Gevurah
I have always loved horses. Their grace makes the heart pause, their power makes the soul stand still. The way they move, every muscle coiled and flowing, is like poetry in motion. The curve of a neck, the flash of an eye, the soft flare of a nostril as they breathe—it is beauty and strength intertwined.
Standing beside one, you can feel both calm and awe at once. Even the gentlest horse carries majesty in every step. And yet, these creatures are not delicate. They are living, breathing reminders of God’s awesome creativity, His attention to detail, His love for both beauty and purpose. Before we even read a word of Scripture about horses, I want you to see them as I do: majestic creatures made by God, perfect in their balance of grace and power, and worthy of our wonder.
✝️ ✝️ ✝️ ✝️ ✝️
In the ancient world, horses weren’t cute companions or barnyard workers. They weren’t for plowing fields or pulling carts of grain like oxen. No, the horse was different. It was elite. Fierce. Untamed unless trained, and even then, its power was only on loan. Horses were bred for battle. Crafted by God Himself to charge headlong into war, muscle coiled like springs beneath skin. They were the very image of might under motion, and they stirred awe in the human heart the way thunder makes a valley go quiet.
That’s why, in Scripture, God never casually mentions the horse. When He does, it’s deliberate. It’s charged. It’s often a warning, but it’s also a marvel.
Let’s begin where God Himself speaks of the horse, not to judge it, but to celebrate it.
In Job 39:19–25, the Lord asks Job:
“Do you give the horse its strength (gevurah)
or clothe its neck with a flowing mane?
Do you make it leap like a locust,
striking terror with its proud snorting?”
The word gevurah doesn’t just mean raw physical strength. It speaks of valor, heroism, divine might. This is not brute force, it’s glory in motion. The horse’s neck in this verse is a symbol of honor. That flowing mane is not mere decoration, it’s a crown. The Hebrew concept here is that of the tsavvar, the upper neck, stiffened in courage, lifted in pride. This is the part of the horse that leads the charge, not the tail end that flees from danger. When a horse runs in battle, it doesn’t shrink, it stretches forward.
Then comes the nostrils:
“It paws fiercely, rejoicing in its strength,
and charges into the fray.
It laughs at fear, afraid of nothing;
it does not shy away from the sword.”
The nostrils in Hebrew thought are tied to breath, neshamah, spirit, life. When a horse snorts in Job’s description, it’s not just exhaling. It’s declaring its readiness. God made the horse to rejoice in the adrenaline of battle, not to cower from it. His creation of this animal was not accidental, it was intentional. Every muscle, every tendon, every flash of the eye was built for a purpose. And it was good.
But now here’s the turn.
Because while God glories in the horse’s might, He also warns against replacing Him with it.
In Psalm 20:7, David writes: “Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the LORD our God.”
The Hebrew word for trust here is batach, בָּטַח; it means to lean on, to rest your weight fully, to be confident in something. And this is where the horse begins to carry a double meaning. God’s not rebuking the horse. He’s rebuking the human tendency to trust in the wrong thing.
Horses became a symbol of independence, of strength without God, of self-sufficiency. In the days of the kings, when Israel turned to Egypt for help instead of turning to the LORD, God gave this piercing cry through the prophet Isaiah:
“Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help, who rely on horses, who trust in the multitude of their chariots and in the great strength of their horsemen, but do not look to the Holy One of Israel…” (Isaiah 31:1)
There it is again. Batach.
And the word for woe is hoy, הוֹי, a cry of sorrow, of alarm, like the sound of a funeral dirge or a mother’s first gasp at losing her child. God isn’t angrily condemning the horse. He’s heartbroken that His people would trust in muscle and mane more than in Him.
This matters because horses were not just military equipment, they were political statements.
Kings who amassed great stables were flexing their dominance. In Deuteronomy 17:16, God warns that any future king of Israel must not multiply horses for himself or cause the people to return to Egypt to get them. Why? Because Egypt was the symbol of human pride, wealth, and war without God. It was the birthplace of empire. The king who gathered horses was subtly saying, “We don’t need YHWH. We have horsepower.”
And God will always bring that down.
That’s why, in judgment passages, the horse is often the first to fall. So sad, to me.
In Jeremiah 50:37, when Babylon is being judged, God says:
“A sword is against their horses, against their chariots, and against all the foreign troops in her midst…”
It sounds harsh, like the horses are targets. But they’re not. It’s what they’re yoked to that brings the sword. The system. The empire. The pride. The rebellion. The horses suffer not because they were evil, but because they were forced to carry the symbols of war and human arrogance.
And still, they run. Even into fire. Even into slaughter. Because that’s what they were built for, obedience, loyalty, motion. But God sees. And He remembers. That’s why the end of the story is so staggering.
In Revelation 19, when the heavens split and the King of Kings returns, He does not come on clouds or thrones or lightning bolts.
He comes riding a white horse.
Not the donkey of humility, like His first coming. Not a throne carried by angels. A horse. A warhorse. But this time, the horse isn’t bearing rebellion, it’s bearing redemption.
The Greek word used in Revelation is hippos leukos, a white horse, radiant, pure, victorious. This is not a beast of Babylon. This is the mount of Messiah. And every eye will see Him, just like Zechariah foretold:
“They shall look upon Me whom they have pierced…” (Zechariah 12:10)
And they will mourn, not as if mourning a stranger, but like a father weeping over his only son. The mourning of Hadadrimmon, the valley of Megiddo, where King Josiah fell and all Jerusalem wept. That’s the level of grief Israel will feel when they finally realize who the King was. Not just a rider on a horse. But the LORD of Hosts, pierced and returning.
And the horse, the warhorse, will not be struck down this time.
It will be exalted.
Because in the hands of God, even the symbols of war can be redeemed.
The neck that once led a charge of pride, now bows to carry the King of Righteousness.
The legs that once galloped for empire now thunder for justice.
The mane, once flowing with human glory, now crowned with heaven’s wind.
And the strength, the gevurah, no longer shouts of human might, but of divine majesty.
The horse’s story ends not in the ruins of Babylon, but at the side of the Messiah.
Because nothing God created, nothing, is ever wasted.
Not even a warhorse.
image made by chatgpt at my direction.