Dennis Tuuri

# Sermon Transcript – Reformation Covenant Church
Pastor Dennis Tuuri

Amen. Sermon text for today is James 5:13-18. Please stand for the reading of God’s word.

Is anyone among you suffering? Let him pray. Is anyone cheerful? Let him sing psalms. Is anyone among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church. And let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. And this prayer of faith will save the sick, and the Lord will raise him up.

And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another that you may be healed. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much. Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the land for three years and six months. And he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain, and the earth produced its fruit.

Let’s pray. Father, we thank you for this word. We thank you that it’s filled with interesting things, things that are hard to understand, but things that are very simple to understand as well. Help us, Lord God, to leave here today with the simple message of this text and also perhaps with some renewed understanding of some of the ins and outs of it and the things that we wonder about. Bless us Lord God by your Holy Spirit.

We thank you for this time to come together and hear from you about your word and may it indeed have its effect upon us to encourage us in the faith and seek out the kind of encouragement we need when we’re sick, distressed or troubled. In Jesus name we pray. Amen. Please be seated.

Do you have any idea what a tremendous blessing prayer is? Do you know what the Bible says about prayer? How important is it to you? Do you realize what the tremendous gift that prayer is to us individually and corporately? Do you have any cognizance of the effects of our prayers and the ability of our prayers to make changes in the world around us?

Do you understand—and I speak to myself as well—the power of prayer, the blessings of prayer, the love of God that both gives us the gift of prayer and then hears our prayers and answers them because of the merits of Jesus Christ?

This text is about a lot of things and some of them are complicated and confusing. What’s that anointing with oil thing? What’s that prayer of faith? What’s that, you know, “you will be healed” thing? In fact, what does it mean to be healed? What does it mean to be sick? It’s not clear. Commentators disagree even what the subject of this text is. Is it physical illness? Is it depression? Is it spiritual difficulty or weakness?

What are these things? It’s hard to tell. And I don’t think we can necessarily—I certainly am not going to make definitive statements about some of these particular details that the church has not agreed on for a good many years. This text is used as a proof text for all kinds of things: both for seeing oil as a medicinal thing only, or for the Catholic Church coming up in the eighth century with the doctrine of extreme unction for those that were dying.

I mean, there’s all kinds of things that happen with a text like this that isn’t necessarily all that clear on specific details—not because the speaker is less than clear, but because our ears need more cleaning and more sanctifying. So there’s lots of things we don’t understand about the text, but the big deal, the big ticket in this text is prayer.

Prayer is mentioned in every verse. There’s like four, five, six different Greek words about prayer that are used throughout this text. It is all about prayer. Now, added to that at the end is confession of sin. So that’s a subtopic, and between those two topics—if we just leave here with a renewed appreciation for prayer and its significance in the life of the church both for individuals, for the elders praying with people, and for corporate prayer or group prayers, friend prayers as well—then we’ll come away with the main intent of this text.

Even the illustration of Elijah, which is an odd one in my view, but the illustration is given to buttress our understanding about the power, significance and blessing and the ability of prayer to make a dent in the world around us. So even the example of Elijah is given to buttress prayer. It’s an odd example I say, just to get you thinking a little bit.

What example would you use in the life of Elijah? You know, the Bible doesn’t say in First Kings 17-19 that Elijah prayed and then there was a drought for three and a half years. Doesn’t say that. It does say that prayer restored it and it shows an interaction between God and Elijah about that. But that’s an odd thing if you’re—if this is a text about physical illness, and I’m getting off into the weeds already, I know.

But if it was a text about recovering from illness and prayer to recover someone from illness primarily, what would you use in the life of Elijah? Well, I think I’d use the one with the widow’s son, right? Because there we actually see Elijah at prayer wrestling with God about this issue, and God answering it and raising the boy up. I would have used that one, but the author doesn’t. Why? These are interesting things to consider. And we’ll get to some of that stuff, and I’ll offer some ideas about it.

But what I can preach with certainty about this text is that you and I should be a praying people. We should be a praying people individually, right? It says, “If you’re sick, pray.” Or if you’re discouraged or weak—it actually means if you’re suffering, if you’re suffering some bad problem, usually attacked by evil people. That’s what the word—the first word used for suffering here—has nothing to do with illness.

If you’re suffering, pray. If you’re feeling good, don’t forget God when you’re feeling good and are happy and blessed. Pray. It’s a different form of prayer. It’s sing praise, which can mean either playing a musical instrument or singing. But either way, you’re singing praise to God, which is another form of prayer. And there, if we wanted to take the time, we could look at New Testament texts that link up.

Praising God is a form of prayer. So even in our good times, we pray—we pray with petitions to God if we’re struggling, or with praise to God, and maybe both of those of course depending on the situation. And by the way, when it says here that if you’re doing well, if you’re joyful, sing psalms—very important for us—it doesn’t mean psalms necessarily. It means songs. Can mean psalms, but it doesn’t restrict itself to that. But it’s very important, you know, that when we have good times or when God gives us grace in the midst of suffering, very important that we praise God in those times. Just as important—the way the text reads—as praying when we’re struggling.

So it talks about that individual prayer at the beginning. And then it says under certain conditions, you’re to call for the elders of the church and they come and pray for you. So now instead of just you praying and me praying, now there are times when you should call for the elders, or the elders should recognize your need and we get together and pray for you and anoint you with oil under certain conditions. So now we’ve moved from individual prayer to an emphasis on having the elders pray for you.

And then finally it says that we’re to pray for one another as well. We’re to confess our sins and pray for one another—you might be healed. So the third form of prayer is prayer with friends, prayer in your community groups, prayer with other members of the church, even the prayers we offer here on the Lord’s day.

So prayer is the deal. And it’s individual prayer. It’s praying with the elders, or for them, for you rather. And it’s praying with other Christians. So this is what this text is primarily saying. And in the context of that, as I said, it also talks about confession of sin.

So as you go into your community group, if it meets this week or next week, should be an easy topic of conversation applying this particular text of the scriptures to what you do in those groups—praying for one another and confessing sins to one another. How do you do that? If you’re not getting a lot of that going on, ask your group. If you’re a leader, think of some things. How do you get to that level of sharing, confessing sins with each other?

All right. Prayer. And it’s a tremendous blessing. There was a preacher named Chrysostom. This is in the fourth century in the early days of the church. And many of you have heard the name Chrysostom. That wasn’t actually his given name. His given name was John. They named him Chrysostom, which translated means “golden mouthed” or “golden tongue,” because he gave great sermons. He was really good at it, and so his name reflected that. The name that the people gave him, of course, he’s a famous personage in the early centuries of the church, and he gave one of these wonderful sermons on prayer.

Here’s what he said, and I’m going to read some things here. What he’s doing is giving a list of prayer and its significance in the scriptures. Here’s what he says: “The potency of prayer has subdued the strength of fire. It has bridled the rage of lions. It has expelled demons. It has broken the chains of death. It has assuaged diseases. It has rescued cities from destruction. It has stopped the sun in its course. It has arrested the progress of the thunderbolt.”

Now, all he’s doing there is making allusions back to biblical text that say this is what prayer does. Do you see? I mean, it’s hard to overestimate the significance of prayer. And I think most of us in the modern day underestimate it a lot. Why pray? We say, “Well, if you don’t want the mouths of lions stopped and you don’t want rain to stop and start, and if you don’t want people healed or brought back from the dead or whatever it is, yeah, why pray?” Right?

If you don’t need those blessings in your life, yeah, don’t pray. But if you do—and we do—if we struggle under the conditions of our life, then this text says when you struggle in the conditions of your life, pray, brothers and sisters—kind of number one job, right?

Remember, we’re in a summation thing here in this text. We’re in the summation of the whole epistle. First of all, speak properly, right? Speak the truth. Be accountable. Be dependable in your truth. And then the next topic, an extended topic involving several verses, is: pray.

So when he gets to the end here, look, now listen. How did the text begin? How does James begin? Begins by saying count it all joy when you encounter various trials, right? Knowing that the trials produce growth in your life, sanctification, right? It produces faith, and let faith have its perfect work. You know, that you become perfect in all things—I mean, in other words, mature. You reach the end and purpose for which God’s created you.

That’s how it begins. Now, at the end, it’s addressing again the various trials you’re encountering, but it’s changed as well. So it’s an arc, right? A character arc. I saw that movie Lucy. That’s not really a character arc. That’s like a character like this. If you’ve seen the movie, you know what I’m talking about. It just, you know, she starts here and she goes right by—the end of the movie, just wow, right? Not really an arc, but we call it a character arc.

So in this epistle, there’s an arc. It begins by talking about trials. It ends by talking about trials. But it begins by talking about trials to you individually, right? “You count it all joy when you encounter various trials.” And by the end, when we get to the culmination of the epistle, what’s he saying? “You, when you encounter various trials, pray. You, when things are really bad, call for the elders. And you, on a regular basis, pray with other members of the church.”

We move from the exhibition of the problem and the call to endurance and joy to means of attaining that joy, which are twofold in the way I’ve just described it. One is prayer. That’s how you count it all joy. Prayer is part of that, and it’s prayer that actually can change the conditions of things you’re involved with. The Elijah example, and number two though, it’s moved from an individual suffering here to by the end—yeah, you’re still alone. You still pray alone, but you also work corporately.

So it brings you into the corporate community, into your community group. Think of it that way as the way you’re going to become joyful in trials. Now, if you don’t listen to the end of the book, you’re going to miss all of that, and if you don’t link it up with how it began.

But you see, prayer is tremendously important, particularly when you’re in a time of judgment, time of trials, time of difficulty. The twelve tribes dispersed. America on the decline. Christianity being, you know, more and more persecuted worldwide—more persecution this last year than years for years on end. In those kind of times, brothers and sisters, we need to be a praying people. We just need to be a praying people.

And as Chrysostom said, look at all these examples. Why should we pray? Not because it’s the only option. Not so that things will be okay and our spirits will be quieted as we’re going through problems. There is that, right? All the difficulties we worry about can come from lack of prayer. So there’s certainly assuring our hearts before God in prayer. But prayer makes a difference—that’s what Chrysostom is saying.

You want things changed. You hunger and thirst for righteousness. Pray for that, right? And so this narrative moves us in that direction.

Let me read more of this sermon from Chrysostom. He says: “There is in prayer an all-sufficient armory, a treasure undiminished, a mind never exhausted, a sky unobscured by clouds, a heaven unruffled by any storm. It’s the root, the fountain, the mother of thousands of blessings.”

Now, I can’t—I’m not golden-tongued, but he is. What a wonderful section of his prayer, his sermon on prayer, reminding us both of the power and effectiveness of prayer and then the fact that it will never be extinguished or run out because you’re going to the throne room of God who controls all things.

So Chrysostom reminds us of the central importance of this text. And the one thing you should walk away with today, the one thing you should think about when you offer yourselves by means of the symbol of your productive increase this last week—the one thing you should think about is: I need to pray more. I need to be a praying person. And I, maybe, my prayer needs to be changed. Maybe my prayer needs to be a little more activist and not quite so, you know, putting up with things. Just my prayer isn’t—in other words—just a way to make me feel better.

My prayer is a way to count it joy knowing that my prayer is founded upon the fact that history bends to righteousness and inclines that way, and your prayers affect the degree of the incline and the degree of the bend. So prayer is the gig here, brothers and sisters.

And as I said, prayer is given in several different dimensions. Look at the verse. Open your Bible, look at it, and we’ll just, you know, make the same point I just made. Is that bad? No. I need it. You need it.

Is anyone among you suffering? Is there anyone here suffering? I know lots of you that are suffering. I know some of you that aren’t suffering. But when you suffer, and believe me, the recipients of James’s letter—this is what it was all about, right? They’re—what are they suffering? By the way, they’re suffering persecution. They’re suffering that stuff. But as has been clearly made obvious in this text, they suffer internal divisions. They suffered bad speech from one another, bad attitudes, right?

It’s interesting he says here, “Pray for one another.” As the text moves forward, what are the “one another” texts that preceded this? Well, there were a couple. He’s just told us earlier in this chapter, “Don’t grudge against one another. Don’t have this resentful spirit one another.” And earlier in the epistle, he said, “Don’t slander. Don’t talk down. Don’t demean one another.”

So there’s three “one anothers” that I’ve spotted in the text. Both the first two are examples of speech one to another that they are suffering. But by the end of the epistle, what are they doing now by way of—if they’re following this instruction now? They’re praying for one another. Big change.

So the suffering that we have is not just—at least if we’re with James’s audience—it’s not just persecution exterior. There’s problems on the interior. And these problems are likewise to be addressed through prayer and confession, praying for one another instead of slandering each other. Praying for one another, not grudging against one another. Okay?

So that’s what he says here. If you’re suffering for whatever reason, let him pray. If you’re cheerful, let him sing psalms. As I said, make music on a guitar, strum the strings—is kind of what this word means. But it can also mean: sing, express your joy to God in that kind of prayer.

Is anyone among you sick? Now this word “sick” could just as easily be translated “weakness.” Doesn’t necessarily refer to physical illness. And this is one of those kind of mysteries of the text that I just talked about. But let’s just leave that alone for a minute.

Is anyone among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer of faith will save the sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he’ll be forgiven.

So personal prayer with the elders.

Verse 16, or rather: Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another that you may be healed. Well, I missed one another, didn’t I? You know, so we got over here: don’t slander one another, don’t grudge against one another. And I said the third one is pray for one another. But before it says pray, it says confess your sins to one another.

So there’s four “one anothers” that are sort of balanced here, right? Two negative: “don’t do this.” But two positive. And so the way to healing, health, effectiveness, the way to make a dent in the world around us and in our own lives, the life of this city and the cities you live in, is to confess your sins to one another and pray for one another.

See, so that’s the gig here. So praying for one another is found in verse 16. And then it kind of wraps this up by saying: the effect of fervent prayer, the powerful working of prayer—the word “energy” is the word here, the basis for our word “energy,” is “fervent.” If you work hard at prayer, it’s effective. If you work hard, as a righteous man, it avails much. It’s effective.

And then to close the section off, he gives us an example of Elijah. Elijah was a man with a nature like ours. Okay? Just like you and me. Put his pants on one leg at a time. Put his toes on—this, well, whatever it was, I don’t know. And he prayed earnestly.

And what that means is it says—praying, he prayed. It uses the word prayer twice there. And so it’s translated in our text as “prayed earnestly,” but it really is “he praying, he prayed.” In other words, he kept at it. He was repeated in his prayer and he was dynamic in his prayer. It wasn’t, you know, a mousy kind of thing. It was really getting into a solid conversation with God.

He prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the land for three years and six months. Okay. So and then he prayed again—then it rained, right? And he prayed again—the text says—and the heavens gave rain and the earth produced its fruit.

So the way these verses are divided up, every verse has the word “prayer” in it at least once. So the main deal, the main message of this text is: pray and pray believing that it makes a difference in the context of the world.

You know, Jesus tells us that “I will do whatever you ask in my name so that the son may bring glory to the father.” He says, “I’m going away, but ask things of me, but I want to glorify the father. What I do”—he says in this text—”I’m going away, but the things I did, you’ll do. The work of Jesus will continue through us. But they’ll continue through us. And one of the specific means that happens is that we ask for things from the son.”

Okay? So by prayer, the work of Jesus is affected through his people in the context of the world. So the big deal here is prayer. Pray. Pray over and over and over. Pray. Pray expecting that it will be effectual. Pray remembering the source of blessing that the Lord gives us by prayer.

So prayer is the big deal, and in the context of that we’re talking about several different kinds of prayer. And maybe you’re good at the corporate prayer and maybe you’re lousy at your individual prayers. So what this text is a call to us to do is to bring them together.

You know, there’s that old song: “What a friend we have in Jesus. Oh, what peace we often forfeit. Oh, what needless pain we bear. All because we do not carry everything to God in prayer.”

So there’s that element of it. Prayer is important for our personal well-being and our state of mind to remind ourselves that God is in control. But secondly, as the example of Elijah shows, our prayer is effective for a particular purpose.

All right, let’s talk a little bit now. That’s the big deal—prayer. But what are some of the other things, some of the big issues in this text? You know, so what are some of the questions? Well, what do these words mean? Do they mean “health” words or other words? And let me just tell you what I think.

And this is what I’ve come to after meditating on the text, studying the text, thinking about the text. Well, let me work backwards just a little bit. So one of the big mysteries is: what’s this “anointing with oil” thing, right? What’s that? And there’s all kinds of answers.

Let me tell you a thought line that may assist you to think about this, and it may lead you to the conclusion that I’ve made. And before we talk about anointing with oil, the verses in here that say “if you’re sick,” “if you’re weak,” “if you’re whatever,” and then that “you’ll be healed” or “saved”—those words are ambivalent. Those words can be used in two different ways. They can talk about physical problems, most of them, but they can also just as readily talk about non-physical problems by way of either a metaphor with physical problems or just as meaning “weak.”

So when it says “sick,” a better translation is probably “weak,” because “sick” says it must be physical, whereas “weak” says it could be physical weakness or it could be moral or spiritual weakness. Okay. And the same thing with “heal.” You know, if we keep in mind that “healing” can mean either a restoration to health or it can mean, you know, that we’ve healed the arms, that the limbs that hang down—in Hebrews, for instance, same word—then it can mean a physical or a spiritual, rather, healing of somebody who’s really drooping, right? You know the text in Hebrews: “fix the people whose hands, whose arms lie limp, right? Fix them, make them better, make them whole.”

And so that’s a metaphorical use of a physical condition to speak about spiritual condition. So the words can go either way. Number one.

So who are we supposed to be anointing with oil? Well, it’s not clear. The only people that I know that anoint with oil—including what this church has done in the past—we always anoint physical conditions. But the text from my perspective could go either way. Okay.

With that in mind, let’s talk about anointing with oil, which is attached to the prayer of the elders for the person. Now, you know, one big issue is that prophets, priests, and kings were anointed, right? Anointed ones. So it’s a reminder that we’re prophets, priests, and kings. It’s a reminder of Christ. All that sort of works, right? And another thing it does, of course, is oil. As you should know, in this church, is a really important connection or symbol of the work of the Holy Spirit. So whatever’s going on in this process is a work of the Holy Spirit for the person. Okay? So all those things are true and I think we can bring all those to the text.

But here’s the question I think that drives me in a particular direction. What lay people—non-priest, non-king, special non-special officers, right? What lay people—and the whole, by the way, the Old Testament there to be a nation of priests and kings too, you. So so it isn’t just in the New Testament. But in any event, what in the Old Testament, what we have anointings with oil. What lay people were anointed with oil in the Old Testament?

Do you know? Can you think of any? Could be. There are none. I actually—I know there is one case, the only case that I can think of. And you know, John, if you’re hearing, is he here today? Yeah. Well, if I’m wrong, just let me know right away so I don’t go too far with this. As far as I know, John, the only lay person who is anointed with oil in the Old Testament is a man who’s recovered from leprosy.

Do you know any other case, John? No, I don’t either. So I think that’s the—that’s the Old Testament kind of thing exemplar that may hook up with anointing with oil in the New Testament.

Jesus does it. When Jesus sends out his apostles on their preaching ministry, he tells them to anoint with oil and heal the sick. What would they have thought about that—anointing lay people with oil? What was the image? The only image I know of based on the word of God in the Old Testament is a person who was leprous.

And there’s a seven-day cleansing ritual ending in an eighth day and resurrection deal with sacrifices. And on the eighth day, that leprous, formerly leprous man is anointed with oil. Now, leprosy is a physical condition, but you know, it’s not because of somebody’s sin that a person becomes leprous necessarily. It can be. We know that God will strike certain people with leprosy, but it isn’t always connected to sin.

So that might drive us to a physical malady, but it’s the only physical malady that’s anointed with oil at its conclusion. And it seems like leprosy and that uncleanness is used generally by God to describe the nation of Israel—both in the Old and New Testaments—as those who wandered away from him and who are idolatrous. It’s a leprous nation.

I think that when Jesus had his—and I could be wrong—but here’s what my meditation of the text has come up with: that when Jesus has his disciples, his apostles, anoint people with oil, it’s a mark that the nation has become leprous and that Jesus is healing the leprosy of the nation. Jesus is resurrecting Israel. And Jesus, when you’re resurrected, the spirit’s power and authority he comes upon you.

And the leprous man would be oiled up on his right ear so he could hear the word of God, on his right thumb so he could do the word of God, and on his right big toe, which is similar to the priestly ordination—but this is not a priest. This is a man in his ordinary hearing, doing, and wherever he went would be empowered by the Holy Spirit to do work for the Savior, do work for Yahweh. Okay? And then the rest of the oil that was left over be put on his head.

Okay. Put on his head. And so anointing with oil seems to be a restoration from a physical condition that was a picture or symbol of spiritual death, spiritual wasting away. The leprous man doesn’t, you know, get something and fall over dead immediately. He wastes away, right? Okay.

I combine those two things. The text can go either way—physical or spiritual conditions being referred to here. And then I see the anointing with oil that seems to only hook up for laymen with a restoration from leprosy with all of its symbolism attached to leprosy and uncleanness. And I think what is going on here is—I think that these words are actually referring to spiritual struggles, not to physical health. That’s where I think another evidence of that is. The opening text, the opening verse in this section, this pericope on prayer—is absolutely. Everybody knows that “words,” when you’re suffering, means suffering from evil.

So if you’re in persecution, okay, if you’re having struggles or trials with your own sin, evilness, with other sin, people’s sins and evilness, whatever it is, that’s the header to this entire section. So I think that the header would point us towards seeing these other words first and foremost—not that you can’t do it in terms of physical healing, but first and foremost, it seems like it pushes us in the direction of people who are weak or sickly, who are weak spiritually.

You know, people who have been in the fight for a long time have grown discouraged and depressed because of the persecution, the difficulties, maybe the physical exhaustion of the sort of work God has called them to do has contributed to it. But they’re struggling—people struggling in the church, I guess is what I’m saying—to stay faithful to God, right? Who are kind of wasting away spiritually.

I think that’s what this text is talking about. Okay. That’s the ones who are to call for the elders and to be anointed with oil. They’re to be refreshed. They’re to see that they’re like the leprous one—God is bringing them back from the dead. They’re being newly anointed as a new creature to dedicate the person’s life to God.

If there’s a connection to their own personal sin that’s helped bring the weakness, confess it. The text doesn’t say “always have them confess sin.” It says “if there has been sin, it will be forgiven him.”

So I think that in terms of the stuff we know, this is about prayer. The stuff we don’t know, I think it’s about the institutional church and her officers, the elders, having a particular ministry of prayer and anointing with oil for people that are in severe spiritual struggles who, for whatever reason, you know, are at the end of their rope, right? And we’re to come along and pray for them and restore them. And you know, if that’s the case, then the assurance, right, of “it will heal the person” can be said to be pretty emphatic.

Now let me address that too. That’s another problem in the text: “The prayer of faith will heal the person.” Prayer of faith just means a prayer based on faith. It doesn’t mean a prayer of great confidence. It means a prayer that says: “I have faith that Jesus is the great healer whether it’s spiritual or physical. A prayer of faith is: ‘Lord, we would like this person to be healed, physical or spiritual. And we know that sometimes you don’t do that. But we know that if you’re going to do it, we go to you because you’re the source of all healing. Lord God, please heal this particular person.’”

That’s a prayer of faith. Okay? It’s a prayer that maybe, as the person that Jesus healed—the son of, the man who says Jesus says, “Well, do you believe?” “Well, I believe, but help me in my unbelief,” right? But he knew where to go. So the prayer of faith is not faith in what God will do. It’s not confidence in what he will do necessarily. The prayer of faith is a prayer to the one in whom we have faith—is the only source of all blessing—and that’s God.

So the prayer offered to God in that attitude—that’s a prayer of faith. Will it heal him? Well, physically, not necessarily. No. All prayer is bounded by the providence of God, right? Okay.

So we have people here that use guns, and we have people here with young children. And you know, if your eight-year-old son—”What do you want for Christmas this year?” “Well, I’d like a rocket launcher.” No. Let’s make it more realistic. “I’d like an attack rifle. I’d like some kind of a rifle that can shoot semi-automatically with armor-piercing shells. I’d like that. And I’d like to start being able to use it.” Well, that’s a request from the son. And are you going to grant it? Of course not. Or you may say, “When you turn twenty, you’ll get that,” right?

Now, we’re not children, but in a way, we are, right? Because of our limitations of what we know and don’t know. And so we don’t know. I mean, there are many things in life that we’re going to ask for. We don’t know if it’s good for us or not. If we’re healthy the next week, it could be. It’s like giving us an AK-47 in the midst of people that we’re angry at. I don’t know. God knows. He knows what we need. Okay? And so prayers are not always—you can’t say with confidence that prayer will be answered in the affirmative.

And when we read texts like that seem to say that, we have to put that in the context of all of Scripture. And earlier in this very same epistle, James has said, “You ask and you don’t receive because you ask amiss.” So we have to put it—we have to bound it with all that stuff.

Now, so if it’s a request for physical healing, maybe answered, maybe not. Who knows? It’s up to God. He’s the smart one here. Prayer for spiritual strength, I think we can have more confidence about praying for that, right? We have a member of this church—member in good standing. They’ve struggled with whatever it is—is maybe sin, maybe not sin, maybe the sin of others. They’re on the verge of really not even want to go to church anymore. Whatever it is, they don’t want to pray anymore. They’re at the end of their rope spiritually.

And we pray for that person. We anoint them with oil. We make them a special subject of prayer for the elders of the church. I think we can with confidence say that should turn that person around, assuming they’re part of the elect of God. He has a confident prayer earlier in this epistle, right? Do you remember this? Right at the beginning, again?

You know, when we get to the end of something, one of God’s books, we sort of look at the beginning again. Trials, counting it joy, how prayer, community, confessing of sin—early on, what did he say you should pray for? Verse four or five in chapter one: “If anyone lacks wisdom, let him ask of God who gives all things freely and graciously,” right? Now, that’s a prayer God will grant you wisdom. Now you may not know that he’s given you wisdom, but he’s going to give you wisdom because he always wants that for you. And that’s the point of the verse on prayer at the beginning.

So the prayer at the end is probably, in my way of thinking, like that. That’s one other reason why I think it’s prayer for the spiritual strengthening of the person, not necessarily physical restoration of the person.

All right. So that’s that’s my best take is that the leprosy thing is really the analogy here. That’s the way they would have understood it in the Gospel accounts. This is based on the Gospel accounts. So I think that’s the way the Jewish primarily Jewish audience here, Jewish Christians, would have interpreted it—as a restoration from leprosy. And so I think that’s what it is. And I think that kind of helps clear up some of the ambiguities of the text, although by no means all of them.

Now, if you don’t like that explanation, that’s okay. I’m giving you my best understanding of the scriptures as I see them, and it’s what—it’s the direction that I’ve come to believe after studying and meditating on the text and reading a whole bunch of different commentaries on it. But the big thing is prayer.

So back to what we know is true. And the second big thing is, as I said, and just to re-emphasize the point here, the second big takeaway from the text—whether you agree with everything else I’ve said—that’s really a lot of that has to do with what the elders are going to do in this church, right? Either way, I think the elders would like to know if you want them to come and pray for you and anoint you with oil. Either way, we do that kind of thing, whether it’s spiritual or physical.

But that’s an elder thing, but it relates to you because it will relate to certain ones of you that we end up praying for. But that’s that. What you need to know is: pray individually, at times pray with the elders, have the elders pray for you, and then pray corporately. And then secondly, as I said, the text that tells about people praying corporately also exhorts us, verse 16: “Confess your trespasses one to the other.”

Now, this is pretty straightforward, right? It’s not easy to do, and it’s not easy necessarily to do in a right way. What are some of the problems? Well, you could be overly morbid about your sins and confess them in a kind of an odd gushing sort of way, right? And that might be difficult and problematic. But more often than not, our problem with this text is we just don’t want to do it. We don’t want to tell other people about our sins. We don’t trust the people, that they’re not going to tell other people about our sins, or we don’t want to admit that we’ve got particular sins.

Now, I understand that. I’m a man with the same mindset as you. I don’t like doing this either. But it doesn’t make any difference because the God who loves us, who loves you, more than you can possibly know—okay? And I know we get a picture of that love every Lord’s day here in the death of Christ. But that God who loves you more than you could possibly know has given you a whole epistle here about sufferings and difficulties and trials. And he’s opened it up by saying, “Count it all joy.”

So he wants us to get to joy, brothers and sisters, in our trials. And at the end, the matching section says: “The way you’re going to get there—believe me and trust me, God says, and I say, trusting and believing God—the way we’re going to get there, surviving the kind of external problems and internal problems of divisions in churches and problems, the way we’re going to get there is prayer and confession of sin. Confession of sin one to the other.”

Bonhoeffer—what was his book? Was it called Life Together? Who knows? Was there a Bonhoeffer book called Life Together? Yes. And in Life Together he’s got a section on confession. I thought that was the name of it. I couldn’t remember the exact title, but he’s got a section on confession of sin one to the other. And he’s very careful about it. He says it’s not a law. You know, you don’t have to do it every time you’ve got a sin. I understand that. He says, “I know that there are problems about it. But then he says, this is a practice of the early church that really needs to come back. We need to do this.”

You’ve heard me say—I was given a book by Jay Grimstead recently, and you’ve heard me talk about this—but Grimstead early on, thirty years ago, began a lot of the sorts of reconstruction sort of activities that were helpful to this church. But Grimstead early on said: “The Methodist cell group, when it went away in our country, is when problems really started to happen.” And those cell groups were times—they would get together and confess sins to each other in small groups and then pray for one another. And Grimstead said: “When that went away, things really changed.”

I believe that because prayer is significant. And this text tells us near the conclusion of it that also significant is confessing our sins to one another.

Now, brothers and sisters, I just want to exhort us to see the community groups as a potential place where both these things should be ongoing. And I’m so encouraged by the reports from community groups that are praying for one another and are getting down below the surface a little bit. But I’d love to see that continue and spread to all the groups. It’s not just a prayer time, right? But it is partially to be a prayer time, and it’s to be a time where relationships are built and formed and you rely upon each other and you can trust each other enough to confess your sins to each other and ask for prayer for something other than your dog.

Yeah, dogs are important. I get that. But you know what I’m saying, right? That’s why one of the reasons we established community groups was so there would be intentional discipleship. Discipleship happens through confession of sin and prayer, and we need to figure out a way to get there in our community groups—to get there in our community groups so confession of sin is very important.

Doesn’t have to be the community group. Could be a small group of friends that you have. But I think for most of us, the community group will be where this will become a regular feature of your life. I remember when we started these groups up a couple of years ago, and you know, talking with you know, one of the young men of the church that really wanted us to do this, and that was one of the things he said: “For the young people, our prayer times seem a little, you know, not real, not connected to life. Well, let’s start community groups. Connect up the prayers and confession of sin to real life. Make it real, and that’ll be good.”

But you know what? That’s hard to do. It’s hard to do, and it begins with a commitment to do it, which here in this text is, I think, the place to talk about it.

Okay, one last subject before we conclude. So we’re moving toward the end now. So the big deals, the big takeaways, is the movement from individual to corporate that produces joy. And it’s a corporate prayer time, individual prayer, but also corporate prayer—pray for one another. And connected with that is confession of sin. And that these things are effectual for taking us when we’re in times of spiritual weakness and making us strong again in the Lord for the work.

And then finally—and I asked the question and I didn’t answer it. Elijah, a man just like you and me, right? In well, in some ways yes, and in some ways no. He was like us. How was he unlike us? Well, he knew God’s word really well. Why did he say “drought, God”? Because he read in Deuteronomy 28. He knew the word of God that the blessings and cursings—one of the cursings was drought. The heavens would become brass, or whatever it is, right? Your land would be parched up, parched and dry. So he knows the Bible well enough to pray accurately and effectively for things that he knows God has said will come to pass.

So he’s listened to God, brothers and sisters. You want to talk to God? Listen to him, okay? Listen to him. Listen to him in his word. Listen to him in your prayer times together. Listen to him in the worship services. The spirit ministers to you. Write things down. Listen to God. And if we’re not listening to God, why would he listen to us when we go to him? Why would God really answer the prayers of fair-weather friends who only go to him for things we need?

Well, actually, he is so gracious and loving, yes. Frequently he will answer those prayers, but you can’t count on that, right? You know, the only time you go to the God Father is when you got a problem and not to give him respect, right? Probably he’s not going to be positively moved toward your request. By way of analogy, this is God.

Elijah was like us. He was just like you and me. He felt the same sorts of things. Weak like you, prone to anger like me, whatever it might be, right? That’s who the guy was. He was normal. But he had disciplined his life to listen to God in his word. And he knew how to pray then because of that word. Number one.

Number two, he was an obedient guy. We don’t have the time now, but when Peter Leithart preached on this at our family camp several years ago, he talked about a “command compliance pattern.” God gives a command. Elijah is compliant. And there’s this pattern. And if you read the account of Elijah in First Kings 17-19, this is what it says: God will say, “Well, leave this place. Go east. Go to the brook Kidron, right? Go to that brook and I’ll feed you there.” And then the next verse will say: Elijah left the place and he went to that brook and he sat there waiting for God to feed him or something along those lines. This happens several times in the account of Elijah. Why?

Because when we read in James that Elijah’s prayers were answered, we want to have our prayers answered. And he says, “This is the way you do it. Command compliance.” When God tells you what to do, you do it. Just the way he says to do it, you do it. That’s who Elijah was. He listened to God. He knew his word. And secondly, he didn’t just know it—he obeyed the word of God. When God said, “Do X, Y, and Z,” he did it.

When we read in the text: “Confess your sins to one another,” are we going to do it? If not, then we’re not going to have the expectation of answered prayer like Elijah got. Okay?

So number one: he knew God enough—because he listened to him. And secondly, he was compliant. And then third, he prayed. He was active and involved. And his prayer life is so much established as part of the text, and we can read in it, that James doesn’t have to be told that he prayed for the drought. He knows he prayed for the drought. He was had an intimate relationship with God. You see it back and forth. They would talk, right?

Do you ever wrestle with God in prayer? Well, that’s what Elijah did at times, right? So Elijah’s talking to God because he’s listening to God, and he’s praying for things that won’t benefit him necessarily. He’s praying for things for the kingdom.

I ask: Why? Why is this the illustration—the rain? Well, if all this text was about was physical healing, why not use the raised son from physical struggles, right? But that’s not the point of the text. Now it may address physical healing, but what’s the point of the whole book? “The wrath of man doesn’t work or affect the righteousness of God.” He’s telling us what does affect the righteousness of God.

Elijah was like the people at James’s period of time, persecuted by the king, syncretic religion, Baal worship, how in the very temple of God persecution of the prophets and the godly people—has to run for his life at times, right? And because of this, Elijah’s like them. He got tired. He got depressed. He got fearful, right? A man like us. So very much an example.

And God doesn’t say, “It’s all right, just suffer through it, everything’s okay.” He says: “Yeah, part. That’s part of the message earlier in this chapter: ‘Wait for the rains, wait for the judgment,’ right? That’s part of it. But the other part of it is he tells us here that while we’re waiting, to affect change—not wrath, not bad words, not slandering each other, but praying for one another, praying for the situation.”

He uses this example because this example is explicitly tied to Elijah’s interaction with Ahab and the wickedness of Israel as he sought to recover the nation. That’s why. Because he wanted these people to be encouraged—not just so they could get by in life, but so they could be more than conquerors through the same God who made Elijah a more than conqueror, and bringing the judgment of God upon the pagan god priests of Baal and those in Israel who would follow them.

He wants to give you victory. That’s the point. That’s his intent. And this message from Elijah’s life is a much more potent example—even though it doesn’t talk about prayer in the Old Testament text, it’s a much more potent example of really what the whole point of the epistle is. Yeah, it’s about putting up with things. Yeah, it’s about not sinning as a result of it, but it’s a lot more than that.

He says, “Pray for one another that you might be healed.” Interesting. When it says that you’d be healed, it’s plural. So we confess our sins to one another. We pray for one another, that we corporately—if these things are going on, prayer and confession—might be healed, might be made whole, might be made strong for the battles that we’re in to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ to Oregon City, the cities you live in, to the world, and to make a dent.

Remember: prayer is effectual for making a dent in our culture, for changing things. And that’s, I think, why James uses this example of Elijah.

You know, there are other themes. Can’t go through all of them, but earlier in the chapter, right, you’ve got parched ground, and God says, “That’s where you’re at. But rains will come. Be patient for the rain.” And Elijah is the same thing, right? No rain, parched ground because of God’s judgment. And “wait for the rain; it will come.” And the rain will be a signal—and it was to Ahab and others—that God is the one who’s in control. And judgment is going to happen, and his people will be vindicated from their enemies.

If we don’t pray and confess sins to one another, we can end up being parched ground. You know, the difficulties and trials of life, right? Choking out the seed. We’re parched, dry, dirt. Some of you are that right now. I know you are—parched, dry. It’s not because you’re a sinful person. It’s because the Lord has taken you through a lot of things in your life, and a lot of things over the past few years.

What’s our way to get oil, soothing oil, rain, the reign of God’s blessing into our lives? You know, it’s clear and simple. All this other—okay, forget all my theories about leprosy and stuff. That’s all there. Some of you are interested in that stuff, and it’s important for the elders. But the big picture here is quite simple: You’re dry and parched. The way to get back into a position where God brings you out of that is prayer and confession of our sins. It’s getting real with one another and having the kind of Christian fellowship, koinonia, that marks a successful advancing community that changes the world in which it lives.

Let’s pray. Father, we thank you for the wonderful text before us, and we thank you for the depths and all the contours of your scriptures, the beauty of them, the way so many themes are echoed and resonate through this epistle of James that we’ve been studying. Bless us with our last sermon or two on it in the next couple of weeks. And bless us, Father, as a congregation, that we might remember that we’re called to be people whose faith produces deeds and works.

Bless us, Lord God, with these works that we might be a praying people and that we might be people who confess our sins one to the other. In Jesus name we ask it. Amen. Amen. Amen.