Jayber Crow

As Part 3 of the novel begins, the author presents the protagonist reborn into a new life, into the redemptive power of love. Jayber’s journey brings him to a place of self-sacrifice and reignites his faith. Jayber’s spiritual revival comes not from a place of disbelief to belief but toward a place of acceptance of a God whose ways he cannot fully understand and surrendering his resistance to the unknown of what lies on the other side of “Thy will be done.” Just as his beloved professor prophesied, not all of Jayber’s questions will be answered. However, this time, the lack of answers does not drive him to despair but to a deeper desire to understand God's character. Jayber comes to realize that God loves everyone despite their sin, and he must also live in this way. Just as God must be grieved by human mistakes, so will Jayber experience grief and sadness, but there will also be joy. He makes peace with living in the tension between heartbreak and happiness. Jayber makes his religion the service of his community and the individuals residing inside.

The first heartbreak Jayber must endure in this new enlightenment is the decline and death of Athey Keith. Jayber commits to helping Della and Mattie preserve Athey’s dignity to the end by the simple act of shaving his face and cutting his hair. It is a tender service that brings Jayber into home and family life that he deeply desires. He feels guilty for experiencing joy while Athey is dying, but in this season he comes to realize the power of grief and gladness existing in the same moment. When Athey’s death comes, Jayber experiences both the loss of his dear friend and the end of his time as a part of the family. As with the death of a patriarch and as Jayber predicted, the Keith-Chatham family begins to unravel. Jimmy idolizes his grandfather and is now lost without Athey’s guidance in the sanctuary of the farm. Troy moves from distant father to demanding overseer and Jimmy will not comply. Mattie is left to deal with the fallout of her grief and the handling of the estate, which could put her at odds with her husband.

The author shifts from the view of one family’s demise to the wider view of Port William’s decline. Just as Athey’s death was a slow, gradual loss of his faculties and dignity, Port William’s deterioration is an agonizing dismantling bit by bit. Jayber charts the decline through the closing of family farms and businesses serving as pillars of the community. As the old generation passes away, their progeny has no taste for the slow, humbling work of the homestead or managing a storefront. The temptations of modernity are too strong. As he watches the stores close, the schoolhouse be shuttered, and respected elders fade into the past, Jayber feels a profound sense of loss capitulated with the symbolic death of Mat Feltner. Mat was instrumental in Jayber’s installation as a member of Port William. Along with Burley, Mat saw past Jayber’s youth and poverty and invested in him, not just as a business owner but as a man. As Jayber and Burley fill Mat’s grave, Jayber seals the end of an era in his life and his community’s. The interstate barrels into their quiet community destroying the environment, choking out the last of the old life and noisily ramrodding modernity into the heart and lives of the tiny town.