The Rattler | Previous Challenge Entry

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TITLE: The Rattler | Previous Challenge Entry
By Lynae Fisher
07/23/25
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With a terrified scream, the horse reared up. Grasping desperately, the cowboy tried to hang on, but he was thrown from the saddle and crashed to the earth with a thud. The horse fled. As the dust began to settle, he heard the fearful rattle. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the coiled form of the rattlesnake ready to strike.

The heat of the day seemed to blur his vision. The rattler looked to him to be laughing… no, it was the serpent of old, laughing, as he must have in the garden when Adam and Eve’s eyes were opened in Eden at the fall.

Caught. Helpless. Fallen.

The cowboy did not dare to move. Never could he out move a rattler’s strike. If he ever needed help, it was now. Now he wanted to pray, but he didn’t dare move to fold his hands or bow his head as he had heard the preacher instruct men to do. From the depths of his heart, he cried out a silent prayer of repentance. Time after time, he had tried to live his own way, but the devil only laughed at his sin-stained soul which he could never keep pure.

Again, his vision blurred. The serpent laughed again, but this time it looked like a giant cobra with its hood spread across the sky in the gathering gloom over the Place of the Skull. There on the cross at Golgotha, the Savior of the world hung dying for the sin of the mankind.

Then, as the scene before him changed again, he heard a voice thunder, “O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?” A roar ripped through the air. Heavy footsteps shook the ground. A lion ran towards him with the sun in its mane. No… it was not a lion… it was… his horse! The horse ran like he had never seen it run in all its life as he found himself back in the present. Surely, life was over for him, he figured, with the snake ready to strike and the horse running full speed at him. Clenching his eyes shut, he waited. But the horse did not trample him.

When the dust settled again and the thunderous hoof beats died down, he carefully opened his eyes. The rattlesnake lay crushed and broken in a decimated heap. The horse, still panting heavily, gently walked back towards him and nuzzled him with its long, soft muzzle.

With a little help from the horse, he sat up into a kneeling position. Bowing his head, he prayed. No longer would he try to be good enough on his own. Only the Lion and the Lamb who crushed the serpent’s head could save him from the power of that wicked serpent of old.

(fiction)

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