The Right Combo    

 

I'm always amazed when I see a team come into the barrel racing world and dominate the competition.  It's one of the mysteries of life to me when a certain horse gets into the hands of a certain rider and they become the perfect combination.  They complete each other and excel together. 

 

The horse had to be a great prospect, but what brought him to completion in excellence in performing was the mixture of training, shoeing, feeding, vet care, correct tack, etc.  When all of these are applied correctly to a great prospect, the results are awesome. 

 

However, you can correctly apply all of the above to a horse that is not a great prospect and all you will have at the end is an empty pocket book.  The old timers used to say, "you can not mix chicken poop with mayonnaise and produce chicken salad."   Wrong combination. 

 

I am also continually amazed to see how many people try to come up with a winner by starting out with a horse that is never going to be great even when all the proper training and care is applied.  Some horses are not bred or built to ever be a great barrel horse.  Some have conformation faults that will not allow them to stay sound year after year in the arena of competition.  Wrong combination. 

 

I've also seen great horses that went to waste because they lacked the right rider and great riders who never had the horse to complete their abilities as a trainer.  Wrong combinations.  The combination has to be right to excel in our sport.  Everything has to click for that team to dominate the competition.  They have to be a team that complete and compliment each other.  Many horses and riders never reach completion in the sport of barrel racing. 

 

I am so glad that people are not like horses in that we ALL have a chance to reach excellence and completion in this life.  When we ask Jesus Christ into our lives, He gives us the Holy Spirit to indewll us.  At that very time, we are complete.  The perfect combination - the right combination for a successful life forever.   Ephesians 1 :13-14 says:  Because of what Christ did all who heard the Good News about how to be saved, and trusted Christ, were marked as belonging to Christ by the Holy Spirit, who long ago had been promised to all of us Christians.  His presence within us is God's guarantee that he really will give us all that he promised; and the Spirit's seal upon us means that God has already purchased us and that he guarantees to bring us to himself. 

 

We have become new at the moment of our acceptance of Christ.  We are born again.  (This is our second birth.)  2 Corinthians says:  If any man be in Christ, then he has become a new creation.  Old things are passed away, behold, all things are become new.  (note that the words are become is a continual process - not instant)   We just got put in training with the greatest trainer of all trainers.  The combination of us and Jesus Christ is the combination of perfection and completion.

 

Your first birth matters not - it is the second birth that counts for eternity. 

It is not your looks or build that matters - it is the inner man that is in training.

It is not your abilities that matter - it is your availability and attitude to be trained that will count.

It is not your goodness that matters - it is Christ's Righteousness that covers you and your faults.

It is not about how talented you are - but who you belong to.

 

We are not like the horse that has to have so many variables work out to excel.  We all have the opportunity to become what Christ designed us to be.  All we lacked was the perfect trainer and when we receive Him - we become instantly complete and ready for the trainer's manual.  The only perfect combination is a human being and Jesus Christ.  That is only the beginning.  Then the training begins and continues until the day when we see Him face to face.      The perfect combination and available to anyone and everyone.