EECC 1.3: Liturgy—Worship Styles (Critique)

This is the final post concerning worship styles, but the liturgy discussion will continue on after this. For now, we shall approach the concerns, benefits, and detriments of the chosen worship style of the Churches of Christ, that is (predominantly, anyway), a cappella.

A Small Note of Thanks

Due to the job hunt on my part and Mr. Fisher's absence as he does God's work in Ukraine, the posts for the summer have been few and far between. Yet, for some strange reason, you people are still reading this blog. So to you I wish to offer a moment of thanks. I think as a blogger it can become dreadfully easy to forget one's audience. Even preachers, whose audiences are fairly consistent (given a steady location, that is), can forget who is listening.

EECC 1.2: Liturgy—Worship Styles (Rationale & Rebuttal)

Introduction
As we have seen, the primary mode of lyrical worship for the CofCs is a cappella, that is, solely vocal music. But where does this idea come from? Why do we primarily stick to a cappella music? The most common argument I've heard is that it is "scriptural". By this my fellows have generally assumed an argument from silence. This is when something is based on what is not said rather than what is. It is not stated explicitly in the New Testament that Christians (Jewish or Gentile) worshipped using anything but their voices. Aside from the argument from silence, there is one primary passage which has been used to defend an "a cappella only" stance: Ephesians 5.19, and using only a small section of this short verse: