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Saturday, January 17, 2015

2nd Ordinary Sunday, Year B, 18.01.2015

1 Sam 3:3-10, 19 / 1 Cor 6:13-15, 17-20 / John 1:35-42

We may know this song that goes by the title “What a difference a day makes”. 

The song begins like this – “What a difference a day makes, twenty-four little hours, brought the sun and the flowers, where there used to be rain.”

Oh yes, what a difference a day makes. And if what a difference a day makes, then we can imagine what a difference a year makes.

Day by day we think that nothing changes but one year ago, would we ever have imagined that we are what we are now?

Maybe one year ago, we hoped to get slimmer, but one year later we only got fatter.

One year ago, we had hoped to get richer. One year later we are still hoping.

One year ago, we were younger. One year later, we are certainly older and maybe grown a bit wiser.

But whether it is one day or one year, things have changed, whether we want it or not, whether we liked it or not, whether for better or not.

As it is said, not all change is for the better, just as not all movement is forward.

And even if everything else is inconsistent, then change is the only constant.

For the young Samuel in the 1st reading, change was going to take place. God was calling out to him to be His prophet.

For Eli the old priest, change was also going to take place.

At the third call of Samuel, Eli realized and understood that his time is over and that Samuel was going to take over.

In the gospel, we also see that change is happening. John the Baptist saw Jesus passing by and he stared hard at Him.

And then he said to his disciples – Look, there is the Lamb of God. 

Hearing this, the two disciples left him and followed Jesus.

John the Baptist also realized that in pointing out Jesus to his disciples, his time was going to be over. He must decrease and Jesus must increase.

The theme of today’s readings is about answering God’s call. But that would mean that change needs to happen, and that we must be willing to accept this change in order to answer God’s call.

The phrase “to change our minds” does not mean that we are fickle-minded. Rather it may mean that we are open-minded about the situations that we encounter.

There is a story of a big company in a big city that was manufacturing soap and packing it into small boxes.

But there was a flaw in the production lines. Some boxes were not loaded with the soap and were shipped out resulting in complaints from customers.

So consultants and engineers were called in to analyze the problem and then they introduced a combination of mechanical and microelectronics automation, with X-ray technology and the problem was successfully solved.

So whenever there is an empty box in the production lines, it will be detected and picked out. The whole system costs $900,000.

That was the big company in the big city. A much smaller company in the outskirts also had a similar production line and hence a similar problem.

The owner told the supervisor to solve the problem immediately. 
Being a small company it was obvious that forking out $900,000 is not an option.

The supervisor thought about the problem and he managed to solve the problem with just $190.

This was his solution. He bought a high-powered fan with that $190, and put it next to the production line. The strong draught from the powerful fan blew away the empty boxes. So problem solved, for $190, instead of $900,000.

A few lessons can be learnt from this story. One of which is that technology is not necessarily productive. Another is that knowledge is not synonymous with creativity.

But what is obvious is that there are many ways to solve a problem.

It’s whether we are open-minded enough to change our minds and look at other simple solutions.

If they can say that what a difference a day makes, then what a greater difference an open mind makes when it is ready to change.

Because those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything at all.

As we saw in the 1st reading, Eli was open-minded enough to see that God was calling Samuel.

In the gospel, John the Baptist was open-minded enough to see that Jesus was the Lamb of God and pointed Him out to his disciples.

May we be open-minded enough to see the ways of God and open our hearts to the call of God.

We may have heard this before – Yesterday I thought I was clever so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wiser, so I am changing myself.

When we change ourselves to answer God’s call, then what a difference we will make.