{"id":4287,"date":"2025-04-30T15:01:52","date_gmt":"2025-04-30T15:01:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/truthreallymatters.com\/wordpress\/?page_id=4287"},"modified":"2025-05-01T15:49:25","modified_gmt":"2025-05-01T15:49:25","slug":"what-can-you-really-count-on-5-1-2025","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/truthreallymatters.com\/wordpress\/?page_id=4287","title":{"rendered":"What can you really count on? – 5\/1\/2025"},"content":{"rendered":"

I subscribe to First Things<\/em>,\u00a0a monthly conservative journal with essays, book reviews, and even poetry on a wide variety of topics in politics, culture, and history.\u00a0 Authors and editors include those in the Roman Catholic faith, Orthodox, Jews, Protestants, and evangelicals.\u00a0 On balance, though, the perspective is predominantly Catholic, and consistently ecumenical.\u00a0 Everyone within Christendom is viewed as \u2018Christian.\u2019\u00a0 This is, at times, annoying to me, albeit instructive.\u00a0 It is interesting to see the way conservative co-belligerents view the issues of the day, yet miss a properly biblical outlook.<\/p>\n

Personally, I am decidedly non-ecumenical<\/u>, embracing the principle often espoused by Cornelius Van Til, in that there are fundamentally only two distinct worldviews, belief and unbelief.\u00a0 Unbelief <\/em>comes in many sub-varieties such as atheism, Hinduism, Islam, Roman Catholicism, Jehovah\u2019s Witness-ism, Mormonism, etc.\u00a0 Namely, the big distinction in worldview is between those born again by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and those who are not, regardless of whether they claim to be part of Christendom.\u00a0 A consequence of this is that I can\u2019t really see conservative Catholics, etc., as part of \u2018my team.\u2019\u00a0 We may vote similarly, and be rooting for and against the same policies, but ultimately, you\u2019re either with the Lord Jesus or against Him.\u00a0 It\u2019s binary \u2013 that\u2019s what Jesus said.<\/p>\n

One column I enjoy each month is \u201cThe Back Page,\u201d by Ephraim Radner.\u00a0 Radner is a theologian, author, and professor at Wycliffe College (University of Toronto).\u00a0 His March, 2025 offering is \u201cDon\u2019t\u00a0 Count On It,\u201d which speaks to life\u2019s uncertain path no matter how diligently or cleverly we plan.\u00a0 He discusses, for example, how friends drift apart over the years as things change \u2013 marriage, children, career, losses, locales, experiences \u2013 we become different people over time and a gulf may develop between friends.<\/p>\n

I would point to James 4:13-17 . . . Go to now, ye that say, Today or tomorrow we will go into such a city, and continue there a year, and buy and sell, and get gain:\u00a0 Whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow.\u00a0 For what is your life?\u00a0 It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away.\u00a0 For that ye ought to say, If the Lord will, we shall live, and do this, or that.\u00a0 But now ye rejoice in your boastings:\u00a0 all such rejoicing is evil.\u00a0 Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin.<\/em><\/p>\n

Scripture clearly teaches that the believer\u2019s trust must be in the Lord, who knows the future and holds each of our body\u2019s atoms in His hand.\u00a0 The last verse above (17), emphasizes the primacy of doing right in the present moment, which is the only moment in which we live.<\/p>\n

Radner asserts:\u00a0 \u201cWe cannot plan our lives and we do not create our futures.\u201d\u00a0 He notes that Catholics and Protestants alike tend to use pious language about trusting in God, but their intent is for God to fulfill their own<\/em> hopes and dreams, citing the promise in Psalm 37:4 . . . \u201cDelight thyself also in the LORD; and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart.<\/em>\u00a0 I think Radner misses the best interpretation of this promise.\u00a0 It is not that we start with our desires and seek the Lord so He will fulfill them.\u00a0 Rather, it is that if we follow Jesus, He will fill our heart with godly desires!\u00a0 Verse 5 supports this . . . Commit thy way unto the LORD; trust also in him; and he shall bring it to pass.<\/em><\/p>\n

After all, are we not to follow Jesus, rather than expecting Him to follow us, as if He should clear the path that we have defined?\u00a0 How much wiser would it be to fix our eyes on Jesus and let Him define the path?\u00a0 Proverbs 9:10 . . . The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom:\u00a0 and the knowledge of the holy is understanding.\u00a0 <\/em>It should be obvious that holiness does not spring naturally from our own natural desires.\u00a0 We must first be reborn<\/u> and then grow in accord with Scriptural principles and the leading of the Holy Spirit.<\/p>\n

That point is what led me to write a letter to the editor of First Things<\/em>, commenting on Radner\u2019s piece.\u00a0 I don\u2019t know if they will publish it, but I hope, at least, that Ephraim reads it.\u00a0 All of his advice about putting our trust in the Lord for all the exigencies of life, apparently offered to the journal\u2019s readers \u2013 who inhabit mere <\/em>Christendom \u2013 are irrelevant (or worse) to those who have not been born again.\u00a0 Worse, perhaps, in that a professing Christian, who has not been born again, may embrace religious-sounding exhortations without self-examination.\u00a0 The first challenge to the religious lost man must be that made by Jesus to Nicodemus \u2013 one of the most religious Jews in Israel at that time \u2013 Ye must be born again.<\/em><\/p>\n

Now, I have no idea what the spiritual condition of Ephraim Radner is, but that is the question I would ask if I met him.\u00a0 \u201cEphraim, I enjoyed your column.\u00a0 You spoke much Scriptural truth.\u00a0 So tell me, Have you been born again?\u00a0 Have you passed from death to life, have you repented from sins that you would admit that condemn you, have you trusted Christ, and shown evidence in your life that you are a new creature?\u201d<\/p>\n

And so we should challenge the multitude around us.\u00a0 Or at least give out a zillion Gospel tracts each week to those who won\u2019t take the time to chat.<\/p>\n

Below is the letter I sent to First Things<\/em>:<\/p>\n

Letter to the Editor: <\/em><\/p>\n

Ephraim Radner assures us what we can wholeheartedly count on in \u201cDon\u2019t Count On It,\u201d (March, 2025):\u00a0 God\u2019s faithfulness to us, if we are part of His family.\u00a0 The conditional if is implicit in Radner\u2019s references, such as Prov. 9:10, wherein wisdom begins with the fear of the Lord, and life\u2019s practical understanding is tied to holiness \u2013 a way of life directly against culture\u2019s flow, but a necessary fruit of the born again child of God.\u00a0 Also Phil. 4:13 where Paul declares that he can do \u201call things\u201d through Christ, which certainly implies Paul is in Christ, and Christ is in him.\u00a0 What \u201call things\u201d?\u00a0 The apostle had just detailed his bonds, afflictions, sufferings \u2013 all to preach the Gospel to the lost and to build up new converts in their faith.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/em>As Radner observes, the \u201cmodern twist\u201d is to attach this \u2018can do\u2019 promise to building a business, acquiring fame, and getting any little thing our small heart desires.\u00a0 Ps. 37:4, then, also gets twisted.\u00a0 It\u2019s not that God provides worldly pleasures wished by our carnal heart; rather, that God provides us with new desires appropriate to our Spirit-filled heart, as implied by our commitment in verse 5.\u00a0 <\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/em>Radner observes that we cannot cockily plan our lives, yet God will build His house out of the bits and pieces we offer, especially if the bits are in obedience to the Great Commission given us by the Lord Jesus \u2013 the single theme He reiterated during the forty days between the Resurrection and the Ascension.\u00a0 What is eternally precious if not a soul?\u00a0 Who is to share, if not a forgiven, redeemed sinner, namely any Christian?\u00a0 Not all will engage verbally, but multitudes will accept a simple Gospel tract.\u00a0 Fyi, I\u2019ve attached one of the tracts I\u2019ve designed and distribute by the thousands.\u00a0 Make your days count \u2013 Ps. 90:10-12.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/em>Dave Stone<\/em><\/p>\n

WALKER, LOUISIANA<\/em><\/p>\n