Do You Have an Old Friend?

Do you have old friend?  Not friends that are old, but friends that you have known since childhood.  Some of those friends are ones that you may not see for a while, sometimes a good while, even years.  But when you get together it's as if you've never been apart, you just take up right where you left off.  Catching up only takes a few minutes and then your just right back where you were the last time you saw each other and in those early years of friendships.  Those are lifetime friends, friends that you developed a relationship with through the thick and thin of life and they will always be your friend no matter what. They are friends you've shared you most intimate secrets with and your biggest joys with. They are a permanent part of your heart.  It's just gotta be a God thing.  My friend Judy is like that.

In my deep sadness, I could not figure out why I was so deeply affected by the situation with Gus.  I have not actually OWNED him in 9 years.  Gus had  belonged to someone else.  While I have seen him through these years, I have not ridden him or been around him for any length of time.   I've had numerous horses since Gus and two now.  But Tuesday it was if I was losing my only horse, my best friend, my comrade, and a piece of my heart.

Today it hit me.  I realized it was because he was like one of those old friends that you take up the relationship right where you left off.  Tuesday, as I leaned over him, kissing him and telling him goodbye, he was that old friend, the one you hope you'll never lose.  All of our time together just came racing back into my heart and mind as if it were yesterday.  In a flash, I remembered so many good times with him and some difficult times too.  Our relationship was not void of some trials and hardships too, but we made it through together, he and I.  This realization has mades sense of it all now and it has blessed me to see this so clearly.

Today I am so grateful for those treasured memories and treasured friendships.  God is so faithful to give us treasures in our hearts, the kind we will take with us till the end.

One of the best things about Tuesday was that his current family was with me or should I say, I was with them.  There was this bond between us that neither of us had ever known, but it was as if our love for Gus individually had bonded the two of us together as well.  There's  no other way to describe it.  There's just this spiritual thing between horses and the women who love them that only those women know and feel.  It would have been too hard to do it alone, but we were there for each other and for that I am eternally grateful.  There were angels among us.

I found this reading and scripture this morning in my Jesus Calling devotional that sort of said it all.  I sent this to Gus' mom.

2 Corinthians 1:3-4

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God.

This scripture is as if Jesus said to us.....
"When you need comfort, I love to enfold you in My arms.  I enable you not only to feel comforted but also to be a channel through whom I comfort others.  Thus you are doubly blessed, because a living channel absorbs some of what is flowing through it.  No matter what losses you experience in your life, no one can take away my constant companionship with you."

God, I thank you for your loving arms that hold and comfort me all day long, in good times and in bad.  You are my Savior and I praise your name.

You know me.  There will be many more trails and tales of horses in my life.  There will be a zillion memories to share and hold dear to my heart.  There will be more horse love than I know what to do with!
So here's to happy thoughts and happy trials and swishing tails and hoof prints in the sand!

Matthew 6

¹⁹ Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal:

²⁰ But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal:

²¹ For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.

Encourage One Another, continuing the journey on fresh paths.
Blessings and love to you, xoxo.