I was recently reading Ann Voskamp’s devotional companion to her book One Thousand Gifts and she talked about how music is made on a guitar by plucking the string. She explained that “Music is made in stress” and tells how a guitar string has to be moved and pulled tight before it can release music. This made me stop and think about other ways music is made. A drum is silent until it is struck. A tambourine must be shaken and struck. Trumpets, horns, and the like must have wind blown through them. The keys of a piano must be pressed before a sound emerges.
The more I thought about it, I realized she was right; music is indeed made in stress. The more I thought about this, I realized that all the stress in my life has the potential to make some beautiful music. If music is made in stress, then I have the opportunity to allow the stress in my life to make a beautiful melody. “I will give to the Lord the thanks due to His righteousness, and I will sing praise to the name of the Lord, the Most High” Psalm 7:17. Scripture is full of commands to praise God and to lift our praises up to Him. Each day is an opportunity for me to decide what I will do.
Will I allow Him to help me make beautiful music out of the stress or will my voice be raised in complaint and frustration? I do have a choice. I can choose to look for Him in the midst of the trials, choosing to ask Him to show me how to bring a beauty out of the mess. Will I allow myself to bend with the stress, allowing the music to pour forth from my soul? Or will I refuse to bend and like the drum, have to be struck in order for the music to come forth? What will it take to allow the music to be made in my life? What will it take to make me sing His praise?
Each instrument makes its own unique and beautiful sound just as each of us has our own unique God-given voice with which to praise Him. The guitar must be plucked, its strings moved and pulled tight before its music is released. For some of us that is all that it takes for the music to come. God just has to move us out of our comfort zone, pull us tightly against Him and the worship music flows from our hearts. We just needed Him to set us free and help us to make the music He created us to make. We were waiting for Him to release the melody deep within our hearts.
Others are like the tambourine. He has to shake us up a bit more before the music starts to flow. And still others are like the drum, we must be struck before the music flows. “My suffering was good for me, for it taught me to pay attention to Your decrees” Psalm 119:71. Some of us are a little more hard-headed or maybe we are too fearful. Whatever the case may be; it takes a little more to get our music flowing, but once it comes, it has the potential to be a beautiful symphony. We can take our stresses, our wounds and allow God to teach us to make a melody in our hearts for Him.
I don’t pretend to know all the answers, but I know that I want my life to be a beautiful song that tells of His glory. I want the song of my life to reveal the real Hero of my story, the One who has brought me through every trail I have faced. I know next to nothing about how to make beautiful music; I only have a deep appreciation for beautiful music that speaks to my soul. And that’s what I want my life’s song to be… beautiful music that speaks to the soul and displays the glory of the One who gave me a song to sing. “Let them praise His name with dancing making melody to Him…” Psalm 149:3
Let everything that hath breath praise the Lord! Praise the Lord! Psalm 150:6
Oh sing to the Lord a new song; sing to the Lord, all the earth! Psalm 96:1
I will sing of steadfast love and justice; to you, O Lord, I will make music. Psalm 101:1
Katrina Douglas
