Sid’s eyes opened slowly. He was in a hospital bed, and his mother was crying softly beside him. His head, wrapped in bandages, ached. What had happened to him? How had he gotten here? Slowly it came back to him ...
Sid was only 12 years old the summer he joined the Seattle Cycle Club. This particular Saturday the club was planning a bike trip from downtown Seattle, Washington, out to a small town named Maple Valley, near the Cedar River, a ride of around 26 miles. The group would pass his house on the way, so he decided to join them as they passed, rather than at the start of their trip. But he was helping his father with a car problem right when the other bikers passed his house, so he could only wave as he saw them go by.
No problem, he thought. Fifteen minutes later he was heading out after them, hoping to catch up somewhere on the route. But when five miles had passed and he still hadn’t seen them, he decided to take a shortcut. This was a path along some railroad tracks, which came out next to the Maple Valley Road.
Where the railroad and the road came together, trains crossed the Cedar River on a high trestle more than a block long. He needed to use that trestle if he were to get across the river to where his group would be. There was a wooden beam about a foot high and a foot wide running between the edge of the rails and the edge of the trestle. He decided to ride his bike on that beam, pushing himself along on the rail with his right foot and on the beam with his left foot.
Sure enough, as he was crossing this dangerous trestle, he saw the group below him on the other side of the river. Perfect timing! They started calling back and forth, and then suddenly, Sid realized that his left foot was no longer coming down on the beam, but in the air, and quite suddenly, he and his bike tumbled off the bridge. The last thing he remembered was hitting his head on a steel girder a few feet below where he should have been. He was knocked unconscious, and he and his bike both fell down the 20-foot drop to the river below.
The watching club leader felt like fainting. It looked like Sid would land on some huge boulders in the river below. But somehow, he completely missed the rocks and landed, instead, in the swift waters of the river. His bike followed him.
Some of the club members dashed out into the river, waist deep, so that as he and his bike floated by, they were able to rescue both of them.
The next thing Sid knew, there he was, opening his eyes in that hospital room. He had to have stitches and his bike was never the same, but how amazing that he had been kept from dying in that dangerous fall!
Today, children, I hope most people know better than to ride their bikes across train trestles! Many safety laws have been put in place since those days, and in many countries it is not legal to walk or ride along railway tracks.
But, let’s think about Sid, unconscious in that river. What could he do to save himself? Nothing! He would have died if his friends had not gone to the trouble of saving him. And that’s a good picture of us as sinners. We are all sinners, and we are completely unable to save ourselves or do anything to please God and make it safely to heaven instead of going to hell. But the Lord Jesus came down to earth for that very reason ... to save us. He could save us, and He did everything that was needed to save us. God put all of our sins on His holy Son on the cross of Calvary, and the Lord Jesus took all the punishment for our sins on that terrible cross where He died. There, God “made Him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him” (2 Corinthians 5:2121For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. (2 Corinthians 5:21)).
If you accept the gift of God, which is eternal life in God’s Son, God will see you as just as righteous as His Son, the Lord Jesus, and one day you will enter heaven. If not, you will get what your own sinful actions deserve, your “wages,” which is eternal punishment in hell. “The wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Romans 6:2323For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. (Romans 6:23)). I hope you accept that wonderful gift of God!
Messages of God’s Love 1/22/2023