Even G.F. Handel Was Miserable

They say that misery loves company but company doesn’t love your misery, or something like that.  For century upon century artisans have struggled with emotional highs and lows in their lives.  A tendency toward angst seems to be an occupational hazard for the artist.  In its own way it is a beautiful thing, the struggle.  The fight for true art, is filled with intense longings accompanied with periodic feelings of joy and loss.  While artisans are not the only ones who struggle, it is a consistent thread among the artistic community.  Of those who wrestle with these feelings, some embrace it and persevere. Others may respond by suppressing the art within believing that feeling anything is to feel everything and therefore too painful to endure.  Sadly, some succumb to the depressive side of the struggle, turning to substances or destructive habits in order to numb the pain which sends many artists over the edge into fits of insanity or even suicide.

Somewhere in the midst of these and other emotions is the intent of God to fashion the artist with joy for His glory and purposes.  There is a glimpse in the Scriptures that God has set a unique aspect of the imago dei into the heart of the artist. Viewed in the creation event, the Psalms, and the life of Christ, God’s love for the artist permeates the Word.  Though corrupted by the fall, the desire to create and experience the joy in sharing our “creations” with the rest of the world resemble God’s desire to share in creation.  (Gen. 1-3) The God who was, and is, complete within himself set out to create and share with that creation His greatest work of art.  Foreseeing the fall of man, He suffered the rejection of His Glory by His very own creation.  This rejection resulted in the perversion of all that He created and called “good”.  As creator, God perspicaciously peers into the heart of the artist.  Those who struggle deeply with feelings of not being understood or valued may be able to gain a small glimpse into what it meant for God to be rejected by His creation not only in the garden but at the cross as well. (Isa. 53) But in order to get that glimpse they must engage the struggle.

One such man who grappled with this was George Fredrick Handel.  The German born contemporary of J.S. Bach was afforded an excellent education and music career.  As he entered his mid-fifties he found himself heartbroken and jobless.  The very people he had given his life to, and the system that provided his ability to create and perform rejected him.  Discouraged, depressed, and in debt, a downcast Handel relocated to London where he sought solace with some friends and benefactors.  In 1741, at the age of 56 he was given a libretto by Charles Jennens on the birth and life of Christ.  Nearly all of the text was directly quoted directly from the King James Bible.  With a renewed enthusiasm, Handel wept as he secretly poured himself over the libretto.  In misery and joy the artist secluded himself on August 22 and emerged 24 days later with his first rendition of Messiah.  Over the next several years he would adapt and modify the work, but the essence of his creation was birthed. It likewise re-birthed his career as a musician earning him a lasting legacy transcending centuries and continents.

What seemed like the death nail to the career of this musician was merely the pathway to the one thing that would define his entire life.  The path through suffering produced a work from the heart of an artist the world has yet to forget.  It is interesting that what brought Handel through his depression and raised him to life again was complete immersion of the Gospel.  He is noted to have said, “I did think I did see all Heaven before me and the great God Himself.”  We cannot say with certainty, but it stands to reason that through his suffering and immersion in the Gospel, it appears that God shaped the heart of the artist and once again donned the pen of creation through the life of Handel.  When submitted to the Word of God, he was a redeeming instrument for his day and the generations that followed.