Study of James: Our Word & Our Prayers
Sunday, March 22, 2020
Peace to Live By Study of James: Our Word & Our Prayers - Daniel Litton
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[Transcript may not match broadcasted sermon word for word. Sections in bold are extra material that was cut from the broadcast due to time constraints]
Today we come to the conclusion of our study in James here. I must say that I have particularly enjoyed this study, and I think the approach we have taken has been both beneficial and brought to mind some new ideas, some insights, into the subject matter that is presented here. That’s a beautiful thing about the Scriptures. There is always another perspective, another way to look at the same text, and that way begets us greater insight. Most of the time we rely on different Bible teachers to give us our variety of perspectives, but we really don’t even need to go that far. We ourselves, by placing various types of eyeglasses on, can see different things from the same text and therefore learn and grow.
So now we are picking back up in chapter 5. Starting in verse 12: “But above all, my brothers and sisters, do not swear, either by heaven or by earth or by any other oath, but let your "yes" be yes and your "no" be no, so that you may not fall under condemnation.“ (ESV)
James starts our section here noting that what he is about to say is the most important thing to be said of his recent comments. And notice, as James has done quite a bit in his epistle here, he moves right back to our speech, the things we say with our mouths. Now, in James’ context for his original readers and listeners at the time, he obviously was talking to Jewish believers in Jesus. He even references Jesus’ comments on this topic, and all of this is tied into the Jewish culture. So, the background is that basically some Jews back then had the habit of swearing false oaths by other names (names other than God’s name) and thought that that was okay to do. They thought the only oath that you had to keep was when you swore by God’s name. Otherwise, you could tell a lie if it was by any other name, and that wasn’t sinful to do that.
Of course, to our minds here in American society we can think of similar ways people do this. The thought comes to mind of a person crossing their fingers behind there back (usually a child) as they are agreeing to something. The random example that comes to my mind is Veruca from the movie Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory (1971). We can remember when Willy Wonka was telling the kids about the Everlasting Gobstopper that Veruca appeared to agree she wouldn’t share the secret of it with anyone, only to be crossing her fingers behind her back. What are some ways we, today, swear by false oaths? Maybe it’s as simple as a person telling their friend they will help them move, and then when the day comes, the yes actually wasn’t a yes. There’s no valid excuse. The person just doesn’t feel like it. Or, on the opposite end of the spectrum, perhaps it’s the larger, more common thing we are seeing. It’s the decision to divorce without any real, significant reason to do so. Ten years ago, twenty years ago, whatever it was, the yes wasn’t a real yes at all. Much like the weather changes, and the seasons change, some people’s yeses go right along with the flow of their feelings.
You see, God doesn’t like it when people don’t keep their word, keep their commitment. Now, I certainly don’t want to be legalistic about this. There are things, many things, that we as Christians have freedom in. There are even certain instances were divorce is appropriate. What I am talking about is when our word isn’t kept without valid reason, whether big or small. Perhaps we just aren’t ‘feeling it’ anymore. That’s usually not a valid excuse to break our word with whatever it is. I think, deep down, we know when we are violating our conscience in regard to an oath. We can feel the resistance. When we feel that resistance, we need to be careful. We don’t want others upset with us, even condemning us, and we don’t want God upset with us, even condemning us.
It certainly is true that sometimes people will condemn us when we really haven’t done anything wrong. The lower a person is on the levels of consciousness the more they will be focused on themselves. In that case, if we do something like, say we decide to move to a different state, there may be a group of people that are upset with our decision. But that’s because they are focused only on themselves, and how the decision affects them, and not how it is good for the person actually moving. Sometimes our minds can play tricks on us and try to get us to think that God is mad at us when he really isn’t. This ‘personalization’ or ‘mind reading’ from David Burn’s Cognitive Distortions can really mess with our heads sometimes. I think that it must be the case that God is mad at me because I feel guilty. But the presence of guilt doesn’t always mean that we have done something wrong. It may be that we just ‘think’ we have done something wrong and really haven’t. When we assume we know what God is thinking that can get us into trouble with ourselves.
Next, now in verse 13, we read, “Is anyone among you suffering? Let him pray. Is anyone cheerful? Let him sing praise. 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 one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven.”
James kind of looks at both ends of the spectrum here in regard to our mental state, as Christians, where we stand in our pursuit of happiness. On the one hand, there is the person who is suffering. On the other hand, we have the person who is cheerful, who is happy. Notice, right off the bat, that what is our goal?
What does James say our wish, our desire, is to be?
Which person are we to be like?
Well, obviously, the cheerful person. We know because James goes on the say that the elders of a person’s church should be called to pray over them if they are suffering. This goes to show us that suffering is not be desired, then. It’s not our end goal. We don’t desire to suffer. I know, I shouldn’t have to say all that but I think that I do because unfortunately there are certain individuals who teach that suffering is good, and that it’s our goal to suffer.
Note then, the contrast between the higher levels of consciousness versus the lower levels. If we combine the Levels Three and Four Christian’s characteristics, what do we get? Here are the character traits again: faith, easygoingness, acceptance, enjoyment, love, joy, peace, and patience. These are the upper attitudes that I have identified, and I’m sure, you could come up with similar or even additional positive character traits. So this is the picture of what we want to be like. On the flip side, what are the negative character traits? Those are unhappiness, lowness, bitterness, hopelessness, anxiety, self-righteousness, aggravation, and wantingness. Hopefully, as we read over this second list, we don’t find that we closely identify with these characteristics. If so, no worries. We just need to look at where we ought to improve, to move up, and set our focus on those areas. But James’ model here is cheerful versus suffering. I think that’s a tremendous summary of the Levels of Inner-Self.
We see then the importance of prayer when we are at the lower end of the consciousness scale. Yes, indeed. And depending on what our suffering actually is, let’s say it’s hopelessness, then it might be appropriate to call for some of the elders at your church to pray over you. There’s nothing like a group of high ranking Christians praying for their follow person. I’m sure there are different ways to go about this. Email might be the easiest. I don’t think the people all have to be present together. If you take the anointing of the oil as literal, then perhaps you’ll want to do that. But really, the people praying is anointing the person’s head with oil, as David talked about in Psalm 23 with God doing that for us. What a great blessing that is! But again, that’s not to say that afterwards the person shouldn’t been helping themselves to get better, doing anything they can depending on the specific situation. Sometimes not much can be done. But regardless, only depending upon the prayer and not helping ourselves I don’t think is the best course of action. I do believe that God helps those who help themselves. Why, didn’t you help yourself when you called upon the elders to pray? That was a first step that you took.
Anyhow, the prayer that the elders offer up to God will indeed help the person who is sick. In the case of bodily sickness, granted, this may be in this life—that is, the person may recover. Or, that person may end up transcending—for James says, “the Lord will raise him up.” Since all that matters is God anyway, there’s no fear here. For the person who has Given Up Control, or surrendered, then whether they live or whether they die everything is fine. Really, transcendence means we get to be with God, in his presence, which I definitely think is better for us. There’s no more sin there, and we aren’t affected by anything bad anymore. If a person isn’t healed after the prayer from the elders, and rather transcends, this is not to say the person had unrepentant sin in their life. I think that’s presumptuous, and is missing the heart of the passage. Besides, the mere fact that the person is having the elders prayer over them certainly seems to indicate that the person’s heart is in the right place to begin with. If not, why would the person be calling for the elders?
Verse 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.” (ESV)
It appears in this verse that James is moving into a more general, whole church focus here. This is moving past a sick person and the elders praying for him or her, to a more general picture. We know that because he says “pray for one another.” This just isn’t limited to the elders of the church. So, let’s first discuss the confessing of our sins, and I believe we have to be careful here because there are proper times I think to publicly confess one’s sins, and there are other times not to. None of us should be a big, giant dump truck that likes to dump our load of garbage on the stander-bys. To use some Solomon phraseology, there is a time to confess in front of others and a time not to. It’s just like Jesus talked about in the Sermon on the Mount in regard to doing things before others. I think people, now watch this, people can actually take pride in confessing their sins. What I mean is that sometimes people actually get a high from their seemingly humble, in their own estimation, presentation before others. They think they look good because they have the guts to actually confess some sins.
I would say that a good time to confess your sin, whether in front of your Bible study or discipleship group or whatever, a good time to do it is when you feel it will be beneficial to others to see that you struggle as well. People can get the idea that others are awesome super-Christians, and that they’re the only person struggling. But, when one of these so called super-Christians actually speaks up, and says, “You know, I have been struggling with this.” Or the person says, “I made this big mistake,” it can actually help those who are hearing. It can start to clear through the distortions that one has built up in their minds. One of my favorite books of all time is ‘Feeling Good: The New Mood Therapy’ by David D. Burns. If you read chapter 14 of that book, the psychologist talks about perfectionism, and how he himself, though often believed to be perfect, actually was not perfect. And in that chapter he goes through a dialogue where, in front of a larger audience at a lecture, he actually confessed a wrong he had done when he was dealing with one of his patients. His humility only goes to back up everything he says in the book. That’s what humility often does.
Now, it is true that sometimes when we confess our sins in front of others, there will be that one person, maybe two, who has a real problem with it. What I am saying is that the person might hold the wrong over our heads and see us differently than they have in the past, as happened to Dr. Burns. In actuality, though, this kind of person is undoubtedly on a lower level of consciousness in that they haven’t come to grips with the truth that everyone messes up. They do. Everyone does. It’s just that a lot of times most people don’t know about a significant mistake we have made. The lower the level of consciousness of an individual, the more he or she will see the faults of others and tend to magnify them, or hold them in mind when they see people. Actually, this is a good baseline test for us. If we find that when we are in the presence of others that we are actually running a laundry list of their faults in our minds, then we know we have a low-consciousness level problem. As Dr. Burns points out in chapter 3 of that same book (‘Feeling Good’), it is the person who has the philosophy, (paraphrasing) ‘The measure of a person is the mistakes they make.’ That indeed, is a polluted, cognitively distorted, low-level consciousness viewpoint.
Anyhow, we need to move on to the second part of this verse, and let’s read it again, “The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.” Before we even discuss this, we need to define who “a righteous person” actually is. Technically, all Christians are righteous from having Jesus’ righteousness bestowed upon them from believing in his work on the cross. But I don’t think that’s what James is talking about here. If it were, then all Christian’s prayers would have great power as they are working. The implication seems to be that there are certain Christians, namely, ‘righteous’ Christians whose prayers have a greater impact than the normal. They have great power from God behind them. So, in view of this, who is a righteous person? We could say that a righteous person is one whom is on the higher levels of consciousness. Certainly so. They have been more obedient to God and haven’t been wallowing in self-pity and selfishness. In other words, the more negative a person is, the more unrighteous he or she is. I think it’s fair to put it that way.
What I have found in my personal life is that the higher my consciousness level, the better I feel, and the greater I see God’s power flowing in my life. Prayers seem to be answered easily and effortlessly. I think you know the flow. It is when everything in life, from our relationship with God to going through the routine seems to be flowing really well. And, in considering the why behind this, I think we find that because we are more filled with faith (one of the characters of the Level Three Christian), because of that we find that things are flowing better. When I notice that negative events start to get on a roll, and start to snowball into something greater, the first thing I do is check my own consciousness level. Eight out of ten times this is the problem. It is that I have let my own happiness start to drift downwards, slowly and subtly. That’s the problem; it often happens so slowly that we don’t realize it until we have a continuous stream of bad things happening. Then we realize it and can make correction, which sometimes takes a day or two of re-thinking.
Continuing on, on this subject of prayer, James says for us: “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. Then he prayed again, and heaven gave rain, and the earth bore its fruit” (James 5:17-18, ESV).
Let us focus first on how James says, “Elijah was a man with a nature like ours.” I think it’s often the case that with Biblical figures, or even celebrities of our day, that we cast this sort of mystical, magical, superiority of character over their personhood, as if somehow they are some sort of superhuman. But, really, we should know, in serious contemplation, that all humans are just that humans, whether they are famous or highly revered by many. They are of the same makeup as the average folks. For them, themselves, on a personal level, many of them would tell you there is nothing magical about them. The point James is making is that the famous prophet Elijah from the Old Testament was a human being just like any other human being and he prayed, and big stuff happened. We know he was an obedient man to God, we could say that, but he was just like any other person. So, if Elijah’s prayers reached far and wide, so can ours. Just another reason it’s important for us to pray.
Speaking of obedience, now we come to the our final instruction from James. Verse 19: "My brothers and sisters, if anyone among you wanders from the truth and someone brings him back, 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.”
Now we could debate over whether the person James is talking about here is a ‘born again’ ‘new creation’ Christian, or one who just ‘knew about’ the truth, was a part of the church, and then just one day left. From the reading of the rest of the verse, I think personally I tend to favor the second approach here because, otherwise, I guess you would be saying the Christian lost his or her salvation, or could in fact lose it. Nevertheless, the point is that there is a lot of deception in the world. There is a lot of thinking that is contrary to sound doctrine presented in the Scriptures. That’s why we need to keep the Bible at the top, to keep it as the sole filter through which everything else flows. If someone says something, whether that be a believer or anyone, and it aligns with Scripture, we know we are good to go. But if what they say directly contradicts Scripture, we know that’s an alternative avenue that we don’t want to follow. It will hurt us down the road.
In our day of so much knowledge, perhaps never has there been greater opportunity for people to wander from the Truth. Unfortunately, I would have to say that I have already seen it a couple times in my Christian existence. These were people that believed the Bible, shared the Gospel, one of them had their own personal ministry that they created, and yet they left the Truth and began to follow after ways that don’t align with God. This can be heartbreaking to see, and especially when the person shows no remorse, and is completely unrepentant when confronted. I don’t like to have to say this, but I am sure that many of you out there have known people who have left the truth. I’m not talking about switching denominations here, or going to a different church. We’re not talking about self-righteousness here. What we are talking about is a person who leaves the good, sound, universal principles of God, those which he presents in his Word. And this is usually most obviously manifested in a loss of morality.
Sometimes God gives us opportunity to bring the person back, or perhaps lead a believer who is just kind of lukewarm onto a more solid path. In these cases, this a great and gracious thing from God. It shows the wonder and forgivingness of his character, how he is compassionate and merciful, how he wants everyone to be on his side. And when the person makes the choice to come back or be more serious about their salvation, this only works to be an example to others around the person to consider the same thing. This good begets more and more good. And it’s good also for the person, or series of persons, who helped the person to come back. But there is all around goodness. God is pleased, and his character is shown forth in true light and abundance for all.
Well, this concludes our study of the book of James. I think we’ve had a grand time going over it, and trying to squeeze as much as we could out of it. Before we finish, let’s recap what we have learned in the second half here, in chapters 3 through 5, so we can have it as a summary and easily go back and refer to it:
- In chapter 3, we first talked about the decision of a man or woman in becoming a teacher of God’s Word, whether or not a person wants to go ahead and make the leap. We discussed the potential concern from James about others being more critical toward teachers. We also discussed the importance of our speech, whether for the teacher or any Christian, and how that’s tied to our thoughts. The importance of positive speech was talked about, as well as the need to relinquish our self-righteousness. This included any bragging, jealously, and self-ambition we may do or have. We wrapped the chapter up with a brief discourse on wisdom and peace.
- Within chapter 4, we went over possible fights and quarrels among Christians. Then we retouched on the passions and desires, things we want in life. I brought up again how a strong desire can block prayer and what we want out of life. Then we talked about what it means to be a friend of the world and how God really wants us to act. This way we find he is not jealous toward us. We also went over what it means to submit to God and resist the devil. I talked about how to avoid sinful lifestyles. Then we went into a discussion about forgiving one another. Finally, we talked about being careful in presuming upon the future, that we need to approach the future with a humble mindset (this was the beginning of chapter 5).
- Finally, in chapter 5 we discussed what our view should be toward material possessions. I spent quite a lot of time on how we should not be too attached to them. Then I discussed how we should treat others who are performing services for us. We also went over the importance of the coming of the Lord again to the earth. Not grumbling and holding offenses against one another was talked about. Then we spent quite a long time talking about suffering and the example of Job. We talked about the importance of our oaths and keeping true to what we say. The topic of being sick and the elders being called was went over. The confession of sin with one another and the importance of prayer was highlighted. Finally, a Christian bringing back a wayward person was analyzed.
I hope everyone has enjoyed this study. I know I have had a good time in writing this. I want us also to remember the three concepts I discussed, the three filters, that helped guide us along this study, which were The Four Levels of Inner-Self, the practice of Giving Up Control, and finally the Law of Liberty. Of course, these are just one series of ways of looking at this great and grand book, one perspective, and it has been fun trying to understand the things here in God’s Word through them. Remember to carefully consider these things, as they can be beneficial in many of life’s experiences.
Today’s Acknowledgments:
John MacArthur, Joyce Meyer, and Psychologist David D. Burns.
Overall Acknowledgements:
Lots of contemplation and care went into the entire Study of James series, not to mention the time spent compiling the shows in post edit. My listeners are the driving force behind this, alongside the hope of seeing people helped, and perhaps, just perhaps, having that light bulb come on and meeting God for the first time.
Some of the listeners I have personal relationships with on a first hand basis. These include Christian brothers and sisters, and even those who might not identify as that. The face-to-face, verbal feedback is always encouraging and certainly works to add fuel to the fire of motivation.
A lot of the understanding of the concepts presented here in the Study of James is owed to secular Psychologists’ David R. Hawkins and David D. Burns, whom I never met. Their great understanding of human nature has been of particular benefit to me, and helped me to understand to a much greater degree why people do what they do, and why I act the way I act.
There’s no question I wouldn’t be where I am today without some formidable Bible teachers, most of whom I don’t have personal acquaintance with, but who have nonetheless been keenly instrumental in my understanding of the Bible. Special thanks to John MacArthur and Joyce Meyer for this particular endeavor.
Special thanks to Wayne Shepherd, who, over the years, has brought creditability and professional-ness to the sound of this broadcast.
I also want to mention and thank Pastor Becky Hart, who, in my personal church going, has been an inspiration and encouragement to me over the last year and a half or so as I have gotten to know her, as she certainly is to many others. You and Pastor John enjoy your retirement.
And, last of all, I cannot forget to mention to thank all of those who taught me how things shouldn’t be done. If I had only watched the example of those who did things right, then I wouldn’t have ever learned how not to do things. This continues to be a valuable insight each day forward into the future.
And now, off to writing an Amish fictional book. Yes, I know. I have studied the Amish so much that it seems like a good way to make use of what I have learned. Whether this will work, I have no idea. The first five chapters I have written over the last couple weeks seem good. It is definitely an experiment.
Today we come to the conclusion of our study in James here. I must say that I have particularly enjoyed this study, and I think the approach we have taken has been both beneficial and brought to mind some new ideas, some insights, into the subject matter that is presented here. That’s a beautiful thing about the Scriptures. There is always another perspective, another way to look at the same text, and that way begets us greater insight. Most of the time we rely on different Bible teachers to give us our variety of perspectives, but we really don’t even need to go that far. We ourselves, by placing various types of eyeglasses on, can see different things from the same text and therefore learn and grow.
So now we are picking back up in chapter 5. Starting in verse 12: “But above all, my brothers and sisters, do not swear, either by heaven or by earth or by any other oath, but let your "yes" be yes and your "no" be no, so that you may not fall under condemnation.“ (ESV)
James starts our section here noting that what he is about to say is the most important thing to be said of his recent comments. And notice, as James has done quite a bit in his epistle here, he moves right back to our speech, the things we say with our mouths. Now, in James’ context for his original readers and listeners at the time, he obviously was talking to Jewish believers in Jesus. He even references Jesus’ comments on this topic, and all of this is tied into the Jewish culture. So, the background is that basically some Jews back then had the habit of swearing false oaths by other names (names other than God’s name) and thought that that was okay to do. They thought the only oath that you had to keep was when you swore by God’s name. Otherwise, you could tell a lie if it was by any other name, and that wasn’t sinful to do that.
Of course, to our minds here in American society we can think of similar ways people do this. The thought comes to mind of a person crossing their fingers behind there back (usually a child) as they are agreeing to something. The random example that comes to my mind is Veruca from the movie Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory (1971). We can remember when Willy Wonka was telling the kids about the Everlasting Gobstopper that Veruca appeared to agree she wouldn’t share the secret of it with anyone, only to be crossing her fingers behind her back. What are some ways we, today, swear by false oaths? Maybe it’s as simple as a person telling their friend they will help them move, and then when the day comes, the yes actually wasn’t a yes. There’s no valid excuse. The person just doesn’t feel like it. Or, on the opposite end of the spectrum, perhaps it’s the larger, more common thing we are seeing. It’s the decision to divorce without any real, significant reason to do so. Ten years ago, twenty years ago, whatever it was, the yes wasn’t a real yes at all. Much like the weather changes, and the seasons change, some people’s yeses go right along with the flow of their feelings.
You see, God doesn’t like it when people don’t keep their word, keep their commitment. Now, I certainly don’t want to be legalistic about this. There are things, many things, that we as Christians have freedom in. There are even certain instances were divorce is appropriate. What I am talking about is when our word isn’t kept without valid reason, whether big or small. Perhaps we just aren’t ‘feeling it’ anymore. That’s usually not a valid excuse to break our word with whatever it is. I think, deep down, we know when we are violating our conscience in regard to an oath. We can feel the resistance. When we feel that resistance, we need to be careful. We don’t want others upset with us, even condemning us, and we don’t want God upset with us, even condemning us.
It certainly is true that sometimes people will condemn us when we really haven’t done anything wrong. The lower a person is on the levels of consciousness the more they will be focused on themselves. In that case, if we do something like, say we decide to move to a different state, there may be a group of people that are upset with our decision. But that’s because they are focused only on themselves, and how the decision affects them, and not how it is good for the person actually moving. Sometimes our minds can play tricks on us and try to get us to think that God is mad at us when he really isn’t. This ‘personalization’ or ‘mind reading’ from David Burn’s Cognitive Distortions can really mess with our heads sometimes. I think that it must be the case that God is mad at me because I feel guilty. But the presence of guilt doesn’t always mean that we have done something wrong. It may be that we just ‘think’ we have done something wrong and really haven’t. When we assume we know what God is thinking that can get us into trouble with ourselves.
Next, now in verse 13, we read, “Is anyone among you suffering? Let him pray. Is anyone cheerful? Let him sing praise. 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 one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven.”
James kind of looks at both ends of the spectrum here in regard to our mental state, as Christians, where we stand in our pursuit of happiness. On the one hand, there is the person who is suffering. On the other hand, we have the person who is cheerful, who is happy. Notice, right off the bat, that what is our goal?
What does James say our wish, our desire, is to be?
Which person are we to be like?
Well, obviously, the cheerful person. We know because James goes on the say that the elders of a person’s church should be called to pray over them if they are suffering. This goes to show us that suffering is not be desired, then. It’s not our end goal. We don’t desire to suffer. I know, I shouldn’t have to say all that but I think that I do because unfortunately there are certain individuals who teach that suffering is good, and that it’s our goal to suffer.
Note then, the contrast between the higher levels of consciousness versus the lower levels. If we combine the Levels Three and Four Christian’s characteristics, what do we get? Here are the character traits again: faith, easygoingness, acceptance, enjoyment, love, joy, peace, and patience. These are the upper attitudes that I have identified, and I’m sure, you could come up with similar or even additional positive character traits. So this is the picture of what we want to be like. On the flip side, what are the negative character traits? Those are unhappiness, lowness, bitterness, hopelessness, anxiety, self-righteousness, aggravation, and wantingness. Hopefully, as we read over this second list, we don’t find that we closely identify with these characteristics. If so, no worries. We just need to look at where we ought to improve, to move up, and set our focus on those areas. But James’ model here is cheerful versus suffering. I think that’s a tremendous summary of the Levels of Inner-Self.
We see then the importance of prayer when we are at the lower end of the consciousness scale. Yes, indeed. And depending on what our suffering actually is, let’s say it’s hopelessness, then it might be appropriate to call for some of the elders at your church to pray over you. There’s nothing like a group of high ranking Christians praying for their follow person. I’m sure there are different ways to go about this. Email might be the easiest. I don’t think the people all have to be present together. If you take the anointing of the oil as literal, then perhaps you’ll want to do that. But really, the people praying is anointing the person’s head with oil, as David talked about in Psalm 23 with God doing that for us. What a great blessing that is! But again, that’s not to say that afterwards the person shouldn’t been helping themselves to get better, doing anything they can depending on the specific situation. Sometimes not much can be done. But regardless, only depending upon the prayer and not helping ourselves I don’t think is the best course of action. I do believe that God helps those who help themselves. Why, didn’t you help yourself when you called upon the elders to pray? That was a first step that you took.
Anyhow, the prayer that the elders offer up to God will indeed help the person who is sick. In the case of bodily sickness, granted, this may be in this life—that is, the person may recover. Or, that person may end up transcending—for James says, “the Lord will raise him up.” Since all that matters is God anyway, there’s no fear here. For the person who has Given Up Control, or surrendered, then whether they live or whether they die everything is fine. Really, transcendence means we get to be with God, in his presence, which I definitely think is better for us. There’s no more sin there, and we aren’t affected by anything bad anymore. If a person isn’t healed after the prayer from the elders, and rather transcends, this is not to say the person had unrepentant sin in their life. I think that’s presumptuous, and is missing the heart of the passage. Besides, the mere fact that the person is having the elders prayer over them certainly seems to indicate that the person’s heart is in the right place to begin with. If not, why would the person be calling for the elders?
Verse 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.” (ESV)
It appears in this verse that James is moving into a more general, whole church focus here. This is moving past a sick person and the elders praying for him or her, to a more general picture. We know that because he says “pray for one another.” This just isn’t limited to the elders of the church. So, let’s first discuss the confessing of our sins, and I believe we have to be careful here because there are proper times I think to publicly confess one’s sins, and there are other times not to. None of us should be a big, giant dump truck that likes to dump our load of garbage on the stander-bys. To use some Solomon phraseology, there is a time to confess in front of others and a time not to. It’s just like Jesus talked about in the Sermon on the Mount in regard to doing things before others. I think people, now watch this, people can actually take pride in confessing their sins. What I mean is that sometimes people actually get a high from their seemingly humble, in their own estimation, presentation before others. They think they look good because they have the guts to actually confess some sins.
I would say that a good time to confess your sin, whether in front of your Bible study or discipleship group or whatever, a good time to do it is when you feel it will be beneficial to others to see that you struggle as well. People can get the idea that others are awesome super-Christians, and that they’re the only person struggling. But, when one of these so called super-Christians actually speaks up, and says, “You know, I have been struggling with this.” Or the person says, “I made this big mistake,” it can actually help those who are hearing. It can start to clear through the distortions that one has built up in their minds. One of my favorite books of all time is ‘Feeling Good: The New Mood Therapy’ by David D. Burns. If you read chapter 14 of that book, the psychologist talks about perfectionism, and how he himself, though often believed to be perfect, actually was not perfect. And in that chapter he goes through a dialogue where, in front of a larger audience at a lecture, he actually confessed a wrong he had done when he was dealing with one of his patients. His humility only goes to back up everything he says in the book. That’s what humility often does.
Now, it is true that sometimes when we confess our sins in front of others, there will be that one person, maybe two, who has a real problem with it. What I am saying is that the person might hold the wrong over our heads and see us differently than they have in the past, as happened to Dr. Burns. In actuality, though, this kind of person is undoubtedly on a lower level of consciousness in that they haven’t come to grips with the truth that everyone messes up. They do. Everyone does. It’s just that a lot of times most people don’t know about a significant mistake we have made. The lower the level of consciousness of an individual, the more he or she will see the faults of others and tend to magnify them, or hold them in mind when they see people. Actually, this is a good baseline test for us. If we find that when we are in the presence of others that we are actually running a laundry list of their faults in our minds, then we know we have a low-consciousness level problem. As Dr. Burns points out in chapter 3 of that same book (‘Feeling Good’), it is the person who has the philosophy, (paraphrasing) ‘The measure of a person is the mistakes they make.’ That indeed, is a polluted, cognitively distorted, low-level consciousness viewpoint.
Anyhow, we need to move on to the second part of this verse, and let’s read it again, “The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.” Before we even discuss this, we need to define who “a righteous person” actually is. Technically, all Christians are righteous from having Jesus’ righteousness bestowed upon them from believing in his work on the cross. But I don’t think that’s what James is talking about here. If it were, then all Christian’s prayers would have great power as they are working. The implication seems to be that there are certain Christians, namely, ‘righteous’ Christians whose prayers have a greater impact than the normal. They have great power from God behind them. So, in view of this, who is a righteous person? We could say that a righteous person is one whom is on the higher levels of consciousness. Certainly so. They have been more obedient to God and haven’t been wallowing in self-pity and selfishness. In other words, the more negative a person is, the more unrighteous he or she is. I think it’s fair to put it that way.
What I have found in my personal life is that the higher my consciousness level, the better I feel, and the greater I see God’s power flowing in my life. Prayers seem to be answered easily and effortlessly. I think you know the flow. It is when everything in life, from our relationship with God to going through the routine seems to be flowing really well. And, in considering the why behind this, I think we find that because we are more filled with faith (one of the characters of the Level Three Christian), because of that we find that things are flowing better. When I notice that negative events start to get on a roll, and start to snowball into something greater, the first thing I do is check my own consciousness level. Eight out of ten times this is the problem. It is that I have let my own happiness start to drift downwards, slowly and subtly. That’s the problem; it often happens so slowly that we don’t realize it until we have a continuous stream of bad things happening. Then we realize it and can make correction, which sometimes takes a day or two of re-thinking.
Continuing on, on this subject of prayer, James says for us: “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. Then he prayed again, and heaven gave rain, and the earth bore its fruit” (James 5:17-18, ESV).
Let us focus first on how James says, “Elijah was a man with a nature like ours.” I think it’s often the case that with Biblical figures, or even celebrities of our day, that we cast this sort of mystical, magical, superiority of character over their personhood, as if somehow they are some sort of superhuman. But, really, we should know, in serious contemplation, that all humans are just that humans, whether they are famous or highly revered by many. They are of the same makeup as the average folks. For them, themselves, on a personal level, many of them would tell you there is nothing magical about them. The point James is making is that the famous prophet Elijah from the Old Testament was a human being just like any other human being and he prayed, and big stuff happened. We know he was an obedient man to God, we could say that, but he was just like any other person. So, if Elijah’s prayers reached far and wide, so can ours. Just another reason it’s important for us to pray.
Speaking of obedience, now we come to the our final instruction from James. Verse 19: "My brothers and sisters, if anyone among you wanders from the truth and someone brings him back, 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.”
Now we could debate over whether the person James is talking about here is a ‘born again’ ‘new creation’ Christian, or one who just ‘knew about’ the truth, was a part of the church, and then just one day left. From the reading of the rest of the verse, I think personally I tend to favor the second approach here because, otherwise, I guess you would be saying the Christian lost his or her salvation, or could in fact lose it. Nevertheless, the point is that there is a lot of deception in the world. There is a lot of thinking that is contrary to sound doctrine presented in the Scriptures. That’s why we need to keep the Bible at the top, to keep it as the sole filter through which everything else flows. If someone says something, whether that be a believer or anyone, and it aligns with Scripture, we know we are good to go. But if what they say directly contradicts Scripture, we know that’s an alternative avenue that we don’t want to follow. It will hurt us down the road.
In our day of so much knowledge, perhaps never has there been greater opportunity for people to wander from the Truth. Unfortunately, I would have to say that I have already seen it a couple times in my Christian existence. These were people that believed the Bible, shared the Gospel, one of them had their own personal ministry that they created, and yet they left the Truth and began to follow after ways that don’t align with God. This can be heartbreaking to see, and especially when the person shows no remorse, and is completely unrepentant when confronted. I don’t like to have to say this, but I am sure that many of you out there have known people who have left the truth. I’m not talking about switching denominations here, or going to a different church. We’re not talking about self-righteousness here. What we are talking about is a person who leaves the good, sound, universal principles of God, those which he presents in his Word. And this is usually most obviously manifested in a loss of morality.
Sometimes God gives us opportunity to bring the person back, or perhaps lead a believer who is just kind of lukewarm onto a more solid path. In these cases, this a great and gracious thing from God. It shows the wonder and forgivingness of his character, how he is compassionate and merciful, how he wants everyone to be on his side. And when the person makes the choice to come back or be more serious about their salvation, this only works to be an example to others around the person to consider the same thing. This good begets more and more good. And it’s good also for the person, or series of persons, who helped the person to come back. But there is all around goodness. God is pleased, and his character is shown forth in true light and abundance for all.
Well, this concludes our study of the book of James. I think we’ve had a grand time going over it, and trying to squeeze as much as we could out of it. Before we finish, let’s recap what we have learned in the second half here, in chapters 3 through 5, so we can have it as a summary and easily go back and refer to it:
- In chapter 3, we first talked about the decision of a man or woman in becoming a teacher of God’s Word, whether or not a person wants to go ahead and make the leap. We discussed the potential concern from James about others being more critical toward teachers. We also discussed the importance of our speech, whether for the teacher or any Christian, and how that’s tied to our thoughts. The importance of positive speech was talked about, as well as the need to relinquish our self-righteousness. This included any bragging, jealously, and self-ambition we may do or have. We wrapped the chapter up with a brief discourse on wisdom and peace.
- Within chapter 4, we went over possible fights and quarrels among Christians. Then we retouched on the passions and desires, things we want in life. I brought up again how a strong desire can block prayer and what we want out of life. Then we talked about what it means to be a friend of the world and how God really wants us to act. This way we find he is not jealous toward us. We also went over what it means to submit to God and resist the devil. I talked about how to avoid sinful lifestyles. Then we went into a discussion about forgiving one another. Finally, we talked about being careful in presuming upon the future, that we need to approach the future with a humble mindset (this was the beginning of chapter 5).
- Finally, in chapter 5 we discussed what our view should be toward material possessions. I spent quite a lot of time on how we should not be too attached to them. Then I discussed how we should treat others who are performing services for us. We also went over the importance of the coming of the Lord again to the earth. Not grumbling and holding offenses against one another was talked about. Then we spent quite a long time talking about suffering and the example of Job. We talked about the importance of our oaths and keeping true to what we say. The topic of being sick and the elders being called was went over. The confession of sin with one another and the importance of prayer was highlighted. Finally, a Christian bringing back a wayward person was analyzed.
I hope everyone has enjoyed this study. I know I have had a good time in writing this. I want us also to remember the three concepts I discussed, the three filters, that helped guide us along this study, which were The Four Levels of Inner-Self, the practice of Giving Up Control, and finally the Law of Liberty. Of course, these are just one series of ways of looking at this great and grand book, one perspective, and it has been fun trying to understand the things here in God’s Word through them. Remember to carefully consider these things, as they can be beneficial in many of life’s experiences.
Today’s Acknowledgments:
John MacArthur, Joyce Meyer, and Psychologist David D. Burns.
Overall Acknowledgements:
Lots of contemplation and care went into the entire Study of James series, not to mention the time spent compiling the shows in post edit. My listeners are the driving force behind this, alongside the hope of seeing people helped, and perhaps, just perhaps, having that light bulb come on and meeting God for the first time.
Some of the listeners I have personal relationships with on a first hand basis. These include Christian brothers and sisters, and even those who might not identify as that. The face-to-face, verbal feedback is always encouraging and certainly works to add fuel to the fire of motivation.
A lot of the understanding of the concepts presented here in the Study of James is owed to secular Psychologists’ David R. Hawkins and David D. Burns, whom I never met. Their great understanding of human nature has been of particular benefit to me, and helped me to understand to a much greater degree why people do what they do, and why I act the way I act.
There’s no question I wouldn’t be where I am today without some formidable Bible teachers, most of whom I don’t have personal acquaintance with, but who have nonetheless been keenly instrumental in my understanding of the Bible. Special thanks to John MacArthur and Joyce Meyer for this particular endeavor.
Special thanks to Wayne Shepherd, who, over the years, has brought creditability and professional-ness to the sound of this broadcast.
I also want to mention and thank Pastor Becky Hart, who, in my personal church going, has been an inspiration and encouragement to me over the last year and a half or so as I have gotten to know her, as she certainly is to many others. You and Pastor John enjoy your retirement.
And, last of all, I cannot forget to mention to thank all of those who taught me how things shouldn’t be done. If I had only watched the example of those who did things right, then I wouldn’t have ever learned how not to do things. This continues to be a valuable insight each day forward into the future.
And now, off to writing an Amish fictional book. Yes, I know. I have studied the Amish so much that it seems like a good way to make use of what I have learned. Whether this will work, I have no idea. The first five chapters I have written over the last couple weeks seem good. It is definitely an experiment.
- Daniel Litton