Stars and the Long Game

This year, the run up to Christmas at the church where I,Marilyn, am a minister, is all about stars:

stars of hope, like the north star that guides sailors and freedom seekers;

stars of peace, glimmers of light that take hundreds of thousands of years, even millions of years to reach us and remind us of our place in it all;

stars of joy, that startled the shepherds in the fields and became a chorus of angels who brought them the glad tidings of great joy that will be for all people;

and stars of love, that remind us to sing boldly of a love that will turn the world upside down, starting with a defenseless, fragile,ordinary baby, both vulnerable and beautiful who will be called the Prince of Peace.

The stars have been hard to see lately due to cloudy skies and metaphorically due to cloudy power struggles all over the globe. But the stars are there.   They are always there, millions upon millions of them vibrating with sound and emitting light waves.

This year, I want to remember the stars.  I want to be guided by the stars. I want the stars to befriend and comfort us with their long game.

In the time of Jesus’ birth narrative, people didn’t care to differentiate between astronomy and astrology.

They knew the stars, and the stars mattered for their guidance and influence.

Magi from the east followed a new star as it guided them to the birth of a new kind of king – a child who would live and die for love, without armies, without violence, but always instead for a different kind of power – the power of vulnerable, peaceful all-encompassing love.

We need all that he stood for as much now as ever.

This year, I will look to the stars.

I will look to the Creator of the stars,

and I will strain to hear their vibrating song of hope, peace, joy and love. It’s the only long game that matters.

Merry Christmas and blessed peace to all.

Cool article about the sounds of the stars if you are interested – tuned to a B flat apparently. https://science.nasa.gov/universe/exoplanets/symphony-of-stars-the-science-of-stellar-sound-waves/

 

written by Marilyn December 5th, 2024