The Beneficial Bruise

The breeze was whipping through my hair as the gallant horse "loped" up the flower speckled hill. Sounds grand, right? I thought so too. A couple hours earlier it was Sabbath, sunny, and summery. I wanted to ride. Luckily I have riding buddies. Today was a Melody day. Melody is basically the barn manager at Dolly's boarding (where my cousin Crystal boards her horses) and Melody has horses there as well. The joy I get at finally getting some Melody time inspired me to run to the hitching post where I caught a glimpse of Deuce, the mustang. That's right. He's a gangster horse, and my ride. As our horses moseyed along the winding trail, we began to discuss, well...horses--the irony. The main topic happened to be the easy task of falling off of a spooking horse while riding bareback. I call this "jinxing". Up until now I had been thinking such naive thoughts such as: "I'm such a good rider", "I'm invincible", you get the idea. Let us jump ahead to the flower speckled hill. My legs gripped Deuce's belly as he jumped into a canter. No saddle, no mane, nothing to hang onto as he saw a "scary" dog and began the sideways scramble. I grappled around for a split second before realizing it was a lost hope. I was clung to the side of a horse that happened to be moving the opposite direction of me quite rapidly. Gravity did what it had to do. I now have a bruise. A humbling bruise.

We all need a bruise once and a while. Life is good, but not forever. God is good, but we aren't. I realized today that we cannot get too comfortable in this life. Slacking off and forgetting why we need God is easy when everything just happens to be peachy. Taking the reins and forgetting the dangers lurking in the dark is a dangerous path that many of us take at peaceful times in our life. Before you know it, an exam comes up, a financial crisis emerges, or a change becomes inevitable and you suddenly realize that you should have been paying better attention to God. For me, a horse spooked unexpectedly and I was not prepared because I assumed nothing bad would happen to me. But I needed that. Something to make me realize why I am not invincible when I am on the back of a horse. A beneficial bruise is something that God allows to happen in our life to help us realize that we are not invincible on this world. He uses this to get us refocused on our need for Him. Stay focused. Know your surroundings. And let God take the reins.