Spooked

Danae was excited when she returned home from an afternoon of horseback riding. "That was so much fun!" she told her family. "We went on a trail ride through the woods. My horse was spooked once, but I didn't fall off!" "Spooked?" asked Dallas, Danae's little brother. "Did you see a ghost?"Danae laughed. "No, Dallas. It's just that when horses see something they don't expect--like a piece of paper blowing in the wind--they might all of a sudden jump sideways or try to run away. We call that being spooked. If you're not a good rider, you might fall off when the horse does that.""Horses are so big!" said Dallas. "Why would papers scare them?"Danae shrugged. "I don't know. They just do. But if the horse knows you and trusts you, he usually calms down and you can get him to go places he'd be scared to go otherwise.""Sounds like you've learned a lot about horses and how to ride them," said Dad. "Your description of how a horse responds when he trusts his rider is a good picture of how we should respond when we truly trust God."Danae tilted her head. "You mean we shouldn't be afraid to go wherever God wants us to go because we can trust Him to take care of us?""Exactly," said Dad. "We need to trust Him in every situation. Sometimes we get spooked when unexpected things happen in our lives. We need to learn to trust God to take us through all the scary places.""Like when Mom was diagnosed with cancer?" asked Dallas. "That was scary." Mom nodded. "It was scary for me too. But your dad's right--we can trust God to take care of us in scary situations like that. Even though I was afraid of what might happen, I knew that because Jesus died to save me, He would always be with me through everything. Knowing that gave me peace and helped me not be afraid.""I didn't know I'd learn all this just from horseback riding," Danae said.A mischievous grin crept across Dallas's face. "Maybe it's time for me to take lessons too so we can all learn more about Jesus!"– Deborah S. Marett