Horse Story

This amazing piece was sent in by one of my readers. 

"I had this experience yesterday and your rat blog inspired me to write it down. 

While I have worked with or around various animals, the horse has always seemed uniquely special.  Yesterday, as I was getting ready to ride, I paused as I stood next to one whose back I couldn’t even see over.  I stopped, lay my hand on his smooth side, and breathed in the stillness.  Peace washed over me as a spring rain clears away fall’s dead leaves.  I gently pushed on him and he respectfully stepped away from me.  He towers over me, could kill me if he wanted to, and yet was a mountain that moved quietly away from me.  His eye turned to mine with the long lashes slowly blinking and with just a look, asked what else I wanted.  Remembering time, I resumed grooming him, saddled, and rode away from the barn. 

We’ve been together six months now.  When we first started, there were lots of disagreements about which direction to go, how fast to go, when to go home, and his back must have been sore as I was returning to riding and had lost all my muscle tone from years previous.  But today we were a new creature together.  I sat atop and yet flowed with his every movement and motion.  We had no arguments and enjoyed the journey together.  Somewhere around the curve of the river, I realized through layers of cloth and leather that I was feeling his every muscle contract and expand and could tell exactly what his footfalls were.  No sight, simply feeling, and yet more than feeling because I could tell what the next move would be and we made it together.  I was thunderstruck with the spirituality of the moment: to be two and yet work as one to the joy of each.

In that heartbeat, I knew that’s how it can be with God.  He in us and we in Him.  The horse and I place trust in each other, get out on the trail, and through time and trials, connect with each other.  An experience is born that neither of us could have without the other.  I place my trust in God and in turn He entrusts Himself in me.  He is glorified and I receive a fullness I never could have otherwise.  The longer the horse and I work together, the more responsive to each other we become.  He obeys my direction on the faintest of cues and I no longer jar against his movement.  How the horse and I combined reflect what the Father wants to do with me!  To get on His narrow path no matter how hot or exhausting the day, to yield to His directions, to no longer chaff against the propelling forward is to arrive at destinations I never would have otherwise and see the wonders of His nature I never would have otherwise.

When horse and man unite it is an experience that can only be understood by those who have likewise done so.  When God and man unite it is also only an experience that can be understood only by those who have done so.  But the sacred scrolls are full of the histories of those who gone before us and they are waving us forward, even warning us to get up and go.  May I read the warnings are change course and may I hear the encouragements and charge forward."

What God Cannot Do...

Fail –

• In Him also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the counsel of His will. - Ephesians 1:11
• Remember this, and show yourselves men; Recall to mind. O you transgressors. Remember the former things of old, For I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like Me, Declaring the end from the beginning, And from ancient times things that are not yet done, Saying, My counsel shall stand, And I will do all My pleasure, Calling a bird of prey from the east, The man who executes My counsel, from a far country. Indeed I have spoken it; I will also bring it to pass. I have purposed it; I will also do it. – Isaiah 46:8-11.

Do Evil (Lie) - in hope of eternal life which God, who cannot lie, promised before time began, - Titus 1:2

Be Tempted - Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He Himself tempt anyone. But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed. - James 1:13-14

Deny Himself - If we are faithless, He remains faithful; He cannot deny Himself. - 2 Timothy 2:13

Be Unjust –

• to demonstrate at the present time His righteousness, that He might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. - Romans 3:26
• Deuteronomy 32:4; Job 4:17; Isaiah 45:21; Zep 3:5; John 5:30; Rev 15:3.

Contradict His Word –

• All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work. – 2 Timothy 3:16-17.
• for prophecy never came by the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. – 2 Peter 1:21

Make Mistakes – What He purposes, He does.

Forgive Sins without the blood sacrifice of Jesus Christ –

• And according to the law almost all things are purified with blood, and without shedding of blood there is no remission (of sin). – Hebrews 9:22
• For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you upon the altar to make atonement for your souls; for it is the blood that makes atonement for your soul. – Leviticus 17:11
• [Jesus said] For this is My blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the remission of sins. – Matthew 26:28
• When Jesus was praying to the Father in the Garden of Gethsemane He said, “Oh my Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as You will. - Matthew 26:39 (Since the Father did not save Him, it was the Fathers will that Jesus would go to the cross. If there was any other way possible, the Father would have done it, and saved His only Son).
• Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.” - John 14:6
• Nor is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved. - Acts 4:12
• For there is one God and one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself a ransom for all to be testified in due time, - 1 Timothy 2:5-6
• For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life. – John 3:16