I Demur, Mr. Calvin

In college, I wrote a paper challenging the views of one Mr. John Calvin, as if I knew anything then.

Particularly, I took issue with Mr. Calvin’s apparent denial of instrumental music having a part to play in Christian worship.

Since that time, my views of Mr. Calvin have – shall we indulge some understatement – mellowed. The theology which informs my life and practice is something people call ‘Calvinism’, though that too narrowly focuses its origin. I would be happy to be called an enthusiastic follower of the content of Calvin’s theology.

But not all of it.

Recently as I prepared a sermon on Psalm 92, I was struck with the instrumental emphasis brought to worship.

1 It is good to give thanks to the LORD,
to sing praises to your name, O Most High;
2 to declare your steadfast love in the morning,
and your faithfulness by night,
3 to the music of the lute and the harp,
to the melody of the lyre.

The players of stringed instruments are commissioned to assist the community in the worship of God. A commission which, if we take Calvin’s approach, ceased with the advent of Christ.

Calvin’s position, as expressed in his commentary on this Psalm, and elsewhere, is that primitive worship lacking the insight that Christ brought, needed this aid of instruments, but in our maturity we have grown beyond that.

“In the fourth verse, he more immediately addresses the Levites, who were appointed to the office of singers, and calls upon them to employ their instruments of music – not as if this were in itself necessary, only it was useful as an elementary aid to the people of God in these ancient times. We are not to conceive that God enjoined the harp as feeling a delight like ourselves in mere melody of sounds; but the Jews, who were yet under age, were astricted to the use of such childish elements. The intention of them was to stimulate the worshippers, and stir them up more actively to the celebration of the praise of God with the heart. We are to remember that the worship of God was never understood to consist in such outward services, which were only necessary to help forward a people, as yet weak and rude in knowledge, in the spiritual worship of God. A difference is to be observed in this respect between his people under the Old and under the New Testament; for now that Christ has appeared, and the Church has reached full age, it were only to bury the light of the Gospel, should we introduce the shadows of a departed dispensation.”

It is an argument embraced by some of his followers today, but it is an argument which falls empty upon my ears.

I will continue a Calvinist, albeit a 99 44/100% one.