I was putting on my shirt prior to going for a bike ride the other day when I noticed something that shocked me. The shirt was a commemorative shirt from a charity bike ride that I participated in along the Great Ocean Road. We rode a total of a little under 300 km from Geelong to Warrnambool over three days.

What shocked me was the date on the shirt- February 2006. It can’t possibly be ten years ago!

I have many fond memories of that ride – the beautiful scenery, iconic locations such as Bells Beach and the Twelve Apostles (now reduced to nine) at Port Campbell, and the hard slog of the final morning when the unrelenting westerly breeze made riding so difficult.

I have never been athletic or sporty in any way, so this ride in my late 50’s was a once in a lifetime event.

I felt at the time that this was a gift from God. When I saw the Facebook ad I just really felt like I wanted to do this. It seemed that the Lord was saying “You can do this.” That decision led to months of training to get my body used to riding 100 km in a day, and then the hard work of the actual ride.

I was talking to somebody recently about a business expansion he is considering. It seems a little bit crazy, but he knows that God is in this project. He has a peace that it is right to do it, but that doesn’t take away from the work of doing the evaluation and planning and then executing it.

God has given every person the gift of eternal life. It’s a free gift in the sense that you cannot earn it by your own efforts. But it comes with a price tag that you have to put Jesus first in your life decisions.

He gives us the chance of a new start, but we have to live out the new life. He shows us what to do, but we still have to do it.

The Bible says, “If you openly declare that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”

Take hold of that promise, and start living for God today.