{"id":3402,"date":"2021-06-24T08:02:51","date_gmt":"2021-06-24T12:02:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jkitchen.org\/?p=3402"},"modified":"2021-06-24T08:02:51","modified_gmt":"2021-06-24T12:02:51","slug":"forgotten-words-of-the-faith-reckon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jkitchen.org\/?p=3402","title":{"rendered":"Forgotten Words of the Faith: Reckon"},"content":{"rendered":"

One of the wrecking balls that postmodernism has sent careening into our world is the notion that words have no objective meaning.\u00a0 The postmodern says that words only contain meaning for the one using them (and of course they expect you to understand what they mean when they say that).\u00a0 The speaker, it is insisted, may have a specific meaning in mind when articulating the word, but the hearer may have a different\u2014and equally valid\u2014meaning when he hears\/reads the word spoken\/written.\u00a0 It doesn\u2019t take a rocket scientist to figure out that in such a world meaningful and even functional communication is impossible.\u00a0 In that world when I sit down at a restaurant and order baked rigatoni with meat sauce and the wait-staff bring me chicken parmesan I have no room to object.\u00a0 My words had no inherent, objective meaning.\u00a0 So shut up and eat your chicken!<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

So when we lose a word through disuse we must be certain that we don\u2019t lose its meaning.\u00a0 There may be truth that has been carried in the luggage-hold of that now-dated word that remains valuable.\u00a0 Thus we\u2019ve been searching for words of our faith that have fallen into disuse and we\u2019ve been seeking to revive the truth which they carry.<\/p>\n

One such word is reckon<\/strong>.\u00a0 My dad used that word a lot.\u00a0 \u201cDad, can I borrow the car tonight?\u201d \u201cI reckon,\u201d he would say. I knew just what he meant, but I wonder if those younger or from other areas of the country might?<\/p>\n

In the New Testament the word reckon<\/strong> translates the Greek word logizomai<\/em>. This is the source of our English words logic<\/em> and logical<\/em>. One Greek language expert says it means to \u201cthink according to logical rules\u201d (Friberg). Another says it means \u201cto reckon, count, compute, calculate, count over\u201d and \u201cto reckon inwardly, count up or weigh the reasons, to deliberate\u201d (Thayer). I think you can see why it was a word used in the world of accounting.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The New Testament tells us there are some things God reckons to be true.\u00a0 For example, he has reckoned<\/strong> the righteousness of Christ to our account (Rom. 4:3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10, 11, 22, 23, 24; Gal. 3:6). This is an act of His grace and is entered into by faith. As we believe God\u2019s promise, He reckons<\/strong> us to be His children: \u201cIn other words, it is not the natural children who are God’s children, but it is the children of the promise who are regarded [reckoned] as Abraham’s offspring\u201d<\/span> (Rom. 9:8).<\/p>\n

The New Testament also tells us that there are some things that we must reckon<\/strong> to be true. For starters we must reckon<\/strong> that God\u2019s reckoning<\/strong> is true: \u201cFor we maintain [reckon]<\/span> that a man is justified by faith apart from observing the law\u201d<\/span> (Rom. 3:28)! When He declares us righteous by grace (transferring the record of Christ\u2019s righteousness to our account in heaven) through faith, we need to calculate that it is indeed true. We are also called upon to reckon<\/strong> ourselves dead to sin with Christ: \u201cIn the same way, count [\u201creckon,\u201d KJV]<\/span> yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus\u201d<\/span> (Rom. 6:11).<\/p>\n

Here are some other passages to explore which use the word and demand that we rightly calculate the reality of things (Rom. 8:18; 1 Cor. 13:5; 2 Cor. 3:5; Phil. 4:8). You won\u2019t find the English word \u201creckon\u201d in the translation, but logizomai<\/em> is there. We are often required to think \u201cfactually\u201d rather than \u201cemotionally.\u201d We may feel<\/em> one thing is true, but we must reckon<\/em> that what is true. Do you see how desperately we need this word? Postmodernism says that such thinking is dangerous, because truth is only true if it\u2019s in you. Truth has no objective meaning outside of whether it feels<\/em> right to you. Just think how much of God\u2019s love, grace and truth we\u2019d miss out on if we didn\u2019t reckon<\/strong> that Postmodernism has gotten it wrong!<\/p>\n

What we discover is that God<\/strong> reckons<\/strong> in grace<\/em>.\u00a0 His reckoning is based upon His determined will<\/em>.\u00a0 On the other hand we reckon<\/strong> in faith<\/em> which is based upon His declared Word<\/em>.<\/p>\n

When we reckon, we, by an act of our will, choose our thinking. We choose to believe what God says and decisively determine to calculate everything based upon His valuation of reality. Fact is that anyone who does not reckon as God reckons is a fool. Such a person is living in a make-believe world that may feel like reality, but one day the fuller view of reality will dawn upon them and they will see how they have wasted both their years and fears. As my dad would say, \u201cI reckon I don\u2019t want to live that way.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of the wrecking balls that postmodernism has sent careening into our world is the notion that words have no objective meaning.\u00a0 The postmodern says that words only contain meaning for the one using them (and of course they expect you to understand what they mean when they say that).\u00a0 The speaker, it is insisted, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[98],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3402","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-forgotten-words","post-preview"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pgYGxX-SS","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jkitchen.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3402","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jkitchen.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jkitchen.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jkitchen.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jkitchen.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3402"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/jkitchen.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3402\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3405,"href":"https:\/\/jkitchen.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3402\/revisions\/3405"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jkitchen.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3402"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jkitchen.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3402"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jkitchen.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3402"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}