Tuesday, April 19, 2011

Finishing Strong

This past week I enjoyed an equitation education at the 2011 Varsity Equitation National Championship in Waco, Texas. New words like "dressage" entered my vocabulary. I inhaled so much horse hair and dirt it's a wonder I don't whinny when laughing.
Horses responded to the commands of their riders who had only to shift their weight or pull gently on a rein to get a living, breathing 1100-pound gelding, stallion, or mare to do their bidding. Best of all, I watched my beautiful goddaughter finish strong her collegiate equitation career at Baylor University.
Some young women didn't finish strong. In one event the equestrian forgot the pattern. Her horse stood idle while she tried to recall what to do next. Another simply slid off her horse in a badly executed jump.
The apostle Paul wrote, "I have fought a good fight, I have finished the race, and I have remained faithful. And now the prize awaits me" (2 Timothy 4:7 NLT).
I don't want to forget what's important, fall off my horse, throw in the towel, or stumble before I reach the course's end. My goal?
Finish strong. SDG.

Saturday, April 2, 2011

C'EST AVRIL!

Yes, April has arrived! That means daffodils and tulips and sunshine-yellow forsythia bushes. As described in the King James English, "the winter is past, the rain is over and gone; the flowers appear on the earth; the time of the singing of birds has come" (Song of Solomon 2:11-12). The rain isn't over for NW Ohio, and snowflakes still make occasional house calls in this month, but those birdies are a-singin'. Their music is a sweet sound, even from the beaks of obnoxious bluejays and ditsy killdeer.
Soon we celebrate that best and most blessed of all holidays and holy days: Resurrection Sunday. It's enough to make you sing like a bird, blossom like a daffodil, and splash in some mud puddles. Catastrophes, horrific events, and tragedy still mar our days. But we are "prisoners of hope," as it says in Zechariah 9:12. "When these things begin to take place, stand up and lift up your heads, because your redemption is drawing near" (Luke 21:28).
Soli Deo Gloria.