Wednesday, December 4, 2024
He shall judge between the nations, and shall arbitrate for many peoples; they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.
Isaiah 2:4
We read the words of the prophet Isaiah in the context of war, conflicts and struggles all over the world: Ukraine, Russia, Israel, Gaza, Lebanon; not to mention in this nation, in our cities and neighborhoods, our homes and workplaces, and our relationships with one another.
The people of Israel, when they first heard this text, saw a world not much different from our own. More than 500 years before the time of Jesus, they listened to Isaiah’s vision of the future, and then they looked at their once-beautiful city, Jerusalem, burned and battered by powers that must have appeared unstoppable.
It is a story not limited to Israel’s experience, but is known throughout human history everywhere. It is a familiar story to us all.
The renown Old Testament scholar, Walter Brueggemann, has likened today’s beautiful passage from Isaiah to the “I have a dream” speech of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. And like the world at the time of Dr. King, our reality on most days is a long way from either his vision, or Isaiah’s vision of peace, justice, and healing.
We hear this text not only in a time of conflict and war but in a new season at the beginning of a new church year: Advent, the time of waiting, and so much more.
The vision of swords being beaten into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks is a nice idea, but it is ridiculed by our experience of the everyday reality of the world. The sentiment of Isaiah’s beautiful verse is mocked by the cold hard reality of our own lives.
Perhaps, that’s where we need to start, by creating cultures of peace within us, and among us. What are the swords in our lives that we should be beating into plowshares? What are the spears that we brandish all too often that should be beaten into pruning hooks?
And there we see what our calling is: to model what the kingdom of God looks like, only when we can demonstrate what it means to live in that peace that others will see God – to make God fully present. To create those places where God’s grace and love can be known, those places where God’s justice can be lifted up, those places whence God’s instruction can go forth.
In this time of waiting, we know how it is we are supposed to wait: living out the reality that we expect to be fulfilled among us.
Let us pray.
O God, you have made of one blood all the peoples of the earth, and sent your blessed Son to preach peace to those who are far off and to those who are near: Grant that people everywhere may seek after you and find you, bring the nations into your fold, pour out your Spirit upon all flesh, and hasten the coming of your kingdom; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
(Book of Common Prayer, p. 257)
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Photo: Bronze sculpture “Let Us Beat Swords into Ploughshares,” by Evgeniy Vuchetich, a gift to the United Nations by Russia in 1959