Handel's Messiah - Not Just Another Music Score!

When I first experienced this work performed at our church, it was an eye-opener (and heart-opener and mind-opener, and subsequently a Bible-opener). It is as far away from being ‘just another concert’ as you standing in your living room is as far from Jupiter, and even farther away than that! Because it is the Gospel message directly from the Bible; it carries a life-saving urgency. The Messiah came and is coming again! A couple of notes of applicability from the sheet music of Messiah …

           Opening voices: Male voices sound the prophecy, exhortation, and God’s Grace provision. God’s people can feel comforted and assured that God will carry out his promised restoration of His people. He forgives sins. He has sent his messenger to make a pathway, to clear the way for the Anointed One – the Messiah. His promised restoration will raise up His people again, and in contemporary times, we are His messengers, we proclaim the Gospel and coming of Christ. His Holy Spirit makes it possible for us to receive the Messiah by breaking our mountains we have set against God in our sinful condition, and raises us to spiritual life.

Isaiah 40 --  ¹Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God.  ²Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem, and cry unto her, that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned: for she hath received of the LORD's hand double for all her sins. ³The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the LORD, make straight in the desert a highway for our God.  ⁴Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low: and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain:
Then the choir – all voices – forthtell the immensity of the Anointed One’s coming

⁵And the glory of the LORD shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together: for the mouth of the LORD hath spoken it.

Many people shun the truth of the Word – Jesus – but are happy to celebrate a holiday that is said to be about him. Just because folks reject him does not make him to be a nothing, or to be inconsequential – it is like being in front of a tsunami and saying it cannot bother you because you’re in a Hummer. The immensity of the wave is terrifying. On the other hand, those who have accepted Christ the Messiah as their Lord and King, and have been brought into fellowship with him, sense the immensity of God in another way. They already enjoy a revelation of God’s glory – measure by measure – within their lives. When brought into the family of God, God installs in us Himself in the presence of the Holy Spirit so that the Shekinah Glory remains with us and in us. All can witness God’s glory in those in whom God is present – if we continue to let our light shine before men and women. Why? Because God says so – He has purposed a people from before time and has brought them into His glorious light. (Matthew 5:16; 2 Corinthians 4:4) What He also says in this very short verse is that regardless of whether or not you accept the Messiah, you will see the Glory of God – either in a positive way, or in judgment.

                Malachi 3:1-3. Male voices speak of God’s preparation of His people for the day of His coming, and the choir responds

¹Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me: and the LORD, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in: behold, he shall come, saith the LORD of hosts.  ²But who may abide the day of his coming? and who shall stand when he appeareth? for he is like a refiner's fire, and like fullers' soap: ³And he shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver: and he shall purify the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver, that they may offer unto the LORD an offering in righteousness.

Fuller’s soap was a cleanser that was used to scour and scrub wool and cloth. In ancient times, cleaning a wool fabric was not as simple as taking it to the dry cleaners, or using Woolite. If you have ever seen the wool on a sheep, you recall that the wool is full of impurities and is dirty. The person called a Fuller had the job of taking the cloth woven with that wool and scrubbing and rubbing against a rock or other hard surface until it was reasonably clean. These were some very strong-armed folks. Hand-washing made extreme. Likewise, the task of purifying precious metals like gold and silver requires very, very hot fire to burn the impurities away. It is not an easy job standing in the heat of the furnace all day then processing the metal for purity. That is where the ‘karat’ and fineness designations fit in – they describe the purity of the metal.

For the ancient Israelite priests – the sons of Levi who were the only Israelites permitted to be priests, they understood the need for purification – they were handling sacred things, and standing before the very presence of God within the tabernacle and temple. They had to be made holy by God because they were entering a holy place. The blood of a perfect lamb would be sprinkled on the priests to cleanse them of their sins. Their clothing was made to specifications designed by God. It was and still is a fearful and humbling thing to stand before the Creator! And terrifying to come before Him unprepared. Without being made pure by God’s standards, it was impossible for the priest to offer up anything of worth to God. The book of Malachi speaks to how the priests had become wicked and had trashed the word of God. They worshipped other gods and mistreated the people. They refused to be sanctified and purified as God prescribed. Their offerings were worthless before God. Today, we are in the same situation. As a called-out, redeemed people, God has appointed us as his “holy nation of priests, a royal priesthood” (1 Peter 2:9) and we are tasked with the responsibility of carrying out worship in our spiritual temples - our bodies. We are purified, made pure by the fire of His Word (Jeremiah 23:29) and His transforming Holy Spirit (Matthew 3:11, Romans 15:16, 1 Corinthians 6:19-20), so that our worship can be acceptable to God. We who subject ourselves to the authority of the Word, are cleansed and we are also washed in the blood of the Lamb, as the Israelite priests were during the cleansing ritual. (see Eph. 5:26; 1 John 1:7; Revelation 7:14; 1 Peter 1:18-20) If we reject God’s Word and authority, and do not submit to His Holy Spirit’s counsel, we are in the same predicament as those priests spoken of in Malachi chapters 2 and 3, and come under the judgment of God.

            Next time, we will look at the succeeding airs and chorus pieces in “Messiah” so as to understand what we are saying when we share this Gospel with others.