Hope Rising (10 page)

It was time for the trot out.

Would Mojave pass? If he was declared sound and released, Sarah would be able to finish the race—within sight of her parents. I held my breath as he began to trot—twenty yards away from the vet and then back again. The vet’s back was to me; his head slowly dropped as he looked down. I could see Sarah’s wide eyes searching his face for the answer, and then she looked down, too. The vet was scrawling something across her competitor’s card.

A breeze stirred Ele’s mane over the back of my hands. I glanced at them and suddenly realized that my hands were pressed against her neck in tight white fists. I closed my eyes and exhaled.
I trust in You, Lord
, I mouthed into the fluttering mane.

I looked up just as the vet finished writing. He held onto the scorecard for a moment, speaking to Sarah. I stared at her face intently, straining to interpret her expression. Suddenly, her beautiful lips spread into a smile. The vet returned her card and gave her a thumbs up. She looked straight at my face. Her expression etched a permanent portrait in my heart. It was a look I’ll never forget.

We met in a huge embrace. “He passed!” she exhaled into my hair, as if she, too, had been holding her breath. “He
passed.”

Ele’s heart rate took slightly longer to come down, so Sarah passed the vet check ahead of me. She rode out, with a grinning promise over her shoulder that they
would ride slowly until we caught up.

When Ele was released, she seemed to eat the course one long-legged bite at a time. At every turn I watched for Sarah until finally she and her gray boy came into view. Our horses drew up shoulder to shoulder and began to prance with excitement. Fueled by their own fiery passion, they galloped up the mountainside like an uphill avalanche. Each breath seemed to fill them with more energy, more desire, and more power. We charged out into a clearing and were stunned by the beauty of the world far below us. In a near unison declaration of joy, Sarah and I whooped and screamed together. Our announcement echoed through the thin high air, ringing with the gifts of life.

Our horses, faithfully, side by side, climbed until there was nothing left to climb. Then, almost abruptly, a sign announced that the finish was half a mile ahead. We dismounted as before and began walking. Strategically, we allowed our horses’ heart rates to drop, knowing that the race is only finished after you have crossed the finish line and your horse’s heart rate has dropped to sixty beats or less.

The finish came into view, and we were both suddenly aware of how quiet it was. There were no other horses and few people in a normally crowded area. Hand in hand we crossed the finish line together.

Sarah’s beaming mother was the first to greet us with open arms. Her father moved in to capture the scene on film through the eyes of a professional photographer, snapping one photo after another while mother and daughter hugged tightly.

My young partner was glowing, basking in the love of her parents and the incredible effort and sense of accomplishment
that she shared with her horse. With a brilliant smile, her mother exclaimed while nearly shaking her, “Baby, you won!
You won!”
Sarah’s mouth broke into a wide open smile as she hugged her mom with one arm and her horse with the other.

It was the best of days, shared with her family and friends … and her horse—her little gray runt whose starved body and heart were restored by the power of her love.

It was a reminder that every now and then if we work hard enough and dream hard enough something wonderful happens. Hope can
not
be stopped. There are times when the fiery walls of reality are not strong enough, hot enough, or high enough to stop a dream fueled by hope from crashing through. Dreams drive through flames that scar, burn, melt—and forge us into the creatures God wants us to be. Dreams driven by hope, empowered by love, change us forever.

Of the fifty-two competitors that ran the twenty-five mile race, our little team of rescued horses placed first, second, third, sixth and seventh! Sarah, on her silver gelding Mighty Mojave, won the Junior Division and the Junior Best Condition Award. She was the overall champion and set a blistering course record that has yet to be beaten.

I always believed that Mojave would run through fire for Sarah. On that day—he did.

Easy Keeper
 

M
OMMY, IS THAT
a cow or a horse?” the little boy asked. He stood only a few feet away from the stocky chestnut gelding.

Cappy is known as an “easy keeper.” Easy keeping horses are those that eat an ordinary amount of hay and immediately go down the path of “once on the lips, forever on the hips.”

Even with a restricted feeding program, horses like Cappy are usually chronically obese. Whatever he eats might as well be pasted on his belly because that’s where it all seems to go.

“Well, honey, what do
you
think?” the mother answered as she returned the question back to the boy. With his little eyebrows knit together in concentration, the child gazed up at the mighty chestnut girth looming above him.

The young mother prompted, “Do you think that he looks more like a cow or more like a horse?” The child’s visual examination continued with intense scrutiny.

Too much time had passed. He didn’t seem to like either of his choices. Perhaps he felt that it was a trick question.

Suddenly, his eyebrows bolted straight up with the apparent resolution of his conflict. Jamming his little hands over his little hips in triumph, he looked back toward his mother wearing an irrepressible grin. With wisdom he declared his final conclusion: “I think he looks more like a PIG!”

Refuge
 

T
HE WOMAN’S
voice on the other end of the phone line was somber. “Her mother has died. It’s only been three days.” Instantly my heart traveled back to another time, another place, to one of those memories we have, but try to forget. I vividly remembered that moment in my own life.…

“Honey, your parents have died.” The words seared into my nine-year-old heart. In the blur of that moment, I knew someone was trying to comfort me, but all I wanted was to get away, to run as far as I could from this hideous truth. Tearing away from the arms that held me, I burst out through the back door of the house and ran. I ran and ran through a small orchard. The short distance felt like miles until finally I fell, face down, into the powdery, dry earth. I could hear screaming, only to realize that it was my own unrecognizable voice—the cry of a child’s heart that was trying to comprehend the incomprehensible.

I loved both of my parents with all of the passion of a child’s heart, yet divorce was tearing them apart. My dad sought help in many professional directions, but, tragically, help was not to be found. With a decision conceived through blinding despair, he grimly ended my mother’s
life and then his own.

Silence. At long last there was silence. All that was left of my shattered voice whispered the simple words, “Jesus, help me.” A near silent breeze moved through the leafless branches overhead.

In that moment, looking down through the lifeless trees, angels might have seen deep knee prints forming in the dusty earth next to a small, huddled form. It was there in that barren place that the Lord of all knelt to comfort a broken child. In that instant my life was saved. Not fully understanding all that had happened inside my heart, what I felt, what I knew was that I would never again be alone.

After the death of my parents, I moved in with my grandparents. It wasn’t long before they had the foresight to buy a small horse for me. Between the love of the Lord and that little horse, Firefly, I found a refuge in my shattered life. Riding became my place of safety and peace. No matter how difficult things were, my troubles could never catch me when I was on Firefly.

Most days I jumped off the school bus and ran as fast as I could down the road that led to our house. I tore off my school clothes as I ran into the house and yanked on old jeans as I ran out. I couldn’t get to my little mare fast enough. Tears can wait only so long. I was convinced that there was no better place to cry than on Firefly’s soft neck. Certainly I couldn’t have wished for a better listener. She always seemed to understand my broken heart. She never judged me. Instead, she carried me away to a place where the hurt was not swift enough to keep up.

We rode so fast that my tears were whipped dry from my face. We would wind through the brushy forest to leave
behind the pain that tried to destroy my heart. By playing my imaginary game of hide and seek, my pain was soon lost far behind. Only then was my heart free to soar.

For many years my favorite place to ride was an oak forest not far from home. The trees were immense. I used to think that it would take an entire family, holding hands, to reach around each massive trunk. Their gigantic spreading branches arced across the sky, weaving into each other as if they were holding hands in a mighty celebration of life itself. Beneath their shady expanse all kinds of life seemed to thrive—including mine. It was here that I was always safe.

Then the unthinkable happened. A firestorm struck down this magnificent place.

Many months passed before I was able to gather enough courage to ride back and survey my special haven. I was horrified. The devastation was so complete, so final. Nothing but charred blackness existed in this once spectacular place. My mighty oaks were gone. In their place remained only yawning cavernous holes where their roots had once been. They had been destroyed down to their very foundations.

I was completely overwhelmed as I slid off Firefly’s back and walked through the sooty black powder. My tears broke through my emotional dam in an uncontrollable flood. This was my special place, my healing chamber, my home. Now it was destroyed beyond recognition. “Dear Jesus, this is just like my life,” I sobbed.

The puffy, black soot billowed up nearly to my waist. Firefly and I had been walking a while, and finally my racking sobs subsided into silent tears that streamed down
my face. And then I saw it. In the vast expanse of black one tiny oasis of color survived. I moved closer and knelt down to inspect this tiny pink wonder. A little plant had risen through the ash and, defying all the odds, dared to bloom in this world of black. Then I heard within my heart the unmistakable voice of the One who had knelt beside me so many years before. “You are right, child—this is just like your life. You see, I have raised you out of the ashes.”

The truth of that moment has become even more powerful over time. A childhood event that should have destroyed my life instead, by Jesus’ love, gave me life. I once had a horse that gave me refuge and saved my life. Now I have twenty-five that save other children’s lives. I once lived in an ashen place. Now I live in an earthly para-dise where by the grace of God I am allowed to be a steppingstone for others to leave their ashes behind. Life is so good, every moment so rich.…

“Kim.” The woman’s voice on the phone yanked me back to the present. “Can you help?”

The little girl’s mother and two brothers had been killed in an automobile accident. Her grief was so complete that she didn’t seem to fully understand where she was, nor did it seem to matter. Her heart was in a cold, gray vortex of agony, sorrow, and loneliness.
I know that place
, I thought. And silently I prayed,
Lord, help me to be what this child needs
.