HOMILY: 2ND SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME, YEAR B
HOMILY: 2ND SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME, YEAR B
BY: Rev Fr Stephen ‘Dayo Osinkoya
1 Samuel 3:3-10
Psalm 40
1 Corinthians 6:13-15, 17-20
John 1:35-42
Can we recognize the voice of someone we have not met? I suppose your answer is NO! So also it is with the Lord. We need to have known the Lord if we must be able to recognize his voice speaking to us in our daily lives. But there is no way we can know the Lord if his word had not been revealed to us (Cf. 1 Sam. 3:7) So we need someone to help us come to know the Lord; after which we would be able to recognize his voice and in turn help others to know him.
ALSO RECOMMENDED: 2ND SUNDAY: HOMILY IN ORDINARY TIME (YEAR B)
Last Sunday we celebrated the Baptism of the Lord and in my homily I pointed out the meaning of this feast for us, namely; a reminder of our identity as children of God and a reminder of our mission as witnesses to the Gospel of Christ. So my homily today picks up from this our call to witnessing. Being a disciple is an important aspect of our calling as baptised Christians. Being a disciple is the way we give witness to our faith, the way we attend to the call to evangelise the world. “Behold, the Lamb of God!” says John in the Gospel passage of today. Beloved in Christ, when we have Christ pointed out to us the same way John pointed him out to his own disciples, our response is not expected to be any different from those disciples’. An immediate positive response is expected of us upon our encounter with Christ.
“Behold, the Lamb of God!” These words, which we hear at every Mass, are decisive words. These words are meant to excite and challenge us as Christ’s disciples. We are expected to say to others we encounter in our daily lives “Behold the Lamb of God!” as John did to his own disciples. With this pointing we would be fulfilling the meaning of our own lives as God’s children and witnesses to the Gospel.
God calls everyone of us. But there are many forms that God’s call takes. But it is very few who experience God’s call in an impressive a way as Samuel’s. But what is essential remains the same, regardless of what form our call may take. That is, there is someone from whom we somehow hear, “Behold, the Lamb of God. See him! Listen to him! He is the one who fulfils your longing and your hope, who will make you happy!” It could be your parents. It could be any of your children, or any of your siblings. It could as well be your priest or a Religious. It could just be any of those closest to us and that in return we have the confidence to say this also to others.
If we apply these call situations in our readings today to our own daily life situations, I feel that often we are so busy that we either don’t hear God calling, or we do hear God and mistake His voice for something else in our busy lives. And this is where spiritual direction becomes essential. This is where we need someone like John the Baptist to show us the one whose voice we should listen to and someone like the prophet, Eli to tell us how to respond. If only we can simply relax into prayer, and say to God, “OK. I am here. I am listening. Speak to me”, we might actually hear what God is telling us in our lives. The Psalm picks up on this theme as well. “I waited patiently for the Lord.” (Ps. 40:1) If only we can take the time to listen and be patient, then would he put into our mouth His praise (Ps. 40:3), which we shall declare to all nations and we like Samuel would not let any of His words fall to the ground.
Finally, we should ask ourselves: Do we talk to others about Jesus, about the Christ? I don’t mean get a public address system and stand on the corner of the street shouting out to others! But do we talk to others about Christ? Do we share the joy of our faith – the joy of knowing Christ? Like Andrew did when he told Simon his brother, “We have found the Messiah.” It is easy to talk about Christ to fellow Catholics or fellow parishioners, but how do we engage the outside world, many of those who have heard the gospel but do not know how to respond to its life affirming message?
Beloved, Jesus is not just inviting us to come and see where he lives, but also to stay with him and allow him to enter our lives and stay with us too. Then, having encountered him truly, we may go and bring others to him whom we have met and experienced.
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