When the Music Comes from Ruin

In the summer of 1741, George Frideric Handel was a ruined man. At fifty-six, he was paralyzed by debt, abandoned by London audiences who had grown tired of his operas, and weakened by a stroke that had partially crippled his right hand years earlier. His career appeared finished.

Then a libretto arrived from Charles Jennens — a collection of scripture passages telling the story of Christ from prophecy to resurrection. Something stirred in Handel. He began to compose.

For twenty-four days, he barely ate or slept. Servants left trays of food outside his door and retrieved them untouched. When his assistant found him after completing the Hallelujah Chorus, Handel was weeping. "I did think I did see all Heaven before me," he said, "and the great God Himself."

What emerged was Messiah — a work that has moved audiences for nearly three centuries. But it was born not from triumph but from a man who had nothing left except the scriptures set before him and the faith to begin writing.

This is how the Almighty so often works. He does not wait for us to have everything together. He meets us in our emptiness. Hebrews 11:1 tells us faith is "the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." Handel could not see a future. But he picked up his pen anyway.

Faith is not the absence of ruin. It is the willingness to compose in the middle of it.