Out Our Way: "Thy kingdom come"

Out our way, I am pleased to have been able to live a dream. Like many kids growing up, I wanted to play cowboy - and here on the Hi-Line I got to play it for real. Charlie took me under his wing and let me work cattle with him for six years. Oh, I suspect the real deal cowboys will always see me as an amateur - and that is accurate - but at least with Charlie it wasn't just wearing the hat, it was doing the actual work.

Now, I have ridden off and on for years, but always on different horses owned by someone else. I did not know about bonding. Ken Overcast sent out a fun thing on Facebook, a poster with a cowboy saying, "Can you ride my horse? Can I wreck your car?" Years ago I would not have understood that. Now I do. For in the six years I rode and worked with Goliath, old "Doc" and I actually began to bond. We sensed each other and communicated without words.

In the animated film "Avatar," the native people rode dragons and bonded by somehow physically plugging their braid into the dragon and from that point on the two became as one. Later I felt that Doc and I were approaching that unity. We were up in the Beaver Creek area where the open range was still in process. A large herd was being moved down the road and one of the herders, seeing I had Doc in my trailer, asked if I saw any strays to try to head them down the road in the general direction of the rest of the herd and they, the hands, would be back up a bit later and pick up the strays.

Well, as it happened, Doc and I did run into about four pairs a few miles up the road and decided to try to give a hand. But these pairs had been ranging all summer and were well, "rangey." They saw us and took off. That's when Doc took over. Instead of chasing, he somehow got it through to me to let him slowly pick his way around without spooking them, and get behind them. He was raised a cow horse and had far more horse sense than I did - and somehow he communicated the plan with me. So I just relaxed and gave him his head. Sure enough he went around the pairs slowly and indifferently until we were behind them - and then began moving forward and slowly pushing them to the road. No panic, no sudden moves, just nice and easy.

Did I actually learn these things from working with Charlie over the years? Was I subconsciously directing Doc to round these strays up? Perhaps, but it felt more like he and I were connected and both thinking the same thing. I saw his plan and may have subconsciously nudged a tad with leg and heel, but I felt Doc knew exactly what to do and we were both on the same wavelength. That was an amazing feeling.

I wonder if that may not be little something like what Christ was talking about when He asked to come in to us ... and also told us the Kingdom of God is already here inside. This book by the French writer Jeanne Guyon several hundred years ago suggests this very thing. One of the exercises is to recite the Lord's prayer and consider what it is saying. Father suggests an intimacy and parental love that many people have not considered. The idea of God as the tyrant waiting to punish is much more popular with the agnostic and theists who have never desired nor attempted to meet God face to face. And the idea of asking for Thy Kingdom Come, meaning to open the door of the heart when Christ knocks, is equally foreign. Just as the idea that I would feel and connect with Doc and we could really communicate simply by blending our bodies together in the riding seemed totally nonsense until I discovered it was true.

My buddy Rick reminds me Doc's brain is the size of an orange - which may be true enough, but when it came to cows he was a lot smarter than I was. I never saw intelligence in those eyes like I do in Scout, my dog - but I sure felt it in my seat and legs. Horses can be trained to act like dogs, and the Sioux word for horse, "Chunka Wakan," means "Big Dog" - but a horse is not a dog. The bond between horse and rider is not the same between dog and master. The Native peoples had a special bond with their ponies as do the real-deal cowboys. A rider who abuses a horse, rides it hard and put it away wet - has no bond.

If the Kingdom of God is within me, perhaps I am binding with God as Doc bonded with me. There is no fear - there is trust and a sense of unity. We are in this together. Indeed for that short time of pushing pairs, Doc and I were connected and on the same wave length. Guyon suggested, if I read her right, God wants that same connection with us. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done - together - united - seeking the same goal.

We pushed those pairs toward the road as a team ... no, as more than a team - as a unit! Working together. We had bonded in the same mission goal. That is what I seek with God. "Unite with me, Lord that my mind may meld with Yours and my will is Thy will ... here on earth as it is in heaven."

--

Brother John Bruington and Doc have discovered what it is to be connected to each other. Now we seek to discover what it is to be connected to the Mind of God and be as one - just as Doc and I were pushing cows. "Maranatha, come Lord Jesus, and unite with me, that indeed Your will is done on earth as it is in Heaven, for I am a sinner with a soul the size of a tangerine and need Your guidance. I am an untrained cow pony with no sense. Guide me with legs, knees, reins and spurs that I may follow the way of righteousness and become a good and solid cow horse. This old Mustang is useless without the Rider to guide it. Cinch me up and step aboard and show me the way You want me to do that I too may find the green pastures and still water promised to your herds."