Unity and Uniformity

One of these is desirable

The other, I am not so sure,

But what I do know, especially today,

They are being mixed up more and more.

Unity means one

Like the church of Jesus Christ,

Diverse in culture and ethnicity

But bought with the same price.

The shed blood of Jesus

Was the price he paid for sin

And it’s that same precious blood

That makes us one in him.

Without the shedding of blood

There is no remission of sin

And his blood applied to our hearts

Says that we belong to him.

Uniformity is a different matter

It is really about looking alike,

Somewhat like the army of a country

You know them when they come into sight.

Some churches require uniformity

In all that their members do,

A strict adherence to their traditions

Sometimes extra-biblical too.

There is unity in diversity

But no diversity in uniformity,

No scope for any individual differences

Given their strict conformity.

Their methodology is unchanging

And their approaches particularly limited

And the members of such institutions

Are severely inhibited.

 

The church army is like a human body

With members not a few,

The members vary in their gifting

But with one purpose in view.

That the whole body may profit withal

Through its administrations and its gifts

And growing in the unity of the Spirit

Eradicate the self-serving rifts.

Unity proceeds from the heart

It is genuine and long-lived,

Uniformity on the other hand, is externals

And often a false impression gives.

 

A uniform does not a soldier make

But rather, it’s his commitment to his unit

And in unity with his fellow soldiers

He does not the army limit.

A puzzle for example is not uniform

No two pieces are alike,

But when each piece is put in its place

They make for a beautiful sight.

Uniformity has its place, I agree,

It clearly identifies a group,

But the triumphant church of Jesus Christ

Is more than a single group

As the church universal, wherever it is,

Conforms to the image of Christ,

It’s unity will be seen and known by all

Whether international or localized.

Stewart Russell © October 2019

To Each His Story

Gazing at the cemetery

I took in the many tombstones

And it occurred to me

It all started in the womb.

And right after this

The messy infant in arms

Followed by the whining schoolboy

Somewhat void of charm.

Quite the opposite though

As Shakespeare regards the lover

That is soon confronted by death

As he becomes the soldier.

And on and on this goes

Until the seventh stage

Sans teeth, sans eyes and everything

Like a child again but in his old age.

No doubt the women too

Encountered their own stages

As they move from point to point

At the various ages.

Whether man or woman

To each his story

Whether the outcome of the story be

Disappointment or glory.

And each story

Full of its own importance

Should be seriously considered

Regardless of the circumstance.

Often we view one’s tombstone

As though that is all

But there was a story here

Before death made its call.

I watched a decrepit old man

Hobble up the path,

He looked so out of place

I was tempted to laugh.

Then I thought

There go I in a few decades or so

And it occurred to me then

What would my story show?

Our stories vary

Influenced by time and place:

Some of glowing achievements

Some of unbelievable disgrace.

Some of mixed narrative

Perhaps such like are the most:

There were times of disappointment

And times of which to boast

People tell our stories

Different from the way we do

And often one is left to wonder

Which of the stories is true.

There are likely inexactitudes

By whichever biographer

But hopefully from one’s memoirs

We can get a better picture.

I observed an old lady

She was wheel-chaired bound,

She screamed intermittently

It was quite a distressing sound.

But she too had a story

That would not have started there,

No doubt she was a mother

That demonstrated motherly care.

Each of her children could tell

How she looked after them

Though at the present time

She was considered a problem.

Each life a matrix

And each existence a story

Consequently an array of matrices

And therein lies history.

A story on its own

May be perceived as great or small

But if allowed to stand on its own

It cannot tell us all.

For each story is impacted

By the circumstances that abound

And to treat to each in a vacuum

Would be insanely unsound.

But to each his story

Each should be given his say,

Preferably during his lifetime

For this is the only way.

Footprints in the sands of time

Are the stories that we write

And who better to tell them but we

Before our day becomes night?

Stewart Russell © April 2019