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Christianity through Jesus Christ stepped into the arena of world religions as a challenger. The Son of God, just as the ancient athlete did, threw down His gauntlet on the ground and challenged the religions of the world to take it up. Heaven's challenge still stands.

Sophisticated religions, uncertainties, philosophic illusions and delusions have claimed the world's interest, but heaven's challenge stands just as vigorously today as it ever did. So long as the blessed Word of God lives in the world, so long shall that challenge endure.

Other religions were old, long-whiskered and grey-haired when Jesus Christ entered the arena. Christianity was a babe among the ancient religions.

Zoroaster had lived, taught his "purification by fire," and worshiped the sun, the fire god. Zoroaster could conceive only one possibility of purifying the human soul, a process of fire cleansing. There could be no other. That was the conclusion of the ancient world.

Buddha followed about 500 B.C., but with no better hope than Zoroaster. His ideal was oblivion, personality lost, individuality gone, merged into the great whole, without distinctive consciousness, vacuity.

Mohammed came at a later period, about 550 years after Jesus Christ. His heaven was a harem, the possibility of everlasting sensuality. Then in modern days Mormonism followed with its "spiritual marriages" and dream of eternal polygamy, all abominable to the Spirit of the Son of God and as unlike Christianity as anything could be.

Into The Arena Stepped Christ
Into the muck and the mess and the darkness came the Son of God with the glory of holiness, with divine righteousness, with heavenly purity, with angelic estate, never ceasing consciousness, perpetuated individuality, life forevermore, resurrection from the dead, man's enjoyment of God eternally, yourself a son of God, like the Son of God Himself in His likeness immortalized.

Heaven stood aghast, earth stood aghast, and hell stood aghast when Jesus Christ stepped into the arena. Could He accomplish the thing He talked about? Was there power in heaven or on earth to revolutionize the nature of man, change the darkness, take away sin and obliterate the night from his soul?

Could the personality of man be preserved? Were Christians going to die just like others die? Did He truly possess eternal life? Could He impart it to others? Was Jesus Christ a boaster or a Saviour?

Christianity did not come to the world to apologize for its existence or to beg a place to live. It came as heaven's champion it has the champion soul: "It shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel" (Gen. 3:15).

That champion consciousness is in the soul of the Christian. Being born of God, he is champion of the Son of God and a demonstrator of His salvation. He is the champion of God He cannot be anything else "As he is, so are we in this world" (1 John 4:17).

More Than Mere Morality
In our day we have almost come to the place where the world is being taught to believe that the message of Christianity is morality - be decent, don't act like a pig, keep the beast under control. That is about the message of modern Christianity.

Jesus Christ never wasted His time establishing mere morality. Jesus Christ, the Son of God, declared immortality to be the goal of Christianity, its attainment, the purpose of God for you and me. "I will raise him up at the last day" (John 6:40), said Jesus. "I will give (him) eternal life" (John 10:28). "The dead in Christ shall rise first" (I Thess. 4:16).

No religion in the world except Christianity ever suggested resurrection as its declared intent. Who in the world was ever bold enough to suggest a resurrection? What dying creature could?

It was only the Son of God Himself, out of heaven, with the knowledge of immortality and eternal life that would dare to suggest such a climax for mankind. If there were no other evidence of Jesus Christ's eternality but that, it would be sufficient.

"Who only hath immortality" (1 Tim. 6:16).
"In Him was life; and the life was the light of men" (John 1:4).
"(He that) liveth and believeth in me shall never die" (John 11:26).
"Destroy this temple? in three days I will raise it up" (Mark 14:58).

Marvellous Redeemer!
Christianity stands today absolutely unique. No other religion of earth has our hope, or our consciousness, or our power. I fear sometimes that we moderns somehow have lost the spirit of original Christianity.

We have lost the smash of it. We have lost the charge of it. We have lost the overcoming of it. We are begging the devil for a place in the world, apologizing for our faith in God, trying to conform our religion to the mind of the world.

Salvation is the transforming power of God. Jesus Christ looked upon the world, which was saturated with sin, shaped in iniquity, and said that the task was not too great for Him.

The biggest contract in this universe was undertaken back in the eternal ages when one time, in the council of the Godhead, Jesus Christ, the responsible Creator, became the responsible Saviour and settled the sin question by offering Himself as the Saviour of the world. He wrought our redemption. "He…that believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life" (John 5:24).

His dying on the cross was the first incident in connection with our redemption, but it was not the conclusive incident. If Jesus had died on the cross and the process of salvation had ceased then, there would not be a redeemed sinner today.

David was sitting on the mountainside one afternoon watching his sheep, and his spirit travelled out into the regions of God. He began to observe, as a seer does, the things that were taking place; and he broke out shouting, "Thou hast ascended on high, thou hast led captivity captive: thou hast received gifts for men; yea, for the rebellious also, that the Lord God might dwell among them" (Ps. 68:18).

"Lift up your heads, oh, ye gates, and be ye lifted up ye everlasting doors, the King of Glory is coming in" (Ps. 24:7). That is the Christ of God; that is His salvation!

This was a battle of worlds. It was not a battle of earthly religions. It was the battle of every power of light and darkness in heaven and earth. Jesus Christ, the champion of righteousness and salvation, had to make good or, like the philosophers, pass into oblivion at the grave. Instead of being the life giver, He would have been just the propounder of another philosophy.

The resurrection morning came. Jesus, discussing His life had said, "I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again" (John 10:18). He took it at His will. He commanded life! He lived and death became a captive. Jesus Christ, the Son of God, was victor - and there were none like Him in all the universe.

He came out of the battle with the "keys of hell and of death" (Rev. 1:18). No other soul in heaven or on earth ever had such an experience. None other had ever challenged death: no other had ever taken death and hell captive. Jesus Christ stood unique in earth, in hell, in heaven.

100 Percent Supernatural
When Jesus came forth in the resurrection, something breathed and throbbed and pulsed in Him that had never breathed or throbbed or pulsed before. It was the new eternal life. He used a new vocabulary—the ordinary language was not big enough. He said, "All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth" (Matt. 28:18).

Who else in the universe had ever experienced such a thing? None but the Son of God. "ALL POWER" language is Christian vocabulary only. Christianity came from the heart of the Glorified. Christianity is a heavenly triumph. Christianity is one hundred percent supernatural - God possessing man.

Just as God breathed the breath of life into Adam, so Jesus Christ breathed upon His disciples. If He could breathe into them this heaven-born life, they would be heaven-born like Himself. If He could breathe this consciousness of triumph into them, they would become triumphant also. If they could take the deathless life of Christ, they would become deathless likewise.

"He breathed on them, and saith unto them, Receive ye the Holy Ghost" (John 20:22). In Peter's Pentecostal sermon he gives a revelation that no other writer gives us. Peter's broken heart was penetrative. He saw into the glory. He saw Jesus ascending to the throne of God. He saw the Almighty God receive Him at the throne.

He observed what took place. He said, "Having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he hath shed forth this, which ye now see and hear" (Acts 2:33). He saw Him get the eternal saving marvel for universal distribution to all mankind.

Right then Jesus became the world's Saviour, the Saviour of all mankind. He now possessed the saving grace, the Holy Spirit. God had fulfilled His promise. It completed His saviorhood. It made Him heaven's High Priest. He had qualified as High Priest of things eternal.

It was His right now to pour out the Holy Spirit on the world. He came to the balcony of glory and poured out the Holy Spirit on every hungry heart that was ready to receive. They were baptized in the Holy Spirit. So may you be.