My mother used to complain to me, when I was a child, that I never listened!! Sometimes we all suffer from that. Another one is that there is so much in our minds or around us that we don’t listen properly and clearly discern who the speaker is!
This is true of Samuel in our first reading this Sunday. He is so focused on serving Eli that he presumes that it is he who is speaking. But, he is wrong and it is Eli who is able to put him right and direct him to the Lord Himself. In the Gospel, this time, it is John the Baptist who helps his two disciples to focus on who has the real message that will take their lives forward – the Lamb of God; and so they go to Jesus and stay with Him.
Have you ever been with a child, perhaps trying to explain something to them, and they keep running ahead, not really listening, and then jump to the wrong conclusion? That can be us too!
It is the role of the Holy Spirit to speak in our hearts so that we too, like Andrew, who brings his brother, Simon, to Jesus by telling him what he himself has realised, “We have found the Messiah”. But he only knows that on reflection and having met Jesus himself and stayed with Him.
So, just like the first reading of Advent, “Stay awake” and concentrate on the presence of God in your life and then you will hear the Holy Spirit calling you.