GOD HELD THE REINS

A wisp of memory from the long ago comes in. Myself a little lad driving in darkening dusk a great team of farm horses hitched to an empty hay-rack. Suddenly, from unaccustomed noises, perhaps from knowledge of too weak a hand upon the reins, they started on a wild gallop down the sloping road, across a ravine.  Everything I had, tensed arms, pounding heart, appealing voice, was in the attempt to restrain, to control, to guide them, across the narrow wooden bridge.

Does the reader chide me for remembering, and in print, so trivial a thing? But how can I forget, especially how a strong pair of hands reached up beyond my own (I was not alone on that lonely road, you see), grasping the reins, and a voice far more authoritative than my own commanded the galloping horses, and they obeyed. It was good to have Father drive when the horses broke away.

When, in that life which we now live in this body and in such a world, the wild horses begin to rear and plunge, it is good that we are not alone, that we can whisper, ‘Father, you drive.’ ~T. F. Gullixson