CREATING PLOWSHARES AND PRUNING HOOKS

A year and a week ago today my wife and I did something a little unique for my birthday.  We drove up to Philadelphia to watch a variety show called Jesus Bombs and Ice Cream.  The premise of this show organized by Shane Claiborne and his friend Ben Cohen, co-founder of Ben and Jerry's Ice Cream, was what would the world be like if there were fewer bombs and more ice cream?  Well, perhaps there would be some bigger waist lines. However, there would also be more smiles and more peace—seems like a really good trade off to me.

Anyway, one of the things that I vividly remember from that birthday event was an artistic welder who took an AK-47 and turned it into a shovel and a pitchfork.  This weekend I was pleasantly reminded of watching this artist work.  My wife and I organized a whitewater rafting and camping trip with some of the folks that we went to Egypt with this spring. We were enjoying our breakfast Sunday morning when I gave two of the bat-houses that the owners of the property have installed a closer look.  These bat houses were made from 20mm ammo cans.  It instantly made me think of seeing the AK-47 transformed into the shovel and pitchfork a little more than a year earlier. 

 

My friend Brett "FISH" Anderson showing off the transformed AK-47.



“He will judge between the nations and will settle disputes for many peoples.  They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks.  Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore” (Isaiah 2:4 and Micah 4:3). Witnessing both the bat houses and the AK-47 was such a great reminder that God calls us to be creative and that there are, in fact, tangible ways of seeing scripture that we so often associate with metaphor actually become reality! 



These ammo cans are no longer products of war but are now homes for mosquito consuming bats.  How awesome is that?