The New Testament Teaches Us To See Christ In All The Psalms

In Luke 4:11, Satan tempts Christ by quoting to him Psalm 91:11-12, where God "will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways. On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone." If this account had not been included in the Gospels, we might never have known that Psalm 91 is all about Christ.

In the book of Acts, Psalm 16:10 is twice quoted by the apostles, and by them it's revealed that Christ is the speaker in that Psalm. Again, if these statements by the apostles hadn't been recorded, we might never have known that Psalm 16 is all about Christ.

Psalms 91 and 16 are typical of the language of many other Psalms. There is no reason to assume that the words and prayers in many other Psalms are not the prayers of Christ, or words about him, I believe that this is what we are to infer from the many other New Testament references to Christ in the Psalms.

The resurrected Christ himself told his slow-to-understand disciples, "These are the words which I spake unto you, while I was yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled, which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the psalms, concerning me" (Luke 24:44).

So, the New Testament lets us know to look for our Good Shepherd in the Psalms; either for his voice in the "first person" or for words about him. 

One common argument against singing only the Psalms in the worship and praise of God is that in singing them we are not singing the name of Jesus. Yet, in singing the Psalms, we're singing both about him and with him. We are singing what he is singing, what he desires to sing in the congregation (Psalm 22:22-25; Hebrews 2:11-13). He will not sing our uninspired words, but will sing his own words, leading the churches in the praising, thanking, and petitioning the Father.

Passages Showing How The Old Testament Musical Instruments Helped

The musical instruments used by the prophets in the Old Testament had a prescribed, prophetic use for that dispensation: you especially see it in some texts, such as in 1 Chronicles 15:16:

"And David spake to the chief of the Levites to appoint their brethren to be the singers with instruments of musick, psalteries and harps and cymbals, sounding (shama`) by lifting up the voice (qowl) with joy."

The word qowl, often translated "voice" in the KJV and other translations, does not necessarily mean the human voice, though here it does. Strong's concordance shows it to also be translated as "noise,' "sound," "thunderings,' and "proclamation."

The Levitical priesthood appointed to song were, by use of their human voices and with instruments of music, to lift up a voice that produced this "sounding," this shama`. You can see how the idea of proclamation could apply here.

In 2 Chronicles 5:13:

"It came even to pass, as the trumpeters and singers were as one, to make one sound (qowl) to be heard in praising and thanking the LORD; and when they lifted up their voice (qowl) with the trumpets and cymbals and instruments of musick, and praised the LORD, saying, For he is good; for his mercy endureth for ever: that then the house was filled with a cloud, even the house of the LORD..."

The human voices together with voices of the trumpets, cymbals, and instruments of music "were as one;" lifted up together, they made one voice "to be heard."

And in 2 Chronicles 7:6:

"And the priests waited on their offices: the Levites also with instruments of musick of the LORD, which David the king had made to praise the LORD, because his mercy endureth for ever, when David praised by their ministry; and the priests sounded trumpets before them, and all Israel stood."

The musical instruments made by David were unique in that dispensation, for they had a specific use; David praised God by their ministry; these musical instruments were commanded by God through David, Gad the seer, and Nathan the prophet (2 Chronicles 29:25) to serve a purpose for that time. David wasn't free to dispense with them, to change them, or to add to them. He wasn't free to innovate with them or with the words sung in any way. All must be done exactly as prescribed through the Old Testament prophetic office.

They are no longer commanded but have been done away with, since Christ has ascended and sent his Spirit to give something better—enabled the church to raise her voice and make melody in, or with, the heart (Ephesians 5:19) to the Lord (see this article regarding this phrase). The "sound," the "voice" of the carnal means prescribed by God in the Old dispensation has been replaced by the spiritual worship that Jesus promised, without the need for shadows and types (John 4:21-26).

How Some Translations Add The Word "Music"

I wrote here about the connotations (to our modern ears) of the phrase "musical instruments" in the Bible, and how knowing more about that phrase can help the reader understand better what was going on in Levitical worship with its use of trumpets, cymbals, and lyres.

I have also noticed that in places in some more modern translations—I've seen it in the ESV and it may happen in other translations too— the word "music" is used in some Old Testament texts when not at all called for. Several times the  ESV uses "music" to translate Hebrew words that mean something different.

While it may not seem like a big deal (musical instruments do, after all, make music), in these places where that happens it's not an accurate translation, and that's never desirable. I think the use of the word in these places masks what's really the emphasis in the passage, for one thing. It can also nudge the modern reader to feel a false familiarity with the purpose and place of the Old Testament musical instruments.

Following are several places where I've seen "music" used this way in the ESV. I've included the actual Hebrew word after each instance, along with the Strong's Exhaustive Dictionary definition of the word. I included the KJV text to illustrate how translators from an earlier era translated the word.


1 Chronicles 15:22

ESV: "...Chenaniah, leader of the Levites in music (massa': burden, song, prophecy) should direct the music (massa') for he understood it."

KJV: "And Chenaniah, chief of the Levites, was for song (massa'): he instructed about the song (massa'), because he was skilful."

Masa' seems to have to do with song and prophecy, though some commentators think Chenaniah's assignment and skill was in bearing the ark. But the idea of this text being about music (as we think of it) is definitely not in view.


1 Chronicles 15:27, 28

ESV: "David was clothed with a robe of fine linen, as also were all the Levites who were carrying the ark, and the singers and Chenaniah the leader of the music (massa', see above) of the singers. And David wore a linen ephod. So all Israel brought up the ark of the covenant of the LORD with shouting, to the sound of the horn, trumpets, and cymbals, and made loud music (shama: to hear, hearken, sound aloud, publish, declare) on harps and lyres."

KJV: "And David was clothed with a robe of fine linen, and all the Levites that bare the ark, and the singers, and Chenaniah the master of the song (massa')) with the singers: David also had upon him an ephod of linen. Thus all Israel brought up the ark of the covenant of the LORD with shouting, and with sound of the cornet, and with trumpets, and with cymbals, making a noise (shama) with psalteries and harps."

We already looked at masa'; and now here is a new Hebrew word, shama, which the ESV translates "music." The phrase in verse 28, "all Israel... made loud music," is misleading! The idea of shama is a loud sound that is itself the message, the publication and declaration of something (the praise of God) that was to be heard, hearkened to, and obeyed. The horns, trumpets and cymbals were actually themselves part of the prophetic ministry of the Levites; only they played upon the musical instruments; their loud sound was a prescribed element and a means in the worship and praise of God.

1 Chronicles 25:6

ESV: "They were all under the direction of their father in the music (shiyr: song, to sing, a singer) in the house of the LORD with cymbals, harps, and lyres for the service of the house of God. Asaph, Jeduthun, and Heman were under the order of the king."

KJV: "All these were under the hands of their father for song (shiyr) in the house of the LORD, with cymbals, psalteries, and harps, for the service of the house of God, according to the king's order to Asaph, Jeduthun, and Heman.

Song, not mere instrumental music, is the goal of the Levites in their service of the house of God. Notice here, incidentally, how the KJV clarifies that all was done "according to" the king's order to (the prophets) Asaph, Jeduthun, and Heman. No aspect of the service of the house was left to any human devising.


Psalm 49:4

ESV: "I will incline my ear to a proverb; I will solve my riddle to the music of the lyre (kinnowr: lyre, harp)."

KJV: "I will incline mine ear to a parable: I will open my dark saying upon the harp (kinnowr)."

Again, the word "music" is not in the original Hebrew text. Removing it and seeing what is in the text makes it easier to see that the harp itself is a keliy, a tool; and in this case, a prophetic tool for the Old Testament psalmists/prophets (in this case, for the sons of Korah).


Psalm 92:1-3

ESV: "It is good to give thanks to the Lord,to sing praises to your name, O Most High; to declare your steadfast love in the morning, and your faithfulness by night, to the music (higgayown, meaning "meditation, solemn sound") of the lute and the harp, to the melody of the lyre."

KJV: "It is a good thing to give thanks unto the Lord, and to sing praises unto thy name, O Most High: to shew forth thy lovingkindness in the morning, and thy faithfulness every night, upon an instrument of ten strings, and upon the psaltery; upon the harp with a solemn sound (higgayown)..."

This is another instance where the use of the word "music," which again is not in the original Hebrew text, potentially leads away from the emphasis of the text. In addition, the ESV inserts the word "melody" in verse 3; no corresponding word is in the Hebrew text.


Psalm 101:1

ESV:  "I will sing (shiyr, to sing) of steadfast love and justice; to you, O LORD, I will make music (zamar)."

KJV: "I will sing (shiyr) of mercy and judgment: unto thee, O LORD, will I sing (zamar)."

 Zamar is a Hebrew word that conveys the sense of striking or plucking an instrument with the fingers. Its Greek equivalent, psallos, is used in Ephesians 5:19 to mean a metaphorical plucking of the strings of the heart ("making melody to the Lord with your heart"). Here in Psalm 101:1, Hebrew parallelism requires that the second half of the verse be a restating of the first half; therefore the KJV translates zamar as "sing," while the ESV again chooses the phrase, "make music."


These are a few of the places where the ESV (and again, not to pick on the ESV; other translations have also done so) has chosen translations and even inserted words into the text that have helped muddy the doctrinal waters (at least it did for me, for years). It's hard to shake off our modern notions of the place musical instruments have in the worship of God, but it's worth thinking deeply about. This is a helpful quote:

...in Old Testament worship "the noise was the worship: an audio-symbolic evocation of the majesty and glory of God … which passed away with the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ, when worship 'in Jerusalem' passed over into worship 'in spirit and truth.' "

Faithful To The Book

I heard someone express an opinion about what was and was not "faithful to the book" in the Lord of the Ring movies. A listener declared that the differences in the movies from the book were offensive to her. "Oh, so you're a purist?" was the response. "Proudly so," was the reply.

Thinking about this later, I was struck at how, in our worship, we should have some sort of desire to see it conform to the Bible- to see it be "faithful to the Book." We should rightly be offended when the worship of the church deviates widely from what God has said.

As movie purists, we're (and by "we" I mean Christians; these were Christians having this conversation; we Christians do love our Tolkien!) ready to take offense at things in these movies that fell short of the book we so know and love. Yet we will gather for worship to God and sing and say and do all kinds of things that God has not commanded, that fall so far short of the Book we profess to so know and love.

The ethic of the Puritans is missing in the churches, and badly needed.

The Keliy of the Old Testament, The Hoplon of the New

It's interesting to consider the use of the term "musical instrument" in Scripture. Our present usage of the phrase could possibly skew our understanding of the place and sanction of musical instruments in worship, particularly in the Levitical sacrificial system as compared to now.

In the Bible, the Hebrew word keliy is often translated by the word "instrument."  But it's also variously translated "furniture," "articles," "weapons," "clothing," "baggage," armor," "yoke," "tool," "implement," "jar," "vessel," and "equipment." Strong's defines keliy as "an article, a vessel, an implement, a utensil, a tool." The various keliy were often those things which had a common use; but sometimes keliy is used to describe things set apart to a holy use. For instance, in Exodus 25:9, keliy describes the various furnishings of the Tabernacle. God tells Moses, "According to all that I shew thee, after the pattern of the tabernacle, and the pattern of all the instruments (keliy) thereof, even so shall ye make it." These instruments included the ark, the mercy seat, the cherubim, the table, and the candlestick. Keliy in the Old Testament was something useful, something that furnished out, equipped. When used in worship, these articles and implements were strictly regulated by God, to be made and used according to God's exact pattern.

In due course of time, God gave an expanded pattern of worship to David, along with the prophets Nathan and Gad, with exact instructions for additional keliy for use in the Temple in the worship of God. These were also strictly regulated by God, and would be implements for the sounding of music. 1 Chronicles 15:16: "And David spake to the chief of the Levites to appoint their brethren [to be] the singers with instruments (keliy) of musick, psalteries and harps and cymbals, sounding, by lifting up the voice with joy." 

So, in the Old Testament, there were keliy for the Tabernacle, keliy for warfare, keliy for farming, keliy for food and eating, keliy for clothing the body, and then, beginning in 1 Chronicles 15:16 with David's appointment of the Levites, keliy for music. All keliy for worship were strictly appointed and regulated by God, whether the candlesticks for the tabernacle or later for the loud-sounding cymbals for the temple. 2 Chronicles 29:25: "And he set the Levites in the house of the LORD with cymbals, with psalteries, and with harps, according to the commandment of David, and of Gad the king's seer, and Nathan the prophet: for so was the commandment of the LORD by his prophets."

In the New Testament, the only Greek word that conveys the same sense as keliy is hoplon, which appears once, in Romans 6:13: "Do not present your members to sin as instruments (hoplon). Strong's defines hoplon as "any tool or implement...arms used in warfare, weapons." So hoplon in the New Testament also conveys the idea of a utensil, a tool, something used; even for warfare, as does keliy in some places in the Old.

Now a little about the use of the English word "instrument" to translate keliy. It was surely chosen carefully by the early translators of the English Bible, because at that time, it still conveyed the sense of its roots, which were in the Old French estrument and the Latin instrumentem; its definition was "a tool, apparatus, furniture, dress, document." Instrumentem is from instruere (to instruct, to arrange, to inform, to teach).  We still retain a vestige of this earlier meaning when we speak of surgical instruments, and also, in keeping with the idea of instruction, of legal instruments.

Mostly, we now associate the word instrument with music. But the earlier translators chose the word instrument to translate various instances of the Hebrew keliy because, for them, it still had connotations of being something useful, a tool or an implement; and because of its associations with the ideas of furnishing out and instructing, as the musical instruments were to do for that age of the church.

Hopefully all this helps to show that the musical keliy of  David and the Temple were divinely appointed implements that furnished out the public worship of God for that time, just as the earlier keliy had furnished out public worship in the Tabernacle. Most know and agree that the keliy of the Tabernacle served as mere copies of the heavenly realities they represented. When the heavenly reality came, and was fulfilled in the Person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ, so did the need for, and usefulness of, these copies. They were ceremonial, and vanished away. And this is just as true for all the later keliy of the Temple, including its musical keliy. They were commanded for use by the Levites for raising sounds of joy (1 Chronicles 15:16-28) and for giving thanks (2 Chronicles 7:6). The musical keliy were themselves the sound of praise. They served as types and shadows of what was to come at the inauguration of the new and better covenant—  sacrifices of praise and thanks to God from hearts "richly indwelt by the word of Christ;" praises voiced without elaborate ceremony by "singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord" (Ephesians 5:18-20, Colossians 3:16).

The lifeless keliy are obsolete in the new covenant, done away with by the accomplishment of Christ. The instruments (hoplon) we now present to God for his service are our living bodies. How privileged we are! Every member of the body of Christ may now serve in this priestly function, once reserved for the Levitical tribe of Israel. Gone are the burdensome mechanical furnishings and helps needed under the old dispensation. It is in spirit and truth, with our bodily members, that we now serve and worship God.

To return to the use of the old covenant keliy is to go backward to a more difficult dispensation. How the Levites who labored under the awful realities of the sacrificial system (which included the playing of the musical keliy) would have rejoiced to see our freedom from the external demands of the ceremonial law, a benefit won by Christ, bestowed upon his New Testament church, and enjoyed by her when she worships God in spirit and in truth!

Two Great Sermons

Two great sermons from G.I. Williamson on the Psalms and singing them:

"Psalms, Hymns, and Spiritual Songs"

"The Mind of Christ"

Very helpful.

The Return To Rome

In Spirit and Truth: Worship as God Requires (Understanding and Applying the Regulative Principle of Worship) by James R. Hughes:

"Within a generation after the Puritans, the Protestant Church began drifting back toward the worship practices of the Roman Catholic Church of the late Middle Ages. Today, that return is almost complete. We once again see Protestants following liturgies and ecclesiastical calendars that are similar, if not identical to, those followed by the Roman Catholic Church. In many respects, there is no essential difference."

A very informative online book.

The Church Only and Ever Sang the Word of God

I've been floored to realize that for both Israel and for the apostolic church, the songs they sang—all the songs they sang—were inspired songs. These songs were each and every one written by God's appointed spokesmen, his prophets. These were the songs given to God's people to sing.

No one was free in Old Testament Israel to innovate in penning new songs for the people to sing. The songs of the Old Testament were all written inerrantly because they were written prophetically. Moses (Deuteronomy 31:19-32:44), Deborah and Barak (Judges 5:1-31), and of course King David, the anointed "psalmist of Israel" (2 Samuel 23:1) come immediately to mind. Korah and others who wrote some of the Psalms were also prophets. We know they were because in the Old Testament, "prophet" is the very definition of the one who inerrantly spoke God's words, words which became written Scripture ("in former times God spoke to us through his prophets, but in these last days he has spoken by his Son"—Hebrews 1:1).

Again, these were the songs, the only songs, that Israel was to sing. The Psalms were the songbook of the nation of Israel., and no command of God ever abrogated that. Where is the New Testament command that changes the command to sing only the words of God given through his prophets?

To our modern ears, Paul's command in Ephesians 5:18-19 and Colossians 3:16 to sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs sounds like a mandate to songwriters. We might get the idea from it that fresh new songs for the church to sing were being written. But it wasn't so. "Hymns" and "spiritual songs" were descriptions used in the headings of the Septuagint Psalms—the Greek Scripture that Christ and the apostles used, and from which they quoted. Paul's readers would have understood Paul, in speaking of psalms, hymns and spiritual songs, to be talking about singing what God's people would have always sung: the word of God.

Where does that leave us today with our song lists for Sunday morning filled with songs written by 20-year-old recording artists? I think it leaves us a good ways away from God's command, to say the least.

More later. I was simply struck, a while ago, by the stark fact that God commanded one thing—that his people sing his word—and that he never rescinded that command.

Singing Together and Musical Instruments

Over the past years and months, I have become an adherent to the regulative principle of worship (i.e., what we do when we gather as the church). I hear a lot of people talking about the regulative principle, but many no longer adhere to the historical understanding of it. The regulative principle is that what we do in worship must be regulated by the word of God; therefore, only what is prescribed in the word of God may be practiced in worship.

Alternatively, the normative principle, which most churches now hold to, says that as long as any practice or activity is not forbidden in Scripture, it may be done in worship as long as it measures up to a denomination's, or local congregation's, criteria. This opens the churches up to whatever practices and activities are approved by its leaders and demanded by the congregation.

My conviction gained from Scripture is that God has always prescribed the lawful practices and activities of the gathered church. In the New Testament no less than in the Old, God's word is very specific about what the church should do. When the Old Testament worship forms passed away, so did its many activities, except for the ones prescriptively described in the New Testament: prayer, praise, singing as prayer and praise, giving, preaching and teaching, breaking bread together/the Lord's supper, water baptism.

I highly recommend this book: Old Light on New Worship: Musical Instruments and the Worship of God, a Theological, Historical and Psychological Study by John Price as a place to begin. Fascinating!!

Here's a website with a lot of good information on the regulative principle, the need for it, and consequence of not adhering to it: Musical Instruments in the Public Worship of God.

Happy researching—I hope you will!