Philadelphia: Que Sera Or Carpe Diem? Series

Well, let’s get this over with. New Year’s resolutions: how

many of you made New Year’s resolutions? Now how many

of us have already broken at least one resolution? Come on,

hands up, confession is good for the soul. How many have

already, five days into the new year, broken at least one of

your resolutions?

I resolved to lose weight, but, hey, the butter pecan ice

cream just reached out and grabbed me. You resolved to

pay your bills on time, but it was so easy to use that plastic,

getting ready for Christmas, and you were just trying to

stimulate the economy. I resolved to avoid arguments in my

household, but, Lord, it’s just like the Garden of Eden, “the

woman you gave me, she said...”! Resolutions are fine, but

they are hard to keep. They melt faster than the proverbial

snowball in hell.

One reason resolutions are tough to keep is that they look

backward as well as forward. We identify things we know we

ought to do better; we look backward and then try to look

forward and to do it in a different way. The ancient Romans

had a god in their pantheon named Janus. Janus was the

god of doors, always depicted as having two faces, one

looking backward and the other looking forward. When you

went through a door, you were supposed to invoke the

protection of Janus, because you didn’t know what might be

on the other side. It is from this god that we get our word

“janitor”; somebody who takes care of the doors. And it is

also from this god that we get the name of the first month of

the year, January. Looking backward and looking forward.

Thinking we can do something in the new year we didn’t do

in the old year.

But there’s an issue here. There’s a problem. The problem

is that we are the same people on January 1 that we were on

December 31. We haven’t changed an iota. We have the

same skills, the same resources, the same problems, the

same everything today, looking forward, as we did when we

looked backward. So what makes us think we can do any

better? What makes us think that the mere flip of a calendar

page will make us do something today we didn’t do

yesterday?

Lots of us believe that we won’t change. Many of us believe

that few things will be different this year. I’ve listened to you.

And I’ve listened to myself. I’ve caught myself, trying to work

with somebody’s problem, shrugging my shoulders and

saying, “What can you do? I’ll just cut and run.” I’ve heard

you, dealing with something that’s so huge, you just turn your

back and say, “It’s no use trying.” Somebody suggests a

new approach, and we say, “Been there, done that.”

Someone speaks about a person with a problem, and we

pass it off, “The leopard cannot change his spots.” My guess

is that lots of us are really fatalists. We believe that certain

things are inevitable, and it’s no use even trying to change.

If you’re like that, your theme song is the Spanish phrase,

“Que sera, sera.” “Whatever will be, will be”. Do you

remember Doris Day in that old movie? “Que sera, sera;

whatever will be, will be. The future’s not ours to see. Que

sera, sera.” And so lifting our hands in a gesture of futility

we wriggle out of doing anything positive, because, well,

“what can you do?” Time’s too short, not enough money,

energy is low, obstacles too high, and so on. “Que sera,

sera”. “Whatever will be, will be.” Why bother?

But to that the Lord Jesus Christ says a resounding “No”. To

all of that the one who was and who is and who is to come

says, “No.” Consider the believers at the ancient town of

Philadelphia and what the Spirit said.

I know your works. Look, I have set before you an open door,

which no one is able to shut. I know that you have but little power,

and yet you have kept my word and have not denied my name.

I know your works. I know what you have been doing. I can

look backward with you, Philadelphia Christians, and I see

what you have done. It’s not bad. It’s good stuff. But now

look forward. Look at what needs to be done. Look at what

is before you. It is an open door. Opportunity. Not a

burden, not a chore, but opportunity. Not drudgery, not the

same old same old, but a fresh opportunity. You are given

an open door, which no one is able to shut.

Actor Robin Williams, in the movie Dead Poets Society,

confronts a troop of schoolboys who are about as hopeless