Groundhog Day

Groundhog Day

Remember the movie Groundhog Day? Narcissistic meteorologist Phil Connors travels to Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania, to cover the February 2 appearance of Phil the groundhog, and gets stuck. Each morning at 6:00 a.m. his alarm goes off to Sonny and Cher’s “I Got You Babe,” and no amount of clock smashing will make it stop. Phil is in a time warp. Every day is the same day, all over again. No matter what he tries.

Do you ever feel like it’s Groundhog Day? Maybe your job is numbingly monotonous, or the same worry wakes you, day in and day out. Maybe there’s a memory you can’t shake or a toxic relationship that never seems to heal. Or perhaps an illness has taken up residence in your body and has become your unwanted, constant companion.

Groundhog Day. Nothing changes.

With nothing to break up the landscape, we languish. As C. S. Lewis asserts in his poem “Love’s As Warm As Tears,” we see only

Deluge, weeks of rain,

Haystacks afloat,

Featureless seas between

Hedges, where once was green.

Once, all of history was just more of the same. Nothing could break the hopeless cycle of sin and death begun with Adam.

But the Resurrection changed everything—changes everything.

What appears to be final, isn’t. What feels fatal, won’t be. In Christ, loss will be gain, darkness will be light, fear will surrender to hope, and hope will never die. The Groundhog Day warp of futile human monotony was shattered when Christ arose. In him, anything is possible. Will your situation change? It will. How? I can’t say. But do you doubt that the God who defeated death can step into your same old, same old and shake things up for your good and for his glory?

I don’t. Not for one Groundhog Day minute. It’s 5:59 a.m. The alarm’s about to ring. God’s got me, and I’m hoping to see springtime yet. Who knows? Perhaps today will break the cycle and set me free.

Listen! My beloved! Behold, he is coming, climbing on the mountains, leaping on the hills! . . . [He] said to me, “Arise, my darling, my beautiful one, and come along. For behold, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone. The flowers have already appeared in the land.”

Song Of Solomon 2:8, 10-12, NASB