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Year - B

Second Sunday in Ordinary Time

READ: (1 Sam 3: 3-19; 1 Cor 6: 13-15, 17-20; Jn 1: 35-42)

REFLECT: A call to Glorify God…

Dear friends, today we are in the second Sunday in ordinary time. The readings of the day invite us to value our call to Christian discipleship and give glory to God in our lives. Our call to Christian discipleship or vocation to Christian living is great at service, when we glorify God or do things that manifests the glory of God. It is not enough to proclaim “all for the glory of God” rather we need to really feel it, live by or live for it. As someone has very beautifully said, “glorifying God means feeling and thinking and acting in ways that reflect God’s greatness, that make much of God, that give evidence of the supreme greatness of all his attributes and all satisfying beauty of his manifold perfections.” Yes, glorifying God would mean that we reflect his image of kindness, compassion, love, forgiveness to all without any bias. We give due recognition to God as he really isand respond to God accordingly. Therefore, based on the liturgy of the word of God, I would like to share with you three points of reflection as how we can glorify God in our lives as Christians.

1.     Listen to God:

Pope Francis very beautifully tells us, “Listening with the ear of the heart,” invites us to reflect that listening involves more than simply the sense of hearing. True listening is a foundation of genuine relationships, and is foundational to the relationship between God and humanity. Pope Francis reiterates by quoting St Paul, noted that “faith comes through hearing.” Listening corresponds to the humble style of God,who reveals Himself by speaking, and by listening to men and women recognizes them as His partners in dialogue. Human beings are called in turn to tune in, to be willing to listen, as God calls them to a covenant of love. Fundamentally, the listening is a dimension of love. Yes, listening makes a lot of difference in our lives. There is a difference between hearing and listening too. We hear a quite a lot of sound but we listen what is important and essential, that we wish and want. So for a listening we need to lend our ears hard and deep, so that we get rightly what someone tells or wishes to communicate.

Something similar in the first reading from First Samuel we find, how Samuel is called by God and he did not understand that God was calling him. Perhaps, it was Eli the priest makes him understand that God calls Samuel. Moreover, Eli confirms the call of God as three times God calls Samuel that it was not just a hallucination or a dream rather a genuine call from God and makes Samuel to respond to God with a phrase, “Speak Lord, your servant is listening.” Yes, listening to God is the only way to lead life in happiness and peace; listening to God is the only way we could find our purpose and plans achieved; listening to God is surest way of becoming God’s children.

Today most of us are faced with a lack of listening. We have learnt to talk lot but hardened our hearts to listen to God or to others in our lives. The lack of listening to one another fails us to respect God and others; the lack of listening to God brings about a friction in relationships with God, family and the society. It is a reminder for each one of us to with an attitude of listening to God in prayer to develop intimacy with God, to nurture the relationship with one another in the family or society. So let us inculcate in us the attitude to listen to God and his voice. When we listen to God, God makes us understand his designs for us, God helps us to respond to Christian vocation positively, God enables us to become worthwhile Christians by life that we live and lead. May God bless us with the gift of listening to him and to others for a better relationship.

2.     Realize the Spirit of God in us:

Pope Francis very beautifully tells us, “The Holy Spirit is the life of the Church, it’s your life, my life.We are temples for the Holy Spirit and must guard the Holy Spirit, so much so that Paul advises Christians not to sadden the Holy Spirit. That’s to say, not to have a conduct contrary to the harmony the Holy Spirit makes within us and in the Church. It is harmony, it gives harmony to this building.So Pope Francis tells us that people are like living stones unique and different and each one contributes something to the Church’s construction, according to the gift he or she was given by God.” Yes, holy spirit is the life of Church, its members. We need to realize and respond to the promptings of the Holy Spirit accordingly. Today, we have forgotten the third person of the Holy Trinity, the Holy Spirit in our lives. We received at the time of Baptism and confirmation, perhaps we think of the Holy Spirit at the time of Pentecost day, the birth of the Church. But do we make efforts to realize the Holy Spirit in us and the spirit of God that Guides, animates and accompanies our life?

What makes all of us to fail to realize the gifts and fruits of the Holy Spirit in our lives is our lack of openness to receive the spirit and accept the spirit of God as part of our daily living. We have engrossed in spirts that leads us astray today. They are like negative impacts of life; the bitter experiences of life and painful and sorrowful past make us fail to realize the gifts and fruits of the Spirit. Perhaps, the spirit of God makes us active and alive; the spirit of God assits us to resist the evil ways and tempting powers of the world; the spirit of God enables us to see what God wants of us; the spirit of God accompanies, animates and assures our lives with the ever-living presence of God; the spirit of God brings us joy and enthusiasm to the dead bones and wearied bodies. Today we need to realize the gift of life that we have received from the spirit of God. That can only be possible, when we understand the importance of the sprit of God in our lives.

That’s perhaps, second reading from St. Paul’s letter to Corinthians reminds us that we have no rights over our bodies to abuse or misuse, because we are God’s as the spirit of God dwells in us. When we have no control our bodies, how could we misuse or abuse our own bodies? It is a serious question we need to introspect and act on in life. Today, there are many forms of abuse and misuse of body, because we have not understood that we are all temples of the holy spirit and the spirit of God dwells in us. There is lots of misuse and abuse, because we have taken undue control over us and have failed to realize that God is the ultimate life-giver or life taker.

As Pope Francis too teaches us that we profess that the Holy Spirit is the giver of life and warns that without the Holy Spirit,the Church would not be the living Bride of Christ, but, at most, a religious association. We are temples of the Holy Spirit who dwells in us. We cannot lock the Spirit out of the house, or park Him in some devotional zone! No, at the centre! Each day we need to say: 'Come, for without Your strength, we are lost.” Yes, today this shall be our prayer in times of temptation and test to the Holy Spirit to come and strengthen us to overcome the power of evil and the devil. I am sure, when the spirit of God animates and accompanies us, we would be drawn closer to God. So let us allow the spirit of God to take control of whole-self, so that we completely belong to God and become part of God’s divine plan in our live.

3.     Seek for and stay with God:

Seeking and staying with God is another form of giving glory to God in our lives. We seek what we want, therefore, our seeking and searching needs to be right and correct. Our stay with God as well determines, with whom we want to accommodate our entire living on earth. Once, the seeking and staying with God is confirmed, our destination and purpose too will have meaning. That’s what we find in the Gospel reading of the day.

John the Baptist rightly shows to the disciples, “Behold the lamb of God.” Therefore, the disciples have to make a right choice to seek and stay. We see that the disciples seek the lamb of God and wish to stay with God. The two basic questions in the gospel reading invite us to understand the cost of discipleship and the purpose of Christian living to seek and stay with the right person. The first question “what do you seek?” was asked by Jesus to the disciples. The second question “where do you stay?” was asked by disciples to Jesus. Jesus wanted to know what the disciples are seeking for and the disciples wanted to know where does Jesus stay. Yes, their seeking was right that is the lamb of God and they preferred to stay with God to obtain grace and blessing to follow.

Pope Francis very beautifully tells us, “You can, you must try to seek God in every human life. Although the life of a person is a land full of thorns and weeds, there is always a space in which the good seed can grow. You have to trust God.” Yes, we need to seek God always in human life although at times we are faced with misery and misunderstanding of God’s divine plan for us. Seeking God presupposes our desire and trust in God. When we seek for God and God’s ways, our lives begin to move on the right perspectives and proper direction. Today most of have gone into wrong hands or wrong path, because we are not seeking God or God’s ways rather our limited ways with lots of limitations or worldly ways that dissuade and deviate our focus from God. Christian vocation and its call to discipleship demands from us to seek God and find God in everything to be his children.

Moreover, pope Francis too mentions that “To stay with Jesus requires the courage to leave.To leave what? Our vices and our sins, certainly, which are like anchors that hold us at bay and prevent us from setting sail. But it is also necessary to leave behind what holds us back from living fully, such as fear, selfish calculations, the guarantees that come from staying safe, just getting by.” Yes, staying with God requires courage, commitment and conviction. If we prefer to stay with God, we make a vow to God to leave behind all that is worldly, because worldly pleasures, worldly promises are just a eye-wash, worldly powers mislead and make the power of God to consider the least in our lives. Therefore, it is a challenge for all of us Christians to live or love the vocation or call that God has given us as gift. So let us seek God in everything and find God in everything to see a world with love and compassion. Let us stay with God and stay away from all that hinders us to be with God and manifest ourselves as God’s children, disciples of Christ and members of the church inaugurated by Christ.

RESPOND:

Do we listen to God’s voice and discern his will in our lives to answer our call to Christian living?

Do we realise the Spirit of God in us and it’s animating and accompanying presence in our lives?

Do we seek God and God’s ways? Do we stay with God or stay with all that is worldly?

Let us glorify God by listening to his voice always, realising the presence of the Holy Spirit in us, by seeking and staying with God to make the bond of relationship strong. Amen.

 God bless us all! Live Jesus!

Fr. Ramesh George MSFS

rameshvkmsfs@gmail.com

9500930968