Prayer in Times of Suffering

James 5:13-15

The subject of prayer is always relevant to the church. As believers, we all struggle to grow in our prayer life. We need encouragement. We need reminders. We need practical counsel from those who pray effectively, if only because they’ve struggled longer than we have. But there is one condition in life that produces the greatest motivation to pray… and that is times of suffering.

All suffering provides fertile ground for a greater harvest of prayers in this life. We pray in times of physical suffering. We pray in times of emotional suffering. And we pray in times of spiritual suffering… more than in times of peace and comfort and prosperity. So suffering has a place in the development of every person God uses. No one ever became a strong Christian without experiencing times of intense suffering along the way.

James was writing to predominantly Jewish Christians who were going through intense suffering for their faith in Christ. They were taught to face their suffering with increased prayers to God. But some of them were battle-weary and had grown tired of standing firm in the faith. They had become weak in their misery. There were some whose attitudes had become bitter and sinful because they thought God didn’t care about them anymore. It was then that they needed the help of someone else to pray for them. James tells them exactly how to handle both forms of persecution in these verses. James 5:13-15. In honor of God and His Word, let’s stand.

13 Is anyone among you suffering? Let him pray. Is anyone cheerful? Let him sing praises. 14 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; 15 and the prayer offered in faith will restore the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up, and if he has committed sins, they will be forgiven him. [NASB]

[Prayer] There are two distinct points in these verses. They answer the question: after praying for yourself during times of prolonged spiritual suffering, at what point should a believer call for the elders to come and pray on their behalf? There are two basic ways a believer faces spiritual persecution and these are addressed in verse 13. Here’s the first point…

I.          Prayer for yourself is prescribed when enduring unjust suffering from persecutors (13).

You should always pray about the issues you face in life, whatever they are, but the suffering in verse 13 is specific. James is referring to the suffering of persecution for their faith in Christ. This word for suffering refers to enduring evil treatment by oppressive people, not to physical illness. This form of suffering is firmly rooted in the whole context of James. Now, this doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t pray for any other form of suffering in life. You should. We are commanded to pray at all times for everything in life. God cares about all of your suffering.

But James is addressing a particular concern of his readers who were suffering harsh treatment from ungodly employers, from deprivation of material resources, and from social disconnection because of their faith. He’s telling them this kind of suffering is first and foremost a matter of personal prayer. When you’re suffering for any reason, the first thing to do is pray. God hears and answers prayer; and the fact that James is reminding these believers of the reality that God is in control of the source and duration of their suffering should provide even greater hope that our resulting prayers to Him will bring the relief we seek… and the glory He deserves.

“Is anyone among you suffering? Let him pray.” The phrase “let him pray” is not optional; it’s stated as an imperative: “He must pray” or as the NIV says, “He should pray”. The present participle of the verb “pray” could also be translated, “let him keep on praying” – suggesting an ongoing, continual activity to ease the affliction of suffering. God is our ultimate source of comfort in all circumstances. At the beginning of 2 Corinthians, Paul described God as the “Father of all mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction” (1:3-4). In a similar way, the apostle Peter wrote, “casting all your anxiety on Him, because He cares for you” (1 Pet. 5:7). God wants you to take your anxieties to Him. Christian hymnody reflects this focus.

Back in 1971, Andre Crouch wrote the chorus, Through It All. In it, he describes the process of growing through adversity into a person who trusts God at a much deeper level. He says…

I thank God for the mountains, And I thank Him for the valleys, I thank Him for the storms He brought me through; For if I’d never had a problem I wouldn’t know that He could solve them, I’d never know what faith in God could do. Through it all, through it all, I’ve learned to trust in Jesus, I’ve learned to trust in God; Through it all, through it all, I’ve learned to depend upon His Word.

There are times when the suffering brought on by criticism and adversity for standing firm on biblical convictions can bring us to our knees. That’s exactly where we should go. But there are also times when persecution and criticism from the ungodly can actually produce a sense of spiritual peace and joy in spite of our natural circumstances.

Jesus told His disciples this would happen. Matthew 5:10-12 – “Blessed are those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 11 Blessed are you when men cast insults at you, and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely, on account of Me. 12 Rejoice, and be glad, for your reward in heaven is great, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.” The only way we can experience this joy is by standing firm on biblical convictions. When Christians lovingly refuse to compromise a biblical principle, even when it means facing retribution from ungodly opponents of the Word, we will feel the pleasure of Christ smiling within us… and it’s a joy the world cannot touch.

So when that situation happens, and you feel a sense of joy in the face of suffering for righteousness, (like Paul and Silas) you ought to sing praises to God. That’s the second half of verse 13: “Is anyone cheerful? Let him sing praises.” I love that! I wish that were always my response to suffering. If you feel the pleasure of Christ for being mistreated for righteousness, then sing a hymn of praise to God! I think it’s a great loss that so many Christians don’t know the hymns of the faith. The words and music of many great hymns have strengthened me through numerous dark hours in my Christian journey. I’m so glad someone taught them to me early in life.

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Martin Luther said, “Next to Holy Scripture, the hymnal deserves the place of highest honor in a believer’s life.” I would say, “Amen and amen!” The best hymns or choruses are really just Bible doctrine put in poetic verse. It’s been said that you’ll never find a Christian who studies God’s Word deeply and who cherishes good theology who hates the hymns of the church. That person simply doesn’t exist. The date of a hymn’s publication has very little to do with its grandeur; it’s about content and majesty: what does it say about God?

When you’re hurting, whether it’s for persecution for doing what pleases God, or for any other valid reason, God wants us to continually plead with Him throughout the period of suffering. As long as we still have strength in our bones and faith in Christ, we are commanded to keep on praying (and singing) knowing that God hears those prayers.

Christians who maintain a cheerful attitude during suffering are to sing praises. The word for “cheerful” describes those who are well in spirit – their disposition is rooted in Christ; it does not describe those who are physically well. So you can have this joy in Christ even when your physical body is broken and weak. The happiness or cheerfulness refers to the spiritual state of the sufferer. Prayer and praise are both appropriate responses to unjust suffering in life.

But there are times when the weary sufferer has lost the will to persist in prayer. They may have suffered for so long that their spirit is broken. It is then that the elders of the church are to be called in for the purpose of praying for that weakened believer. Look at the second point…

II.        Prayer from the elders is God’s design for Christians who have grown too spiritually weak from suffering to pray for themselves (14-15).

These verses have been the subject of misunderstanding and controversy for many years. On the surface, it appears to be teaching that sick believers can expect physical healing through the prayers of the elders. But that interpretation would be out of harmony with the context. And as noted in the previous point, the suffering James has in view is evil treatment (which may have produced physical weakness), but not physical illness alone. First, let’s read verses 14-15…

14 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; 15and the prayer offered in faith will restore the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up, and if he has committed sins, they will be forgiven him.

There are segments within the Christian population who have used these verses to justify the practice of so-called faith-healers. The Roman Catholic Church appeals to this passage for their dogma of “extreme unction”. But neither of these practices fit the overall context of the passage. Nor do they find much grammatical or theological support upon closer examination.

The word translated “sick” in these verses is translated as “sick” 18 times in the NT, especially in the Gospels. But it is also used 14 times to refer to emotional or spiritual weakness. In 2 Corinthians 12:10 Paul used this same word to describe his thorn in the flesh and the weakness produced by the sufferings of life. In that passage, they didn’t translate it “… for when I am sick, then am I strong.” The word should be translated as “weak”. And “weak” would better fit the context of the sufferings in James as well. So the word sick should be understood as spiritual weakness due to prolonged suffering for the cause of Christ. Their faith has grown weak under the burden of prolonged adversity.

When a person has grown spiritually weak, so that they can no longer pray with the faith that God is still at work and will see them through this, they should call for the elders of the church. They call for the elders, not the deacons in this case, which further suggests that this is a spiritual need and not just a physical need. If they only needed someone to pray for their physical sickness and rub some oil on their wounds, the deacons were more than capable of meeting that need. But doctrinal work… theological intervention and the application of God’s Word to the trials of life is really the work of the elders of the church. This is what the spiritually weak Christian calls the elders to obtain. This suffering believer needs spiritual exhortation in the form of faithful prayer! More than one elder is involved in this process: “Let him call for the elders [plural] of the church, and let them [plural] pray over him…” So the weak Christian calls for the elders and the elders work as a team to carry out this restoring ministry of the church.

Then it says “anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord…” This anointing with oil by the elders is not a reference to a religious ceremony – or to a sacred ritual. The word translated “anointing” is never used in the NT to refer to ceremonial anointing. Greek scholar A.T. Robertson suggests that the most common usage would be “to rub” as was common of topical medicines in the first century. And oil was a common topical medicine to soften wounds or to relax sore muscles to aid someone physically as part of their spiritual restoration.

The point is that the elders may have literally rubbed oil on the worn out believers who had suffered persecution from ruthless employers and tense situations. One commentator writes: “It would have been a gracious, kind act on the part of the elders to rub oil on the wounds of those who had been beaten, or into the sore muscles of those made to work long hours under harsh treatment.” So the oil has a medicinal application rather than a ceremonial application in this context of James. Instead of being mystical, this counsel in James is very practical.

A contemporary application for us would be to advise Christians to take their medicines as prescribed by knowing doctors. Don’t imagine that it’s a sign of weak faith to take the medicine you need; medicine should be seen as a gracious provision from God to mitigate our fallen environment. It also emphasizes the relationship between the physical body and the spiritual condition. When we’re physically weak, we may begin to feel spiritually weak as well. It’s only natural since God created us as composite beings. There is certainly a psycho-somatic connection. The word psycho-somatic comes from the words for “soul” (psuche) and “body” (soma). When one of these two natures is compromised, the other nature is affected by it.

There is so much more we need to learn from this connection between our prayer life and how the physical body relates to the soul in the ministry of the elders. We’ll regroup and expand on this when we meet next time, Lord willing. Until then, let’s pray.

(c) Charles Kevin Grant

July 26, 2006