Living with Faith
Living Your Faith • Sermon • Submitted
0 ratings
· 11 viewsFaith empowers the believer to receive God's blessings.
Notes
Transcript
Intro: Turn to James 5:13-20
13 Is anyone among you suffering? Let him pray. Is anyone cheerful? Let him sing praise.
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 of faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven.
16 Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.
17 Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed fervently that it might not rain, and for three years and six months it did not rain on the earth.
18 Then he prayed again, and heaven gave rain, and the earth bore its fruit.
19 My brothers, if anyone among you wanders from the truth and someone brings him back,
20 let him know that whoever brings back a sinner from his wandering will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins.
Pray
There is something attractive to a faithless world to see a believer hold faith in the midst of danger, grief, and suffering. People cannot help but be enthralled when a child of God rests upon him. Like a child watching another eat ice cream, the faith of a Christian entices, almost tempts, those who lack that kind of faith.
As James closes his letter to these scattered Jewish Christians, as he seeks to tie the bow on this message of living your faith, he broaches one final topic that will prove the most rewarding: the prayer of faith.
ILL: The Prayer Warrior
I want to have a prayer life like that. I want to have a prayer life that has that kind of power - such faith in God that he seems to speak his words through my lips, he does his work through my hands, he loves others through my heart.
So what is it that makes the prayer of faith? How do we live with faith in prayer? James describes the prayer of faith - I wonder if we might take a few moments to see what this prayer looks like, and to seek to develop it in our own lives.
The Prayer of Faith Seeks God’s Provision
The Prayer of Faith Seeks God’s Provision
We are faced with a myriad of circumstances and situations, and in every one we need God’s provision. That provision might change from time to time, but the prayer of faith always seeks what only God can provide. When we pray the prayer of faith, we seek God’s provision:
In Suffering
In Suffering
13 Is anyone among you suffering? Let him pray. Is anyone cheerful? Let him sing praise.
This suffering goes right in line with the rest of this chapter: we might suffer hardship through mistreatment, as the workers of the rich suffered from withheld wages. We might suffer as we endure the hardships of hard work with no apparent progress, or suffer through the pain of loss. We might suffer through feelings of guilt for what we did wrong, or what we “should have done.” No matter the source of suffering, the prayer of faith seeks God’s provision in the midst of suffering: “Let him pray” James says.
The command to pray here has the idea of us forcing ourselves to pray. I wonder if James is telling us that we must actively engage in bring ourselves to the throne of grace. We must overcome the hopelessness, the anger, the depression, the knot in our stomach that holds us back from casting our burden upon the Lord. And the only way to overcome is to bow our knee in prayer - only God can provide for us in suffering. But the prayer of faith also seeks God’s provision:
In Success
In Success
13 Is anyone among you suffering? Let him pray. Is anyone cheerful? Let him sing praise.
We don’t often think of good times as indicating our need for God, but we still need him every hour. When we are cheerful, we are to “sing praise.” We are to thank God for the blessings of the moment while recognizing that we need him just as much now as ever. The prayer of faith recognizes that the good gifts come from God (seems like James may have said that earlier in this book).
17 Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.
So even in success, we pray the prayer of faith both to thank God and to seek his continued provision. Now, there’s a third circumstance in which the prayer of faith seeks God’s provision:
In Sickness
In Sickness
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.
The implication of this verse is that the sick individual is on a sick bed unable to come to the church, so he calls the elders to his bed side. They pray and anoint him. Notice something here: this anointing with oil by the elders of the church is connected to the prayer they pray over the sick person - it is the outward expression of the prayer of faith. The anointing isn’t magical or medicinal (though many in that day thought it was) - it’s merely a means to ask God to provide healing.
Whatever the circumstance, the prayer of faith seeks God’s provision. But that’s not all:
The Prayer of Faith Has God’s Provision
The Prayer of Faith Has God’s Provision
15 And the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven.
16 Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.
Not only do we seek God to provide what we need in the prayer of faith, but the prayer of faith receives from God his provision for our needs:
Of Healing
Of Healing
15 And the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven.
Both the word “save” and “raise” refer to physical healing. Yes, it is legitimate to pray to God for physical healing, and yes, God does answer those kinds of prayers. Sometimes his will is to heal - sometimes not. But God promises that the prayer of faith will save the sick and that God will raise him up. Let this verse simmer on the back burner of your mind for a few minutes - that sauce is too runny to serve just yet, and we’ll thicken it up shortly. The prayer of faith has God’s provision of healing, and also it has God’s provision:
Of Forgiveness
Of Forgiveness
15 And the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven.
Sometimes people are sick or need healing just because. The blind man in John 9 is an example of someone who suffered so that God could be glorified in his healing. But sometimes, sin causes illnesses and death - Paul attributes the cavalier nature that the Corinthian church practiced Communion as the cause of much illness and death in that church (1 Cor. 11:27ff). James here points to the fact that those who are sick because of sin will be forgiven through the prayer of faith from the elders of the church! In other words, when the church prays for one to be healed, they are also asking God to forgive any sin that has brought about the need for healing. And the prayer of faith has God’s provision of forgiveness for the one who needs it. Third, it has God’s provision:
Of Community
Of Community
16 Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.
One commentator wrote that “prayer for healing is a communal activity.” God has given us one another as a provision for our needs. The prayer of faith is not an individual, independent matter. It is only possible within the context of the body of Christ.
That means we “confess” to one another and pray for each other. We openly admit our wrongdoing (especially to those we harm), and we intercede on each others’ behalf (especially those who harm us). We have God’s provision through the prayer of faith together.
Not only does the prayer of faith seek and have God’s provision, but:
The Prayer of Faith Has God’s Power
The Prayer of Faith Has God’s Power
Here’s the crux of the text: the end of verse 16 is the key to everything. Remember that pot on the back burner - the sauce of God’s provision of healing that was too runny? It’s time to thicken it up. The prayer of faith has God’s power for two things:
To Provide
To Provide
16 Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.
That phrase, “as it is working,” has the idea of something having all the resources necessary to function. The prayer of faith has everything we need - it finds its source in the will of God, it draws its breath by the Spirit of God, it rests its confidence in the sovereignty of God. God gives power by providing every prerequisite to the one who prays in faith. Then God’s power takes it one step further:
To Perform
To Perform
16 Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.
That “great power” could easily be translated as “the prayer…is highly competent.” Not only does the prayer of faith have every resource of God at its disposal - it uses them effectively for the purpose of God. God empowers the prayer of faith to accomplish its mission, in the same way he empowers his word:
10 “For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return there but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater,
11 so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it.
In the same way, God empowers the prayer of faith by providing everything we need and enabling us to use it effectively for his glory. Now that sauce is nice and thick: we’re not just talking about a prayer that “if you just have enough faith, God will heal you.” No, it’s not about having enough faith: the prayer of faith works because God has empowered it from start to finish. You and I can only trust in the God who is at work. James then provides a case study: Elijah.
Case Study: Elijah
17 Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed fervently that it might not rain, and for three years and six months it did not rain on the earth.
18 Then he prayed again, and heaven gave rain, and the earth bore its fruit.
That kind of thinking that only the spiritually elite can pray like this is just wrong. James says that Elijah “was a man with a nature like ours.” Elijah’s prayers were not effective because of who Elijah was. Elijah’s prayers were effective because they were inline with God’s will. God empowered his prayers. If you really want to pray with that kind of faith, it can only happen with God’s power. Last point:
The Prayer of Faith Has God’s Promise
The Prayer of Faith Has God’s Promise
19 My brothers, if anyone among you wanders from the truth and someone brings him back,
20 let him know that whoever brings back a sinner from his wandering will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins.
God offers the promise
Of Salvation
Of Salvation
20 let him know that whoever brings back a sinner from his wandering will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins.
Before, “save” was physical healing. This time, though, “save” is a spiritual healing. We all have sin that, like a disease, eats away at our souls. We need healing. Only God can provide that healing, and he chooses to do so as we respond to his offer by faith.
But notice what James says: the one who brings back a sinner “will save his soul from death.” Save whose soul, his own or the sinners?
Yes. I believe it’s both - the sinner is saved as he now trusts Christ, and the one who brings him back is “saved” in the sense of having his own soul protected in the process. But God also offers a related promise:
Of Atonement
Of Atonement
20 let him know that whoever brings back a sinner from his wandering will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins.
So the prayer of faith produces both salvation and atonement: both a saving from eternal punishment and a dealing with the sins that lead to that punishment. The prayer of faith is, from start to finish, the core “work” of the Christian life.
Transition to invitation