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JASON’S STAR
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There’s a star high atop a neighbor’s tree. Perhaps there is one like it
in your neighborhood or town as well. I call it Jason’s star. |
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I always wonder how they got it up there. I mean, it’s way, way up. |
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And I wonder why. I know that it’s Christmas, but why this particular lone
star? |
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In this case I’m pretty sure I know. |
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I used to think that people were making some kind of religious statement.
We are to remember the legend of the Christmas star of Bethlehem. |
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Our neighbors experienced just about the worst possible loss. Their teen-age
son’s death just a few months ago. It has to be a raw grief. |
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How do people do Christmas—or any day—with that kind of hurt? |
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Of course, they do. Most of the people on my mailing list have lived in
such a moment. |
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These neighbors always used to fill their yard and trees with lights. Our
corner rural intersection was anchored by their lights, then Linda’s next
door, then our own next to her. There’s was the brightest yard at Christmastime. |
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I wondered how they would handle it this year. |
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Well, the first Christmas light along our road was that high star. It was
there before Thanksgiving. |
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But the other lights are missing. I’m pretty sure there won’t be any. A
great light has gone out of their lives. They are in that period of grieving
that is almost pure darkness. |
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The dark of their yard would be sadder than it is were it not for that
star. |
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In such times we look for metaphors of hope. It is the metaphor we play
for all it’s worth at Christmas. Yet in thy dark streets shineth the
everlasting light. We pray that it may be so. |
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As the ancient ones did long before the coming of Christianity, we also
lift winter lights against the darkness. We want to push back the shadows
as much as we can. |
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Our neighbor’s yard makes no pretense that all is calm and all is bright.
Their dark corner reminds us of all those people who must sit in darkness
and the shadow of death as we go about our Christmas season. |
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But there is still that star. |
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I not only wonder how they got it up there, but what hope raised it. |
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I am sure that the star remembers Jason. It does that for me. It lifts
up his memory and spirit above the darkness below. I can’t help thinking
of him when I see that star. Perhaps that’s all it is supposed to mean. |
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But the star has always been a metaphor for hope. God, how we need it sometimes.
We yearn for it like lost sailors yearned for a sighting of the North Star.
All wise people know that we sometimes need a star to remind, encourage,
inspire, enlighten and draw us forward. |
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I’m not sure what the Bethlehem star was meant to mean. It’s most likely
another of the poetic proclamations of light that leads to a brighter light. |
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So, when I look up at Jason’s star I see sadness and darkness, but I also
see light and the promise of more light to come. The testimony from those
who have walked the dark path of sorrow is that it’s important to keep
walking by whatever dim light you have. You keep an eye out for the far
star. And you keep moving on until the dawn begins to widen the path and
until light one again begins to wrap its courage and hope around you. |
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Those who preach and speculate that the coming of Christ into the world
assures us of peace and light do not win me. But any who will raise up
a star out of personal darkness, whether of memory or of hope, lifts my
own faith and wonder. Jason’s star shines above a dark corner on Airport
Avenue.
-- Art Morgan,
Dec. 2003
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