“Our leader is dead,” he said solemnly. “But god loves us too much to leave him this way. I tell you, god will bring him back to life again—here, before the eyes of you all! I, god’s prophet, declare it so. When I speak the word, President Mark Beaulieu will live again!” The chairman turned on his heel and strode to the lifeless, blood-soaked body lying on the platform and shouted, “Mark Beaulieu! I say to you, live!”

At his command, a single bolt of lightning crackled from the sky and struck the body of the fallen president. People screamed and gasped at the suddenness of the blast. Slowly, Mark Beaulieu rose to his feet. He no longer seemed human. His face—in fact, his whole body—seemed to emanate a luminescent aura that made him appear to the dazzled crowd as supernatural . . . angelic.

Instantly Tauriq Haddad fell to his knees, looked up reverently into the face of the president, and said into his wireless microphone, “You were dead, but now you live. You are the one sent by God. You are god!”

Without saying a word, Mark Beaulieu raised both his hands as a sign of blessing on the crowd. Suddenly there was loud weeping as most people fell to their knees in spontaneous worship of the resurrected leader. Throughout the crowd, some people began to howl and moan. Others clasped their hands and moved their lips in silent prayer. No one spoke against him. All who were assembled there that night were convinced that they were looking at the very face of god’s anointed. All, that is, except a few dedicated followers of Jesus Christ and a small handful of Orthodox Jews.

Television news, the newspapers and news magazines, and the on-line services all focused on the extraordinary events at Soldier Field. Universally, issues of spirituality were on everyone’s lips. Theological professors from the University of Chicago, Yale, Harvard, and Princeton were interviewed on all the television networks.

To a person, each declared why, in his or her considered opinion, the events at Soldier Field fulfilled perfectly Christian prophecies of the Messiah. The leading professor of Christian apologetics at the University of Chicago summed up the feeling of his colleagues, saying, “I can say without hesitation that Mark Beaulieu embodies all that we have hoped for in the Messiah. Last night, the entire world witnessed god become man, and man become god.”

In a world that had been racked by every conceivable disaster, the appearance of the god-man was nothing short of a miracle from heaven. Here at last was the savior they had waited for and dreamed of through the long and difficult months. Here was the one man who could bring solutions to their problems. Here was the god who could rule over them, bringing peace and prosperity, and make the world new. Life itself would be reborn. How could anyone stand in his way?