Caleb: 09:36

So in conclusion, do you agree with this chapter? If so, like this video to let me know. If you disagree with this statement or you have something to add or change to it, then tell me how you would do that by commenting below. And if you like this content and would like to see more of it, subscribe to this channel so you'll be notified every time I put out a video essay like this. And finally, if you want to learn how to write your own theology of worship, just like these Philadelphia Baptists did, click the link in the description below so you can enroll in your first free Theology of Worship course.

Caleb: 10:16

Thanks for watching. See you next time.