A Free Gift

Cillian was so excited. Nice weather was finally here, and he was big enough to ride a bike with real gears! He got on the bike Mom bought last year at a garage sale and pedaled down the street. Then he tried shifting gears, but his ten-gear bike wouldn't shift out of third gear. He sadly returned home. Mom had agreed to buy the bike, but all repairs had to come out of his savings."Mom, it's busted. The bike doesn't work. It won't shift."Mom knew of a bike shop not very far from their home. She loaded the bike into their van and they headed to the shop. When they rolled the bike in, the shop worker asked what was wrong. Cillian explained, feeling very anxious. He didn't have a lot of money saved up--what if it was too expensive to fix? What if it couldn't be fixed? But within two minutes, the bike mechanic adjusted a cable and all the gears shifted perfectly. "What do we owe you?" Mom asked."Nothing!" the mechanic said."Are you sure?" Cillian was skeptical. "No one does anything for free.""Your thanks is enough," the mechanic said, smiling."Well then, thank you!" Cillian said.As Cillian and Mom drove home, Cillian was overjoyed. "I can't believe it," he said. "Nothing on earth is ever free!" "Well, there is one thing," Mom said. "And it's the best thing.""What's that?" asked Cillian.Mom smiled at him. "When Jesus died on the cross and rose again, He paid the price for our sins. He offers us the free gift of eternal life with God. And it's free for us, because Jesus paid for it! If you had told the mechanic you didn't want the free gift he gave you, you would have had to pay him for fixing your bike.""And I probably don't have enough money," admitted Cillian."Just like we would never have been able to afford the cost of our sins," said Mom. "So we accepted the free gift.""Of course," said Cillian. "We would be crazy not to!" –Vicky Kaseorg