The Horse and His Rider — a Gospel Fiction

Once there was a man who owned a wonderful horse.  This was a wonderful man–he was stronger, braver, more agile, more skilled, and altogether better than anyone else around.  So was his horse.  The man and the horse could outpace any other rider and horse, be the race short or be the race long.

One day a stranger rode in.  His appearance was striking.  He was taller, handsomer, nobler, and in every way superior, including to the man.  So also was the stranger’s horse more excellent.  But the man was full of his own greatness and knew it would be beneath him to cede pride of place without a fight.  So he told the stranger.  “Let’s race and see who is the better man.”

“What distance?” the stranger asked.

“Any distance,” the man said.

“To the ends of the earth,” the stranger said.

To his credit, the man did not outwardly blanch.  “To the ends of the earth,” he said fiercely, “I swear it by the LORD God!”

“I am He by whom you swear,” said the stranger.

Then they turned and raced.  Off through the plains and then the deserts.  Up mountains.  Plunging into rivers.  Always the stranger led, and his horse never tired, but by  the greatest strength and the greatest horsemanship the man and his own horse at least stayed within sight.  The man’s horse ran like never a mortal horse has run; the man rode like never a mortal man has rode.  When his animal was too tired to carry him further, he got off and ran alongside.  But they never lessened the distance between themselves and the stranger and his horse, not even by an inch.

At last they came to the sea, where the stranger and his horse stood waiting for them.

“The ends of the earth,” the man gasped.  “I am defeated.  We have lost.”

But the stranger shook his head.  “It is only the sea,” he said, and with a gesture he threw the  horse and his rider into the sea.

What happens next? Well, it possible that the man and his horse struggle until he drowns in the sea.  A jest, cruel but a jest.  It is possible that the horse flounders a bit then rises until he rides it across the top of the water like no horse and rider have ever run before.  It is possible that the ending is not yet–he and his horse are struggling still, and whether they rise or sink is not yet known.

Which is the ending depends on who you are and who you think the mortal man on the mortal horse is.  God comes to you in your season.  Sometimes like Coyote, sometimes like a trumpet and a war cry, and sometimes like a watching, unmoving Judge.

But whichever it is, I think they call come to the glorious ending in the end.