3-26-21
Sometimes songs won’t leave us alone! As a songwriter, my goal is that the words and melodies I compose will somehow touch people’s hearts. And I know I’ve done my job when people say they can’t get a song I’ve written out of their heads. I love it!
And that’s exactly what has happened to me with the song “Available.” I didn’t write it, but the words have settled into my soul, and I find myself singing it over and over and over.
The chorus goes like this:
I hear you call
I am available
I say, yes, Lord
I am available
Simple words that hold within them a powerful, powerful message of what we are called to as believers. To be in a place of total surrender, where we simply say yes when God calls us.
But what if saying yes means we have to let go of something else? What if saying yes goes against the plans we have made for our lives? What if saying yes means we don’t really know where we’re going to end up? That’s where it gets tough.
Reality is, we all have hopes and dreams and expectations for how our lives will unfold. So when God has something different planned for us, can we accept it, or do we fight back?
I’ve definitely done both in my life, and I’m guessing you have as well. I think about my infertility and how much I fought the different path I would walk in that season. It was painful, it left many scars, but it also led me to adopting my two beautiful boys, Christopher and Samuel. And then I got two added sons when I married John! What a bonus! I guess God knew the plan for my life much better than I did.
I read the parable of the four soils found in Luke 8 today. I used to think this parable was only talking about four different kinds of people: those who resist, those who are shallow, those who are distracted and those who get it and are good. But today as I read it, I realized that it’s also talking about four different attitudes. And the truth is, we can display all four different attitudes in the very same day!
I know I sure can. I’m trusting one minute and I’m crying out the next!
But God calls us into that place of deep surrender, where we are willing to say yes…no matter what.
Even when we don’t know or understand the how.
Even when we don’t know or understand the why.
Even when we don’t know or understand exactly where the path is leading us.
God is gently leading me through a season of deep and dangerous surrender. That place where I don’t have to understand. I simply need to say yes, Lord, I’m available. A place of obedience.
God is showing me that I have spent a great deal of my life dreaming big dreams, making big plans, and encountering big disappointments. My intentions were usually good, but I can get easily distracted and thrown off course because my course is set on my will and the way I believe things should turn out.
But the seed on good soil stands for those with a noble and good heart, who hear the word, retain it, and by persevering produce a crop.
Luke 8:15 (NIV)
I know that’s why the song Available keeps coming to my heart. It’s a song about surrender. It’s a song about being obedient. It’s a song about letting go of the outcomes. It’s a song that says, “I don’t know exactly what you have for me, Father, but all I have is yours. Use me as you will.”
How about you, my friend? Are you available? Are you willing to let God use your gifts? Are you willing to be obedient, even when you don’t see a clear path in front of you?
As I sat at my piano and sang this song once again today, I stood before God and declared with a humble heart that I was available and I would simply say yes to His will for me.
I hope you’ll join me!
Hugs and love,
Jill