349. Does God Care what We Sing? (Biblical Worship)

We explore Colossians 3:16–17 and how Scripture-shaped singing forms a church that teaches, admonishes, and gives thanks together. We show why content matters more than style and how psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs each serve the body.

• letting the word of Christ dwell richly 
• psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs explained 
• singing as teaching and admonishing one another 
• content over style and instrumentation 
• unity across cultures and preferences 
• practical leading: let the church hear itself 
• thankfulness as the tone of worship 
• doing all in the name of Jesus

Transcript

Reading Colossians 3:16–17

Letting Scripture Dwell Richly

Psalms, Hymns, And Spiritual Songs

Style, Culture, And Instruments

Singing As Mutual Edification

Thankfulness And Doing All In Christ

SPEAKER_00 0:07

Hi friend and welcome again to Moments of Worship. This podcast seeks to encourage you in the worship of Almighty God each weekday. I'm your host, Pastor Keith McMahon, worship pastor at Bethel Baptist Church. Thank you for joining me on Tuesday, February the tenth. We continue our series on biblical worship. Colossians three sixteen. Let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, verse seventeen, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God, the Father through him. Amen. Thanks be to God for his holy word. Let's look at this scripture, Colossians three sixteen. Let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly. Well the Word of Christ is His revealed word, the Holy Scriptures. Let the Scriptures dwell in you richly, and we know to let them dwell richly we need to be in the Scripture, be studying it, meditating on it, praying on it, that we may be able to teach and admonish, encourage one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. While singing, we are making sound with our voices, and we're singing psalms, and psalms here is exactly that the book of Psalms. Now there are books that are the Psalter that are set to a metrical setting that you would sing it verse after verse, strophic, if you will. We sing those at Bethel. Sometimes we sing uh half of a psalm or maybe two verses of a psalm. We sing the truths in the Psalms a lot. And then we have hymns. Now the first hymn that we see is in the New Testament in Colossians 1 15. He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. Here this text is talking about Jesus Christ. So hymns are Christ-centered songs. Now they could be hymns from the 1800s, a hymn like Holy, Holy, Holy, Crown Hymn with many crowns, or they could be a modern hymn like Christ Our Hope in Life and Death. We sang that this past Sunday. Or in Christ Alone, or Sovereign Graces before the throne of God above. And then we see in the text spiritual songs. Now these are heart songs, if you will, and often will have multiple truths in the song. Think about Behold Our God by Sovereign Grace Music. Spiritual songs. So we have three different types of songs here. The psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs. Now notice what the scripture doesn't say. It doesn't say sing songs just in 2025 or in 1990 or the 2000s or the 1800s. Dear friend, the church has been singing songs in the Psalter since the church was born in Acts. The church has been singing. The church will continue to sing praise to God until Jesus returns. It does not address style, a setting, if you will, whether it's going to be a piano and organ, or whether it's going to be led with a band, or whether it's going to be led with a full orchestra, it's going to be led bluegrass style, or with uh unplugged guitar, upright bass, and a cajone and a couple singers. So, friend, we need to embrace what the scripture says. We all have different preferences. We all like different instruments, maybe more than others, or a certain style, or some like a full choir and an orchestra. Some churches don't have that. And so they have a couple singers and piano. Praise be to God. Maybe you didn't grow up in the church, and you come from hearing music all around the world, maybe just pop secular music. Or maybe you grew up in England or Australia, or in Africa, or in Egypt, in Iran or Jordan. Each of these cultures have different type of instruments, different type of style. What's important is what we sing. Our songs should be filled with God's word. Filled with God's Word. Notice here what the Scripture is saying about horizontal worship, if you will. It says, Let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, one another. We are teaching and admonishing one another when we sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs. That's a beautiful, beautiful picture. One of my most favorite sounds in all the world is hearing the church sing. Hearing the church sing. Just this Sunday, as I mentioned, we sing Christ Our Hope in Life and Death. I just pushed the microphone away and listened to the church sing the gospel story. So it very much is one another. We are encouraging one another as we sing truce together. A practical thought on this for leaders, if you're a leader of Christian worship, leave the lights on in the worship center. I think it's good for us to be able to see each other as we worship God together. And when the lights are off, we're not able to see each other. The last part of this verse says, with thankfulness in your hearts to God, we sing with thankfulness, and we have so much to be thankful for. And then as Paul closes this section of scripture, he says, and whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. Friend, as we end this episode, may we remember to let the Word of Christ dwell within us, that we may teach and admonish one another, singing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, giving thanks to God the Father. Amen. Well, friend, until Wednesday and forever, may we worship Jesus Christ. Thanks for listening.