The Order of the Shovel

"The shovel and the Uzi machine gun are my Messiah," said an Israeli kibbutz worker to me in a cotton field one day. I could not identify with the machine gun, but I have been thinking about the shovel much lately. Have I been expecting the kingdom of God to come while I play educational and social games in the university world? Have I been involved in a shovel-less Christianity? Has the body of Christ lost its muscle? We do not even sweat healthy drops of sweat, to say nothing of drops of blood. Living in a bomb shelter under a machine gun factory with seven others, getting up at 4:00 a.m. to pick pears with students from several countries, showering in cold water, working for simple meals, housing, and the welfare of 300 other people (not for money), and loving it all, shattered my American fetishes so that the culture shock was much greater when I landed in America then when I landed in Tel-Aviv.