Swords into Ploughshares! (Isa 2:4)

Have you ever wondered what it means the prophecy of Isaiah which reads “they shall beat their swords into ploughshares and their spears into pruning hooks? Well, it simply means that a situation of war will be turned into a situation of peace. But why swords and ploughshares? The sword in the bible was an instrument of war. But not just war. It was a symbol of violence. The first story of violence in the Bible was that of Cain and Abel (Gen 4), when an elder brother killed his own younger brother. The ploughshare was a farming implement. The first farmer was Adam, the father of Cain and Abel, whom YHWH commanded to till the garden of Eden and care for it (Gen 2:15). The prophecy of Isaiah is thus a vision of a return from violence to what God originally intended – the peace of Eden. This is what God intends for us this week. May God banish from your heart every violence and return  you to the peace in which you were created.