Last Monday, the Middlesex County Library received a pair of long-overdue books. The books traveled by mail from a home in Ontario, Canada some 600 miles to the Massachusetts library. Officials report that the books are no longer in their system after being checked out about
seven years ago.
Aimee Sparzynski, the library’s technical coordinator, said the books weren’t even the most well-traveled or dated volumes that have been returned. Sparzynski claims, “We had one book that actually came back to us from Paris a few years ago. A patron had borrowed it to read on the plane and left it behind in the hotel.” Oh, well. Better late than never, I suppose.
The Latin phrase, “potiusque sero quam numquam,” which translates as “better late than never” was used in History of Rome, by Titus Livius in twenty-seven A.D. The idiom is most often used when someone wants to welcome the fact that something has happened, even if it happened later than expected. For people who drive too fast to get somewhere on time, telling them better late than never is good counsel for everyone’s safety.
Other uses of the phrase can be a helpful reminder that we all mature at different rates. Being a slow starter is not a sure-fire predictor that you won’t finish at the head of the pack. Nor should you stop showing up because you listened to those who counted you out at a certain point. George Eliot once said, “It is never too late to be what you might have been.”
The Scripture passage from Joel above is an encouraging reminder that though we may be unfinished products, God is not finished with us. Though we are prone to wanderlust, God doesn’t give up on His people, nor should we give up on ourselves. God specializes in new beginnings and promises to use our detours and pitfalls for our good. What matters is not how, when, or where we start the race but that we not quit before giving God a chance to seeing us through to the finish.
And by the way, the penalty for overdue books can be expensive. Yet the cost of giving up too soon is even higher.