They all came out of the bed of Jordan, and yet, there are no two alike!
Judah's is not like Napthali's, and yet both came from the same place,
and are in the same heap. We are not alike, though we be the children of
the same Father. You and I are very different, yet it is "Our Father."
Yours as much as mine. John Bunyan knew this, for he makes his pilgrim
band to consist of very great contrasts. Mr. Valiant for-the-truth, as
well as Mr. Despondency. And they all get across the stream.
It has been a favourite dream, in all ages, to have a church of one
pattern. Uniformity, that is, all of one shape. God does not make the
trees which bear the same kind of fruit of one shape. You can make
artificial flowers by the shipload, all one tint, but the bees won't come
round your ship when you unload it! In a town where I have preached many
a time, there is a place of worship at each end. As you come from the
railway station, there is one which begins the town--a Baptist Chapel,
plain and convenient, but right on the street, with the busy traffic all
round; while at the other end of the town there is a church with a spire
that makes you look up and think it is an anthem in stone! All around
are old-fashioned houses, with gardens filled with flowers, and green
lawns, while beyond there is a real country lane, with May in the hedges,
and the music of larks and blackbirds. What a contrast! Yet if the ark
of God were in danger, there would be brave hearts come from both places
to die for the truth. No! let us have done with this wish to have all
the same. It will become monotony. Go down into the Jordan and fetch
your stone! Aye, aye, and one will pick the heaviest, one that will make
his knees totter; and another will choose the squarest, and yet another
the smoothest, but each man lays his in the heap, and it is well done!
"What mean these stones?"