After a simple, beautiful, somewhat plaintive Overture … the lights come up revealing a small Italian village where two people are opposite each other, on stage and in life: a poor auto mechanic named Nemorino and the woman he loves, the pretty coquettish Adina, the women he loves, who torments him with her indifference and the fact that she falls in love not with him but with the military wonder Sergeant Belcore.

There is a scene where Adina is reading aloud the tale of Tristan and Isolde and the potion of love (which always reminds me of that song of my adolescent past sung by the Clovers, the Searchers, the Drifters, the Beatles … “Love Potion Number 9).

Nemorino decides that what he needs is just such a potion which is sold to him by a traveling snake oil Doctor Dulcamara.

I am describing of course the 19^th Century Opera, Elixir of Love, written by Gaetano Donizetti) which we saw last evening at the Santa Fe Opera.

If you have tickets to see this comic opera this season, I guarantee you will not be disappointed with the production.  And, without giving away all its secrets, I do have to say that I was most jealous of the priest (played by our own Paul Horpedahl, Production Director, Santa Fe Opera) who arrives in the beginning of the second act upon a chartreuse Vespa™!

It occurred to me last night that Donizetti’s opera is all about an unlikely person who is “chosen” (chosen, if you will, to be the one falling in love with someone who toys with his affection) and finds himself rejected.  And, in spite of the rejection, in fact, from the rejection itself … searches, struggles, does not give up with his quest, his purpose, his calling … and finally achieves the love he so earnestly desires … a love which comes, not easily nor without problems and trials, but comes because of his persistence and belief in that love.

Back about Wednesday of this past week, I entitled the Sermon for this Sunday, Unlikely Servants … Ministry of Rejection, because it seemed to me that this is exactly what today’s Readings have in common … the profound ways that unlikely people are involved in God’s purposes; and the rejection that so often comes in the face of such involvement …

David, the quite attractive hero of the Goliath Episode, who captured in marble by Michelangelo’s skill stands in the Effizi in Florence all beautiful and innocent … it is this David who has an affair with Bathsheba, effects the death of Uriah, her husband and is condemned by Nathan the Prophet.

Paul, the great articulator of faith in Jesus, the great 1^st Century missionary who is able to convince multitudes that in Christ was the very Presence of God … this one who begins his work not as a follower of Jesus, but as a persecutor of Christians, is also, and perhaps always throughout his ministry … afflicted, tormented, doubting, and the most unlikely candidate for convincing others of faith.

And Jesus, the one who is not without honour … except among those who question him … “This is the carpenter, right?  The son of Mary, the brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon …?” and curl up their noses as they speak.

Even the disciples, the ones called by Jesus to be the Band of Truth-Tellers, the Allegiance of Compassion, the Affiliates of Healing … they come from the lower classes, the workers, the ignored, the “let us walk away from them because they smell of fish”  … yes, these who occupy our stain-glass windows and icons with such boldness are the unlikely servants who get sent out into the world to face rejection and refusal.

I am reminded of that wonderful scene in Jesus Christ Superstar where the 12 are sitting around drinking too much wine, their own Love Potion of the Gospel, and sing:

Look at all my trials and tribulations

Sinking in a gentle pool of wine

Don't disturb me now I can see the answers

Till this evening is this morning life is fine

Always hoped that I'd be an apostle

Knew that I would make it if I tried

Then when we retire we can write the gospels

So they'll still talk about us when we've died.

These stories of faithful devotion are there for us, not because they are cute and funny and often absurd, but because they are true.

All 13 of us standing and sweltering in the un-air-conditioned Augustus Lutheran Church in Trappe, Pennsylvania and waiting our turn to be Ordained on May 21, 1972 … all of us realized I think how unlikely we were to face the task of Ministry.  Standing there, we knew our sins all too well, they stood out before us in the bold print of our minds; we knew our inadequacies, our shortcomings, our complete unprepared-ness – despite all those years of education – for the Ministry … and yet, we all spoke our “Yes, by the help of God” responses as we faced the Bishops of the Church, and hands were laid upon our heads, and stoles upon our shoulders.

We learned as we were “sent out” that it is the Gospel that calls us, not the other way around, it is the Gospel that brings healing and love into the world, not our ideas of wonder, nor our imaginations of how great we would become, how many people would flock to hear our words, our thoughts … no, it was and is the Gospel.

Where are the unlikely servants of God today?  They are sitting here this morning … you and me.  The teachers, mentors, helpers, healers, companions, parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, children, relatives, partners, singers, writers … and on and on and on.  We are the most unlikely candidates for the position of “ministry” and yet it is through us that the Gospel comes into the world, through us that the light comes into the darkness, through us that world learns to love God and each other.