I’ve spent a lot of the last two weeks replying to a gracious letter about the use of instruments in church.
For about 800 years the majority view among the church fathers was that in the congregational meeting the only singing permitted was of unaccompanied Psalms. This view is still held today by those who hold to something known as the regulative principle — which stipulates that ‘God may not be worshipped according to the imaginations and devices of men, or the suggestions of Satan, under any visible representation, or any other way not prescribed in the holy Scripture’ (from The Westminster Confession).
Interpreting the principle
I would agree whole-heartedly with this principle. However, some adherents to the principle say that, if the New Testament hasn’t expressly sanctioned an element of ‘worship’, then it would be disobedient to use it. Musical instruments would come into this category, as would any hymns (Wesley and Newton included) written outside the Bible. For example, Augustine, Calvin, Luther, Knox and Spurgeon all held the view that instruments shouldn’t be used in ‘worship’.
