We are to sing in New Testament Worship.

     There are certain things which are described in the New Testament as thing the first century Christians did in worship to God with God’s approval.  There is prayer (I Thessalonians 5:17).  There is the Lord’s supper and teaching or preaching (Acts 20:7).  There is the giving of our means (1 Corinthians 16:2).  And then there is singing.  Paul told the Ephesians to, "be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess; but be filled with the Spirit; Speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord; Giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ" (Ephesians 5:18-20).  This is a declaration of Paul, the inspired apostle, for us to sing one to another.  We see that Jesus sang with his disciples. "And when they had sung an hymn, they went out into the mount of Olives"  (Matthew 26:30).  And we see another admonition by James, "Is any among you afflicted? let him pray. Is any merry? let him sing psalms"  (James 5:13).  So it is clear that singing is something that the Lord wants us to do.
     But then someone comes along and says that no where in the New Testament does it say that we are to sing in worship.  They will ask you to show them when we are told to sing in worship.  Many people are convinced by this argument that we have no command to sing in worship.  However, we are commanded to sing in the assemblies.  Listen to the words of Paul, "Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom; teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord"  (Colossians 3:16).  Most people will agree that this is an admonition to sing, but few see where it applies to the assemblies of the saint.  The setting of this command is the assemblies and we will find this in the words "in you."  In the English language the word "you" can be either singular or plural.  It just so happens that in this verse it is plural.  It is the same word that is translated in Romans 1:13 "among you" and therefore is speaking of the assemblies of the saints.  Whence, we are commanded to sing the assemblies.

Make a joyful noise.

     From time to time it will be said by a brother or sister in Christ, "I am glad we are told to make a joyful noise."  Most of the time this is said to break the ice and encourage some to sing even though they do not consider themselves very good at the thing.  However, I am also persuaded that some people may be using this statement as an excuse not to improve their singing.   We might want to take a look at the word "noise" which is used in this way.  Look at the way it is described by Strong:
        to shout, raise a sound, cry out, give a blast
         (Hiphil)
             1) to shout a war-cry or alarm or battle
             2) to sound a signal for war or march
             3) to shout in triumph (over enemies)
             4) to shout in applause
             5) to shout (with religious impulse)
             6) to cry out in distress
    With a close study of this definition we can see that the word is not used in reference to the quality of the sound made but to the loudness of the sound made.  Also this phrase is found seven times in the Bible and all seven times is in the book of Psalms.  As we all know, we do not live by the Old Testament today, so lets not use this statement as an excuse to not improve our singing.

How well are we to sing?

     No doubt someone is going to accuse me of binding where God has not bound and say that I am saying that everyone must learn how to read music.  That is not at all what I am doing.  However, there is something that we need to understand.  Since the beginning of time God has always expected and demanded that his people give unto Him the best they have to offer.  In Genesis 4:4 we find that Abel brought an offering of the firstlings of the flock.  This would have been the best of the animals he had.  Under Judaism they were commanded to give the best they had and not the maimed and lame animals.  However not everyone was fortunate enough to even have a flock of sheep.  Therefore, God made a provision in the Law that they could offer turtledoves or pigeons, a very inexpensive animal.  But whether it was pigeons or lambs, they were the best that the person had to offer.
     Our singing should be no different today.  There are some people who can sing better than others.  But this should not be used as an excuse not to improve our singing individually and as a congregation.  We are each still expected to give unto God the best that we have, whether it be equal to the pigeons or equal to the lambs.  We should all try to improve our singing.  It should not be done to try to impress people or to earn a name, but to worship God to best of our ability.

We are just tuning up while here.

    Our entire life while on earth is to prepare for life in eternity.  John pictures Heaven as a place where God’s servants sing praise to him.  It is hard for me to picture a person being happy in Heaven if they do not love to sing to the best of their abilities.