The Calling That Would Not Let Him Rest

By the summer of 1741, George Frideric Handel was a man the London music world had written off. His Italian operas no longer drew audiences. Creditors pressed him. Four years earlier, a stroke had paralyzed his right side, and though he recovered at the thermal baths in Aachen, the toll on his body and spirit was real. At fifty-six, the German-born composer seemed destined for obscurity.

Then Charles Jennens, a wealthy librettist, delivered a Scripture compilation to Handel's home at 25 Brook Street in London. On August 22, Handel sat down to compose. For the next twenty-four days he worked with extraordinary intensity, rarely leaving his rooms, barely eating. Page after page of arias, choruses, and recitatives poured from his pen. By September 14, the full orchestration of Messiah was complete — 259 pages of music drawn entirely from the Word of God.

When his servant found him after completing the "Hallelujah" chorus, Handel reportedly said through tears, "I did think I did see all Heaven before me, and the great God Himself."

Ephesians 5:19 calls believers to make melody "in your heart to the Lord." Notice that Paul does not say to sing only when life is easy or the audience is large. The melody begins in the heart, in the hidden place where calling stirs even when circumstances say stop. Handel's twenty-four days remind us that God's call does not wait for perfect conditions. It finds us in debt, in weakness, in the rooms where no one is watching — and asks us to open our mouths and sing.