The Masterpiece Born in Ruins

When George Frideric Handel sat down in his London apartment in August 1741, his career was in shambles. The once-celebrated composer was deeply in debt, partially paralyzed from a stroke he had suffered four years earlier, and facing the real possibility that his best work was behind him. He was fifty-six years old, and failure clung to him like a shadow.

Then a libretto arrived from Charles Jennens — a collection of scripture passages telling the story of the Messiah. Handel began to compose. For twenty-four days, he barely ate or slept. Music poured out of him with a force he could not explain. When he finished the Hallelujah Chorus, his servant found him weeping at his desk. "I did think I did see all Heaven before me," Handel reportedly said, "and the great God Himself."

Messiah premiered in Dublin in April 1742 and has never stopped being performed since.

Here is what strikes me about Handel's story: faith does not wait for ideal conditions. He did not compose Messiah from a place of strength. He composed it from a place of ruin. And the Almighty met him there — not after the mess was cleaned up, but right in the middle of it.

El Shaddai has never required that we get ourselves together before He begins His work in us. He asks only that we sit down, pick up whatever instrument He has placed in our hands, and begin.