Every other horse of the twenty or so we’ve owned since 2010 has rather quickly developed the habit of coming to the gate when it’s time for us to move them back from the pasture to the barn. It’s not uncommon for them to be waiting at the gate when we go out in the afternoon to move them over.

Usually, it took no more than three or four consecutive days of providing a little tasty horse treat. And, as additional motivation, we’d feed them a bit of commercial horse feed as soon as we took them back over. Then, skip the treats for the most part and let the feed continue the rewarding part.

That hasn’t worked with Harley, our recently acquired beautiful, flashy, black and white gelding.

About once every ten days or so, he’ll join Earl at the gate, waiting for halter and rope and the slow walk back over to the barn and feed pellets and hay. But, at least once during that same interval, he’ll indifferently keep grazing fifty to a hundred yards away while I halter Earl at the gate. Then, while Earl waits at the gate and I walk over to where he is, Earl with wait until I get within just a few feet of him. Then, he’ll turn and walk off. Sometimes he’ll walk just a few yards away and grab a few more bites of grass. Sometimes, he’ll walk off and head straight to the gate where Earl is waiting. And then, just as I reach him again, he’ll take a couple of steps away before letting me catch him.

After yet another of those events recently, I was venting my frustration to Randa when I got back to the house. “Hon,” she reminded me, “you’ve got to meet him where he is, not where you want him to be.” Which, as it turns out, is true both literally and metaphorically.

Most all of us have had a time when we wish that a particular horse, child, student, neighbor, co-worker, church member, or whomever or whatever was more like one that was easier to work with. Some of them come to us with a better attitude or with more previous training. Some come with both. Admittedly, those do provide quicker results and more visible immediate progress. The others can be both frustrating and disappointing.

Like most buffets, travel routes, and clothing stores, we have a choice. We can focus on that disappointment in ways that practically guarantee additional disappointment. Or we can use patient acceptance to help us both move forward.

That seems to be more the strategy that God has adopted with us, don’t you think?