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Music: Exhortation

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I’m drawing on Jim Jordan’s Biblical Horizons lectures from this summer.

“Be filled with the Spirit,” Paul writes, “speaking to one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord.”

The Spirit is the music of the Trinity, the breath that gives melody to the Word of the Father. When we’re filled with the Spirit, we sing.

Just like David.

When the Spirit departs from Saul, it comes to rest on David. Immediately, Saul’s servants call David to come to the palace to play the harp to drive the evil spirits from Saul. As at Pentecost, the Spirit loosens David’s tongue and hands and inspires music. More specifically, He inspires music that puts demons to flight.

That’s what we’re doing every week in worship. We come together to sing in the Spirit. When we sing with vigor and energy and volume, we’re scouring the land, chasing demons away. The Spirit trains our hands and our tongues for musical warfare.

Pastor Sumpter will be preaching about the family later this morning, and it’s striking that Paul’s exhortation to sing in the Spirit comes immediately before his teaching on husbands and wives in the home.

If the Spirit has filled your home, it will be a home full of song. And when the home is full of song, the devils cower. On the other hand: If you’re not singing in your home, ask yourself: Are the fruits of the Spirit there? Or does your home seem more demon-infested than Spirit-filled?

So, sing in the Spirit and make melody, and don’t give the devil an opportunity.

posted by Peter J. Leithart on Sunday, August 31, 2008 at 5:37 am

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Music: Exhortation

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