Patience in Suffering

Good morning everyone, today we are finishing our series on the book of James. He has been speaking against them doing a lot of different things, arguing, slandering one another, looking out for themselves, but in the last part of James he speaks more pastorally to the church, offering sympathy and encouragement to them. This rest of James centers around three points for how to live their life. 1) live with patience and endurance 2) live by praying in all circumstances and 3) help those who lose patience and wander.

Prayer

Bible

James 5:7–12 NIV

7 Be patient, then, brothers and sisters, until the Lord’s coming. See how the farmer waits for the land to yield its valuable crop, patiently waiting for the autumn and spring rains. 8 You too, be patient and stand firm, because the Lord’s coming is near. 9 Don’t grumble against one another, brothers and sisters, or you will be judged. The Judge is standing at the door! 10 Brothers and sisters, as an example of patience in the face of suffering, take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord. 11 As you know, we count as blessed those who have persevered. You have heard of Job’s perseverance and have seen what the Lord finally brought about. The Lord is full of compassion and mercy. 12 Above all, my brothers and sisters, do not swear—not by heaven or by earth or by anything else. All you need to say is a simple “Yes” or “No.” Otherwise you will be condemned.

One group of people that I will always be amazed by are runners. People who, for fun, go out and run crazy distances. It takes a lot of discipline for someone to go run. I think one thing that helps a runner though, especially those who are running marathons and long distance, is that they know how far they have to run before they get to the end. There is an end in sight, even if it may not feel like it in the middle of the run. James is encouraging us, just as we might encourage a runner, only so far to go. (Hiking illustration, just a little ways before the waterfall) It is hard for us as well as the early church to live out all of these things that James has listed in this letter, but one reason that we can continue to strive to live differently is because we know the end of our race will come. This overlaps with our hope sermon from a few weeks ago. We know that following Jesus means that we will either experience the joy of his second coming or the joy of being with him when we die, this is the end of our race. But James is telling us, be patient, keep running. Keep going because the end is just up the road a little bit.

He then gives us three examples of being patient. First, that of a farmer. A farmer plants the seed in the ground and then has to wait. They wait on the rain to come, for the seed to germinate, for the plant to grow. They have to exercise patience. He continues by telling us that we shouldn’t grumble against one another. Similar to how he had just told us not to slander against one another. We’re all on this ride together, we’re all on this journey together, bear with one another and don’t grumble about one another or else you will be judged.

Second, James brings up the prophets who showed patience despite the suffering that they went through. Many were not well recieved by people for what God had spoke through them. Many were hated and treated badly because of how they followed God. James wants them to endure and be patient just as the prophets did.

The third example James gives is that of Job. Job was looked up to highly because of how he responded to suffering. In the book of Job, we see a man who expresses his protests to God, and has some outbursts at his friends who are trying to comfort him, which doesn’t paint the picture of perfect patience. But what stands out about Job is that in spite of everything he went through, in spite of the suffering that happened in his life, he remained devoted to the Lord.

Practically, then for us, we also should be patient in the midst of suffering. This doesn’t mean that you can’t lament before God or protest like Job did, but it means that despite what happens, we remain committed to God. We do not know God’s purposes, but we know that God’s will is much better than ours. So we trust him even if we are suffering.

In verse 12 James goes off on a brief tangent and it is a little random. But James has mentioned the evil that the tongue can cause and mentions oaths here, echoing Jesus’ words in Matthew 5:33-37

Matthew 5:33–37 NIV

33 “Again, you have heard that it was said to the people long ago, ‘Do not break your oath, but fulfill to the Lord the vows you have made.’ 34 But I tell you, do not swear an oath at all: either by heaven, for it is God’s throne; 35 or by the earth, for it is his footstool; or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the Great King. 36 And do not swear by your head, for you cannot make even one hair white or black. 37 All you need to say is simply ‘Yes’ or ‘No’; anything beyond this comes from the evil one.

This is a call for simple and straightforward speech. We don’t need to misuse God’s name to make people believe what we say. We shouldn’t have to convince people that we are telling the truth. If your yes means yes, and your no means no, you don’t have to swear by God or by heaven. Speak with integrity.

James then tells us that we should live by praying about everything.

James 5:13–18 NIV

Is anyone among you in trouble? Let them pray. Is anyone happy? Let them sing songs of praise. Is anyone among you sick? Let them call the elders of the church to pray over them and anoint them with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise them up. If they have sinned, they will be forgiven. Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective. Elijah was a human being, even as we are. He prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the land for three and a half years. Again he prayed, and the heavens gave rain, and the earth produced its crops.

The first situation that James calls us to pray in is when we face trouble. James may have in mind the persecution that the early church is facing, or he may be pointing out things that affect all of us, problems, difficulties, that we face in life. The solution that James gives is that we should pray. He doesn’t say sit and complain about your problems to yourself, call upon God! Pray! We see this time and time again throughout the Psalms. David faces trouble, what does he do? He prays. When dealing with the difficulties of life, we should pray about them.

The second situation James gives us is when we are happy, when we are joyful. So many times, when life is going well, when we are having a great day, we neglect to think about God in that moment. We kind of have this tendency to forget about God when we are happy and so we forget to be grateful. James tells us though that even on those days, you should pray! Sing praises to God for the day, develop this thankful attitude toward God. That should be especially on our minds this week as we celebrate Thanksgiving. Don’t just pray and thank God for the good things in your life one day a year, do it constantly, keep that mindset of every good thing coming from your heavenly father who loves you, and praise him for it.

The third situation perhaps is the most complicated out of these three. James says that if anyone is sick, call the elder to pray over them, to anoint them, and that the prayer offered in faith will make the person well. As you can likely tell, this might raise questions for us. So let’s look a little deeper at it.

James referring to physical illness in this passage. The Greek word that James uses for sick here always referred to physical illness in the gospels. Paul will occasionally use this word in his letter to express spiritual sickness, but Paul always includes some kind of qualifier, like weak in faith, weak in conscience. Paul points out that he is talking about spiritual sickness in those passages. So James is dealing with physical sickness.

Part of the response for this situation is that the person should be anointed with oil. Oil was used is physical illnesses, not in spiritual sickness. It’s also important to point out that I don’t think James is telling them to anoint the sick person with oil as part of a ceremonial process. Anointing someone with oil in this time was a medicinal act. It helped provide relief from fevers when someone was anointed and fanned and helped soothe pain from injury.

An example of this that we see in scripture is found in the parable of the Good Samaritan. When the good Samaritan finds the man alongside the road, we read in Luke 10:34 what he does.

Luke 10:34 “34 He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, brought him to an inn and took care of him.”

This act of anointing with oil then is not part of a ceremonial rite, but as a way to provide relief through a natural resource. God used oil to bring relief to people hurting, just as he now has provided medicine and other natural things to help those who are sick.

But then we get to the sticky part of the verse. James says that the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well. I don’t think that James is making a broad statement that any prayer for healing will be answered and the person healed. We know that isn’t the case Biblically (think the thorn in Paul’s side) and we know this isn’t the case personally as we have all prayed for healing for people in our lives who were not healed. I believe the point that James is making is that prayer is powerful. Prayer is useful for the spiritual battles that we face as well as our physical battles. We still believe that prayer can bring healing to our physical illnesses. If it is God’s will to heal someone, he will use prayer to do that. That means we should not neglect prayer when we are physically ill. We use the treatments that God has made available to use, however we don’t put all of our trust in them and forget the power of prayer. When faced with a serious illness we pray for healing through treatments as well has healing through spiritual means.

And finally, we get to the last point of how to live, help those who wander.

James 5:19–20 NIV

My brothers and sisters, if one of you should wander from the truth and someone should bring that person back, remember this: Whoever turns a sinner from the error of their way will save them from death and cover over a multitude of sins.

The last instruction that James gives is to not ignore those who wander away. Each of of has the responsibility, the job, of telling lost people about the love of God that has been demonstrated through Jesus. This applies to people who were a part of the church but not yet believers, as well as people outside of the church. God does the work of saving and redeeming, yes, but that does not mean that we should sit on our hands either. We have the opportunity to partner with God, to be a part of his work, so that more people would come to know and rejoice in Jesus as their savior. If you need another reminder of why we should live differently, of why we should live in the way that James has described throughout the book, this is it. Living your life out of Godly wisdom, watching the words you say, being patient in affliction and rejoicing in suffering, all of that can point others toward Jesus.

Revisit the book of James from time to time and use it like a mirror. Does your life look like the way James describes the Christian life? Examine yourself and allow God to continue to work on you and shape you more and more like Jesus.