Somewhere in France | In Memoriam

December 22, 1918

In Memoriam

Serg. JOHN R. HUBBARD was killed in action “Somewhere in France” on September 28^th. The sympathy of the congregation is extended to his mother and sister. The first gold star on our service flag appears to-day.

“He died as few men get the chance to die—

Fighting to save a world’s morality.

He died the noblest death a man may die,

Fighting for God, and Right, and Liberty;--

And such a death is Immortality.

For centuries a star has been emblematic of the highest ideals toward which men aspire. Whatever is not to be surpassed in beauty and achievement, that we symbolize by a star. In the hearts of Americans to-day one star is set above all others—the Service Star.

A Service Flag in the window of a home that gives a son! Simple and quite familiar now, but still prompting many visions. We see beyond it a flag of many stars—Old Glory; we think of a man upon a bloody field, face to face with death; we hear a mother’s prayer; we see far beyond, Justice triumphant and Peace restored. But most often we think of the son and the mother.

Long ago, above a lowly house hung a star of portent and glory, and beneath it, as now, there was a mother and a Son. Then, as now, the star marked a house where the Son offered His life for the life of a world; a house where the mother knew, with all mothers, the agony and the benediction of sacrifice.

We who are but watchers of the battle, pass these present houses of the war, seeing too little. WE need to remember that first House of the Star and, like Wise Men, follow its guidance in the [illegible] of sacrificial joy.