Curb | Word Entertainment recording artist Meredith Andrews is passionate about leading songs that keep people’s hearts and minds set on Jesus. Her inviting new single, “Make Room,” featuring friends Sarah Reeves and Chris McClarney, beautifully continues this mission. Written by Community Music’s Lucas and Evelyn Cortazio, Josh Farro and Rebekah White; produced by Andrew Bergthold (We The Kingdom) and mixed by Ainslie Grosser (for KING & COUNTRY), “Make Room” became an anthem for Andrews during the pandemic. Now, with her own collaborative version, the Dove Award winner hopes to encourage others to make space for God to move. In this TCB Exclusive, Meredith recalls her reaction to hearing “Make Room” for the first time and how the message of surrender really spoke to her. Andrews also talks about the 2021 release of her first all-Spanish album Ábrenos Los Cielos.
Congratulations on the recent release of “Make Room!” Why is the message of this track so important to you personally?
It’s very rare that I’ll release a song that I wasn’t a part of writing. But this song felt so much of what I’ve wanted to say to the Lord. It encapsulates it so perfectly. And I know who wrote it, they are friends of mine, and I was over at one of their houses a couple summers ago. Josh Farro and Rebekah Williams, writers of the song, were talking about “Make Room,” and they played it for me and I was just completely wrecked in the moment. Later that night they had a worship night at Josh’s house and the Cortazio’s (the other couple who wrote the song) were there as well and they played it live. I was again, on my face, during the worship night and it became a personal worship that I would go to when I was spending time with the Lord. I would listen to it over and over again as it was my heart cry. I want to make space for Him and want to live surrendered. It resonates with me so much. I didn’t write it, but it feels like I did.
How do you think the track was enhanced by collaboration with Chris and Sarah?
I know that Sarah and Chris have a similar mentality and mindset – it’s the posture of their heart. So it just made so much sense to collaborate with them. I love collaborations for so many reasons. But these are my friends and I know what they’re about and their track record and they are the same people onstage and offstage. So it just made sense to have them in on this song. And I love the picture of a collaboration because it’s a community with different voices that are lifting up the same message and truth. I love that they were willing to do it with me!
Is there a recurring lyric or theme you have noted from the listener responses you’ve received?
The bridge keeps getting highlighted. I don’t know of another song that says something like that in such a powerful way. It’s this idea of our traditions and religion being shaken up and broken off. While traditions can be good and honorable, that’s not the point. And I think sometimes in the past, the church has gotten caught up in tradition for tradition’s sake when God actually wants to do something brand new. If I’m really going to say I’m surrendering to Him and making room for Him to do whatever He wants to do, then that might mean He needs to break down this traditional religious scaffolding in order for us to really encounter His presence and know His heart. We can tend, as humans, to make it about so many external things, but what if God wants to do something new. What if He wants to show up in a way that feels a little uncertain, but it’s God. It’s a heart-cry for revival. We want to see Him in ways we haven’t seen Him before – so get rid of all the obstacles and all the things that will stand in our way of really experiencing Him in all of His fullness.
How are you looking to define success for this single compared to some of your other projects?
Well, in terms of success, I have learned a long time ago that success in the world’s eye is very different than success in God’s eye. Success in the world’s eye looks like accomplishment and numbers and growth and none of those things are bad. But success in the in the kingdom of God is obedience and surrender. So I felt very compelled to release this song. So for me, it was obedience and stepping out in faith. This isn’t even a type of strategy for world’s success; it’s just on my heart to sing and to say. I know it’s already been released and it didn’t need to be released again, but it was personal for me. I believe God always honors obedience and He gets to determine the outcome. I get to be obedient and make the choice of saying yes to the Lord and then I get to watch Him take it where He wants to take it.
Speaking of other projects, you released your first all Spanish album last year. It hasn’t been out quite a year, but how has that project impacted you?
Well I grew up with a love for the Spanish language. I went to Costa Rica for my first mission trip as a freshman in high school. Around that time I was taking Spanish classes; it came pretty natural to me and I really loved it. When I was in college I went to Guatemala a handful of times, and I was planning on moving there to work in an orphanage after college and then the Lord called me to Chicago, which is a whole other story. So it got put on the back burner. But I’ve always been drawn to Latin people and Spanish culture, and it’s just been a dream of mine to record music in Spanish. I’ve led worship in Spanish in multiple countries – Guatemala, Peru, Dominican Republic – to name a few, and I’ve just never had my own songs in Spanish until just recently. It’s a dream of mine that God has brought full circle years and years after I thought I was going to live in Guatemala. It was such an honor, and a challenge, to record these songs. Most of them had been released in English prior, with a few exceptions, and it was just so fun. A couple of verses in a few of the songs were just super challenging to get all the words in the way the melody had been written. Now it’s a whole new audience of people that get to hear it. It’s one thing for them to hear it in English and they understand it, but it’s another to hear it in Spanish, their mother language, their heart language. It means something more; it’s not just an intellectual understanding.
Who, or what, is currently providing inspiration for you, either musically or spiritually?
If you look for God, you find Him – anywhere and everywhere. So that’s where inspiration comes – daily life. I’m a mom of three kids and I’ve been home most days, not traveling a ton since COVID. A lot of days I’m home and leaning into this season of rest and learning from the Lord when I’m washing dishes, doing laundry, or in the car on the way to picking up my kids. I think we often overcomplicate things – really the Lord just wants to be a part of our day, every moment. If we give Him access, it’s amazing how He shows up and starts speaking and revealing Himself to us through the smallest things or the most mundane things. I do like to listen to podcasts, sermons, and audio bibles and books. So I draw a lot of inspiration from messages, but sometimes it’s good to just be quiet and listen for what God wants to tell me.
What are you most expectant for in 2022?
There are so many things because the last two years, for me, have been a lot of sowing. I really feel the year of 2022 is going to be a year of reaping. I mean that in pretty much every aspect of my life – my family, my own heart. It was a long season of sowing, longer than I anticipated, but what the Lord did during the last two years in my heart is in preparation for what He’s about to do in me, and the people around me, and the world. I’m expectant for God to show up in ways we have never seen in the earth, on a global scale.
