Is Your Christianity Real?
September 7, 2023 Blogs by: Tim Jennings, M.D.
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Satan is the original liar, the father of fantasy and fable; he is the maker of myths, master of make-believe, patriarch of pretend, sire of superstition, wizard of wickedness, architect of the artificial, creator of the counterfeit, founder of fake, the great imposter, preeminent pretender, and diabolical deceiver who declares so that which is not so.

God is the God of reality—the Creator of the cosmos, the Source and Sustainer of life itself. God is truth, the Author of what is real, factual, objective, honest, true, and right.

Satan’s kingdom is an imposter of God’s reality. It is an artificial construct that infects our minds and corrupts our understanding of reality. Satan’s system acts like a dark veil covering our eyes; it obscures our ability to see the truth of God’s kingdom. As the apostle Paul wrote, “For now we see through a glass, darkly” (1 Corinthians 13:12 KJV).

God’s kingdom is the way things are, actuality, what is real and true. It is how reality is designed to function; it is the way of life, health, and happiness; it enlightens the mind, changing the foolish into the wise.

Satan’s kingdom is built upon made-up rules.

God’s kingdom is built upon eternal laws, the protocols reality functions upon (laws of physics, gravity, health, and moral laws).

Satan’s kingdom operates upon lies, fear, intimidation, threat, inflicted external punishments, coercion, and the restriction of liberty.

God’s kingdom operates upon truth, love, and freedom.

Satan darkens the minds of all humanity with his lie that his make-believe system of made-up rules that require external enforcement is also the way God’s kingdom works.

The Bible says,

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it (John 1:1–5 NIV84).

Jesus, the Word, created all things—He built reality—and His laws are the laws that life is constructed to operate upon. He came into the world to reveal, in person, how God’s kingdom of truth, love, and liberty functions—to enlighten us. But that light of truth was not appreciated or understood by the minds darkened into the fake legal view of the world.

As Jesus went around restoring people to harmony with God’s design laws—healing physical illness, thereby restoring people to harmony with the laws of health; forgiving sins, thereby restoring hearts and minds to harmony with the law of love and truth—the religious leaders hated Him because their minds were darkened with Satan’s fantasy that God’s law is imposed rules that require inflicted punishment. They accused Jesus of being a law-breaker (John 19:7). They thought righteousness was rule-keeping and justice was punishing rule-breakers. They could not see through the dark penal-legal veil that Satan had woven over the minds of people.

The evil way is to replace objective reality, how God constructed life to function, with a fake system of made-up rules and external legal enforcement—an artificial way of thinking and functioning.

The idea that God’s law functions like human law, made-up rules that require God to use power to inflict pain, suffering, and death upon His creatures as “just” punishment for sin, is a fantasy, fable, myth, lie; it is an artificially constructed counterfeit of God’s kingdom that lays over the hearts and minds of people and obscures our ability to see God’s eternal truth. It makes God out to be the source of death, the one from whom we need to be protected. It results in theologies designed to hide and protect us from God rather than reconcile us to Him.

It is only through Jesus and the Spirit of truth that we can penetrate this veil of satanic deception. It is only with a heart reborn into God’s kingdom of love that we can overcome fear and recognize that true righteousness and justice is to:

  • Forgive those who have wronged us rather than demand they be punished (Matthew 6:12, 14).
  • Bless those who persecute us rather than cursing them (Romans 12:14).
  • Turn the other cheek rather than striking back (Matthew 5:39).
  • Love our enemies rather than hating them (Matthew 5:43, 44).
  • Feed your hungry enemy rather than let them starve (Romans 12:20).

Those caught up in the delusional imposed law, legal systems of this world do the exact opposite of God’s kingdom. They think that justice is to inflict punishment, to coerce, force, intimidate, control, censor and censure, and restrict liberties.

Jesus said, “My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, my servants would fight to prevent my arrest by the Jews. But now my kingdom is from another place.”

“You are a king, then!” said Pilate.

Jesus answered, “You are right in saying I am a king. In fact, for this reason I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone on the side of truth listens to me” (John 18:36, 37 NIV84).

Those who are on the side of truth do not wage war like the world does; we do not seek to make others conform through fear and punishment. Instead, we seek to win their hearts to loving trust and friendship.

Anyone who is joined to Christ is a new being; the old is gone, the new has come. All this is done by God, who through Christ changed us from enemies into his friends and gave us the task of making others his friends also. Our message is that God was making the whole human race his friends through Christ. God did not keep an account of their sins, and he has given us the message which tells how he makes them his friends. Here we are, then, speaking for Christ, as though God himself were making his appeal through us. We plead on Christ’s behalf: let God change you from enemies into his friends! (2 Corinthians 5:17–20 GNT).

Jesus calls every person, who is on the side of truth, out of the delusional, artificial, make-believe penal/legal systems of this world, out of believing justice is obtained by legal means, by inflicted punishment, and into His kingdom of truth, love, and freedom.

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Tim Jennings, M.D. Timothy R. Jennings, M.D., is a board-certified psychiatrist, master psychopharmacologist, Distinguished Life Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association, Fellow of the Southern Psychiatric Association, and an international speaker. He served as president of the Southern and Tennessee Psychiatric Associations and is president and founder of Come and Reason Ministries. Dr. Jennings has authored many books, including The God-Shaped Brain, The God-Shaped Heart, and The Aging Brain.
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