Brass Instruments in Biblical Worship

(This article originally appeared in the October 2018 edition of the church newsletter.)

Thanks to the generous support of Dr. Dennis and Marci Finton, I’m pleased to report that the French Creek Brass Quintet will once again be enriching our worship with their musical talents several times over the next year.  The first will be on Reformation Sunday, October 28^th, at the 11:00 service.  We’re actually quite fortunate to have such a fine group of brass players available to us here in Meadville.  I realize that in the past I’ve written articles on the organ, handbells, and piano, but I’ve never taken the opportunity to say anything about the use of brass instruments in worship.  So let’s do that now!

With all due respect to those 16^th-century Reformers who felt that instrumental music had no place in worship (I’m looking at you, John Calvin), there is ample Biblical evidence to the contrary.  Before metalwork was practical for the nomadic Jews, their instrument of choice was the shofar, a ram’s horn.  It’s unlikely that actual melodies were played on this instrument: Exodus 19, Leviticus 23, and Joshua 6 imply that the shofar’s function was simply to make a loud noise — an auditory signal of God’s presence.  (Even to this day, observant Jews blow the shofar on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.)

Fast-forward a few centuries to the time of David and Solomon, and it’s clear that a variety of metallic instruments were now in use by the musician-priests.  A nameless chronicler describes the scene as the Ark of the Covenant is ceremonially brought into Jerusalem’s newly-dedicated temple:

“Now when the priests came out of the holy place…and all the Levitical singers…stood east of the altar with a hundred and twenty priests who were trumpeters (and it was the duty of the trumpeters and singers to make themselves heard in unison in praise and thanksgiving to the Lord), and when the song was raised, with trumpets and cymbals and other musical instruments…the house of the Lord was filled with a cloud, so that the priests could not stand to minister because of the cloud; for the glory of the Lord filled the house of God.”  (II Chronicles 5:11-14)

In the New Testament we find passages where the function of these instruments is not praise but proclamation: 

“And the seven angels which had the seven trumpets prepared themselves to sound.  The first angel sounded…”  (Revelation 8:6)

“The trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.” (I Corinthians 15:52)

And proclaim we will, loudly and boldly!  Hope to see you on October 28^th, or even before.