Years ago, on an old web forum, there was someone whose signature read something like, “Those who beat their swords into plowshares end up plowing for those who don’t.” Since we were all into medieval warfare to some degree, as the forum was about medieval armor, it didn’t seem out of place. Yet it got into my brain and has spent a quarter of a century living there rent-free.
No, it’s not biblical, but it made a good point.
See, we’re not quite at the point that Isaiah meant when he talked about beating those swords into plowshares. That was to be a time of peace, when we didn’t need weapons because everyone had given up war.
Some people who say they’re Christian would do well to remember that.
After his father died 12 years ago, Rik Spier inherited a hunting rifle.
The 75-year-old from the northwest side didn’t know anything about guns. “I was handling it totally ignorant,” Spier said. “My son-in-law found two bullets I didn’t even know were there.”
To learn, Spier took lessons and went to a gun show. But, ultimately, he still wanted to get rid of the weapon: “You don’t want it to fall into the wrong hands. It’s very easy to have an accident.”
Now, Spier’s rifle will be softened and molded into something else. It was one of two dozen guns collected by volunteers at Allisonville Christian Church on Sept. 19. The weapons were broken down into pieces and collected by a blacksmith, who will use their spines to create new cookware, art and garden tools.
It’s part of a national, faith-based movement called “Guns to Gardens.” The goal, organizers said, is to get guns off the streets and give people a safe way to dispose of them.
“We will make sure these guns can never hurt somebody again or in the future,” the Rev. Beau Underwood, the church’s senior pastor, told Mirror Indy. He referenced Isaiah 2:4: “And by doing that, we are living out the biblical vision of weapons being turned into plowshares.”
The problem I have with what Underwood said is that in Isaiah, everyone beat their swords into plowshares. There was no one to decide that others would plow for them because we’d moved past that stage. Everyone was on board with the new plan.
There’s a lot of woo in this report, people talking about making a more peaceful world, and I can’t help but think these folks are living in a world of self-delusion.
A weapon is a tool. Isaiah 2:4 talks about a time when those tools are no longer needed, but other tools are; but when you look around, I can’t help but to see that the world these people are living in is one of self-delusion.
You can’t force peace into our communities by disarming yourself. That’s never going to be a recipe for anything other than making yourself a victim. Let’s also remember Luke 22:36.
Then said he unto them, But now, he that hath a purse, let him take it, and likewise his scrip: and he that hath no sword, let him sell his garment, and buy one.
He knew that we weren’t at the time of beating weapons into farming implements. He wanted his followers prepared to defend themselves from the hostility He knew was coming. He told them to arm themselves.
Look around for a moment, and you’ll see we’re still not there.
Understand that I don’t actually care if someone wants their dad’s hunting rifle turned into a garden trowel. I don’t care if a private concern is going to facilitate that.
I have a problem with a church trying to use scripture like this, ignoring the context, and presenting this as the Christian thing to do when it seems pretty damn clear that Christ felt otherwise.
Editor’s Note: The radical Left will stop at nothing to enact their extreme gun control agenda and strip us of our Second Amendment rights.
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