The Bible calls Jesus the Captain see Hebrews 2:10 and because of His experience at the crease, He can guarantee victory!

Jesus has completed His innings and is now out of sight in the pavilion (heaven). But He's not just a spectator, He lives in the hearts of those who put their trust in Him.

Over and over again, the demon bowler hurls everything he can at our three stumps of body, soul and spirit. He tries every fiendish trick to get us out, googlies, bouncers, chinamen, the lot!

Often, we can only play defensively but if we watch and pray, we can sometimes knock a short ball to the boundary or a "wicked" ball for six so that all the spectators in heaven and earth rejoice!

Jesus cried triumphantly from the cross, "It is finished" John 19:30 and "declared" at 33.

He was the only man to complete a perfect innings. He had finished everything His Father had sent Him to do John 17:4. He had taken the full punishment that we deserved for our sins. He did not duck the penalty but paid the price in full with His own blood Ephesians 1:7. He knocked Satan for six, destroyed the power of death and rose through the solid rock of the tomb.

No wonder C.T. Studd, the great cricketer who played with the famous W.G. Grace, said, "If Jesus Christ is God and died for me, then no sacrifice for me to make for Him can be too great."

Leaving his earthly cricketing career, he went out to China then to India and Africa (where he died) to enlist people for the team of his beloved Captain.