Sing to the Lord - Make Room
Continuing my story of songs - Make Room.
Here's excerpt of the lyric.
Every burden, every crown
Every lie and every doubt
This is my surrender
And I will make room for You
To do whatever You want to
One Sunday morning in early June, as my family and I were on our way to church, this song (which I have never heard before) randomly played on our Spotify - 'Make Room'.
It has a lovely tune and I instantly loved it. That being said, a strange and funny thing happened. As I said, it was the first time I heard the song, but when I heard the words 'I will make room for You to do whatever You want to', tears welled up in my eyes.
Something inside of me resonated with the song. In fact, something inside of me resonated with every word of the lyric. When the chorus came again the 2nd time round, I was already crying, whispering to the words 'I will make room for You, to do whatever You want to'.
To say my husband and children were taken aback was an understatement. The entire car was silent, save for the song and my crying voice singing to it. 😅
Since then, 'Make Room' has become one of my favourite songs, playing on repeat in my house and in the car.
And whenever I sang the song, somehow an impression/ image of the upper room comes to mind. As though I'm making the room available for Jesus.
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After a few days of singing, I thought to myself, 'Something's not quite right here...'
Because, how can I say I 'make room' for my Jesus when, really, He should have the entire room? 😆
Thereafter, every time I sang the song, something just felt a lil bit different. A bit off.
Something in my heart disposition shifted ever so slightly - from 'I will make room for You, Lord' to 'I should 'more than' make room for You, Lord'.
I became more and more conscious of asking my heart, if I am ready to give the entire room to Jesus. And at times, I felt like I wasn't quite ready yet, if I were to be completely honest. 😔
Then July and August came.
And many incidents happened in these 2 months, that gave me a renewed sense of revelation whenever I sing these 2 lines now.
Shake up the ground of all my religion.
Because as it is, the Lord has been shaking up all my beliefs about what it looks like to love Him. And what it means to serve Him.
I had gone through the first half of 2023, desiring and excited to do more, to serve more, to give more, to learn more. More for God, more for church. Well, just more, in short.
I had felt like if God wants all of me, then I would give Him more of me. More of my heart, more of my talents, more of my resources, more of my time, more of my effort. More of everything.
Because obviously, I couldn't give Him my all. At least not now.
I have (and love) my family. My children are still young. I'm still working.
So I gave and do what I could. And for a (short) time, I was genuinely joyful in my serving. Although there were ups and downs all the way in this season, I had just wanted to do and give to the best that I can, within the constraint and confines that I am in.
Yet slowly, the 'do my best with what I can' became not enough.
Things spiralled downward. I don't know when or how but along the line, it just swayed from my original intention. Maybe the demands got heavier, maybe the expectation got higher (be it internal or external). But I find myself feeling a guilt rising inside of me whenever I sang the song, Make Room. Because I was clearly, just merely 'making room' for Jesus. And that shouldn't be enough.
That's what I had thought.
In hindsight now, I know that was my flesh speaking. Or a religious spirit tormenting me. Because, even if God has wanted more of me, it would not have come as an accusing, guilt-tripping voice. The voice of the Holy Spirit is always only ever gentle and loving, right?
I remember sharing this unrest with a godly counsel - the 'want to do so much more yet can't' tension.
To which the godly advise given to me was this: While I don't minimise the desire to do things for God, perhaps the Lord is working through this situation to bring change? Change in the sense of being satisfied with God as your reward.
At the time, I didn't think much of it. (I was going through a rough patch and had, obviously, departed from my rest in Christ.)
But right now, with hindsight knowledge, I looked back at that few months and realised that, in all my doing, serving, giving, I had gone off-course. I had lost sight of the hands of my Christ and shifted my focus on to my own hands instead.
I don't know how else to describe this but, it was as though Him holding my hand was no longer enough. I got distracted (much like Martha), thinking that my hands are more fruitful elsewhere - serving Him in His house, ministering to His people, doing His work. Utterly convinced that, that is what pleases Him.
And alas, I let go of that hand. (Sad but true.)
Needless to say, instead of feeling joy and fulfilment, I felt a dread.
As I served more, I have, somehow, lost the joy of serving. Each time I was 'doing' something, I found myself longing to stop. Stop and go back to my Bible, stop and go back to my praying. Or stop and simply go back to doing nothing and be Mary again.
I realised I didn't want to 'do church'.
Now please don't misunderstand, I love my church. I simply do not feel joy 'running church'.
Yet, at the same time, I felt torn and guilt-ridden for feeling so, because, surely, all God-loving children would want to serve in their Father's house.
(OK, I need to emphasise here - we should serve in our Father's house, meeting needs where and how we can. I'm not saying that church is not good, please don't get me wrong. My situation was one of a subtle distraction from my flesh, to the point that it has robbed me of my rest in God.)
I was restless.
I stopped singing the song 'Make Room'.
Until...
Something happened in July, which forced (and allowed) me to step down, take a step back and take stock of where I had wandered off to and ended up in.
And then, I remembered - that original longing I had, just to be with Him.
And then, one day, this song played again on my playlist.
This is my surrender
And I will make room for You
To do whatever You want to
Truly, the Lord has shaken up the ground of all my traditional belief and all my religiosity.
Just last week, as I sang this song, a new impression/ image came to my mind.
As I make room for Christ, I evict all else from the room. Handing over the entire room for Him.
But as He comes and takes residence (taking up the entire room), He does not displace any of the things that I hold dear - my family, my church, my friends, my serving.
As I see this image, a greater revelation dawned on me -
I used to think that, when I make room for Him to do whatever He wants to, it would look like answering His call to meet the needs in His house, it would look like obeying His call to minister and help others, it would look like fulfilling His call on my life. (I wrote about my revelation on walking in His calling here, which again is what the Lord has been teaching and working in me lately.)
But I could not be more wrong.
I found out that when I make room for Him "to do whatever He want to", what He want is really just for me to be with Him.
Maybe, all this while, He was just waiting for me to realise this.
Waiting for me to put aside all my burden, all my crown, all the lies, all my doubt, all tradition and all religion. And make room for Him.
Beloved in Christ,
I guess a question worth asking today - have we made room for Him?
