I will lift up mine eyes unto
the hills. Winds coming, my help, my help
coming. ? Born which made heaven and earth
? He will not suffer thy foe to be moved ? He that keepeth
thee will not slumber Behold, he that keepeth Israel
shall neither slumber nor sleep. The Lord is thy keeper. The Lord is thy shade upon thy
right hand. The sun shall not smite thee
by noon. nor the moon by night. The Lord shall preserve thee
from all evil. He shall preserve thy soul. The Lord shall preserve thy going
out and thy coming in from this time forth and even forevermore. Let's turn in our Bibles once
again to the letter of James, if you will, today, James chapter
5. Beginning in verse 13, James
chapter 5 in verse 13. Is any among you afflicted? Let
him pray. Is any married? Let him sing
psalms. Is any sick among you? Let him
call for the elders of the church. Let them pray over him, anointing
him with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer of faith
shall save the sick. The Lord shall raise him up.
And if he have committed sins, they shall be forgiven him. Confess
your faults one to another and pray for one another that you
may be healed. The effectual fervent prayer
of a righteous man availeth much. Elias was a man subject to like
passions as we are, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain,
and it rained not on the earth by the space of three years and
six months. And he prayed again. and the
heaven gave rain and the earth brought forth her fruit. Brethren,
if any of you do err from the truth and one convert him, let
him know that he which converted the sinner from the error of
his way shall save a soul from death and shall hide a multitude
of sins. This will be my last message
at this time from the letter of James. And I want to remind
us, first of all, how many times in this letter the apostle writes
and says, my brethren are brethren. Seven times in these five chapters
he said, my brethren, and five times simply brethren. In other words, this letter is
written to those who profess to be part of what the Apostle
Paul calls the household of faith. The household of faith, that
is the family of God and those who are part of the family of
God by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. You know that passage
in the first chapter of the Gospel of John says, but as many as
received him, as many as received him. How do you receive Christ? Well, we read on, to them gave
he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe
on his name. How do we receive Christ? We
believe on him, believe on his name, which were born, not of
blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man,
but of God. The apostle John wrote, whosoever
believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God. Born of God,
born of the Spirit of God. Now with this in mind, I want
us to look at these few verses, first of all, that are written
to the family of God and see what all And this, of course,
is not a complete list, but it's interesting what all God's children
may experience in this world. What we may experience in this
world. Notice, first of all, affliction.
Is any afflicted? He's writing to God's children.
He's writing to the family of God. Is any afflicted? Is any sick? Is any sick? Is any cheerful? Or any guilty of sin? Forgiveness,
prayer, and erring from the truth. In other words, we see that a
person who is born of the Spirit of God may experience these things
as we go through this world. Just like the children of Israel,
when they went from Egypt, delivered out of Egypt by power and by
blood, they had to go through the wilderness to reach the land
of Canaan, the land that flowed with milk and honey. We're in
a wilderness land as we live in this world. In John Bunyan's
Pilgrim's Progress, you remember sometime the pilgrim is climbing
the hill difficulty, and then sometimes he's in the enchanted
land. What I'm saying is there's ups
and downs. There's mountaintop experiences,
as we call them, for the believer, for the child of God, and yes,
there are valleys. There's ups and downs. These
various things that James, writing to believers, mentions that a
person might experience. Might experience affliction,
cheerfulness, sickness, be guilty of sin, pray, and might even
err from the truth. This world is not a believer's
home. And I'm thankful, aren't you?
This world is not our home. It's not the believer's home. We're just pilgrims. Our citizenship
is in heaven. We're just pilgrims through this
land. In Hebrews chapter 13, the apostle
wrote to believers, for here have we no continuing city. no continuing city, but we seek
one to come. Abraham left Ur of the Chaldees
as God commanded him, and what was he seeking? A city which
hath foundations, that is, eternal, eternity with the Lord. For here have we no continuing
city, and we see this all the time. We're reminded, man is
reminded that everything that we see in this world is temporal.
It's just temporal. How many times does God send
a flood or a hurricane or a tornado or a war or whatever to tell
people, to remind people that judgment is coming, that these
things may be considered judgments But there's a final judgment
that's going to come. And all of these are just warnings
from God. Prepare to meet thy God. Now, I'm going to divide these
verses today into two parts. First of all, the blessing of
prayer. In the first part, verses 13
through 18. the blessing of prayer. In these
six verses, if you counted them, you would see prayer is mentioned
seven times. Seven times in these six verses
does James refer to prayer. And I want us to consider these
four things about prayer. First, consider how great a blessing
God has given us in the privilege to pray. We take it for granted, don't
we? Most of us, we've grown up knowing that we should pray,
and we just take it for granted. But what a great privilege it
is to pray. In prayer, we may talk to God. We may talk to God, who is our
Father, and we only talk to Him. You know, one of the many lies
that Satan has taught in the last 2,000 years, at least, is
that prayer may be made to others. And many people around the world
today are praying to others. Some pray to the Virgin Mary.
Some pray to departed saints. That has to be blasphemy. There's
no way around it. That has to be blasphemy because
to pray to anyone other than God is to attribute to that one
to whom you pray an attribute of deity, omniscience. Think of it. If there are ten
people today right now who are praying to one of these departed
saints or to the Virgin Mary, you can't hold a conversation,
my friends, with three people at the same time. Neither can
any man. And to think that they can hear
the prayers of people all over this world, around this world
at the same time is to attribute omniscience. which is only true
of God. He's the only one who can hear
the prayers of thousands, even millions of people at the same
time and respond to each and every one who prays to him. Prayer
is a privilege and it is to be offered only to God. The Lord
and the Bible is our rule. The Bible is our rule. It's not
tradition. You say, well, we've got a long
tradition of praying to dead saints. Your tradition isn't
worth anything. What counts is what do the scriptures
say? What do the scriptures say? What
did our Lord say? And this is what our Lord said
in Matthew chapter six to his disciples. He said, but thou,
when thou prayest, Enter into thy closet, and when thou hast
shut the door, now listen, pray to thy father. Pray to thy father. He didn't say to pray to any
other person. Pray to thy father, which is
in secret. We can't see him, but he sees
us. He hears us. You know, one of
the first names that we find in the book of Genesis that was
given to God was by that woman named Hagar, the Egyptian slave
of Abraham and Sarah. And she was fleeing from Sarah,
her mistress, and God spoke to her. And she named that place,
thou God that seest me. Now enter into your closet, shut
the door, pray to thy father in secret, and thy father which
seeth in secret shall reward thee openly. He always sees and
he always hears. I can't emphasize sufficiently. And I'm speaking to myself. I
cannot emphasize sufficiently. the privilege that you and I
as God's children have to talk to God and to know that He hears us.
We're not just talking into the air. We're speaking to God. We're
speaking to Him who rules and reigns over all things. Everything
is under His control, and yet we have the privilege to speak
with Him. You take any great man in this
world, when I say great, I mean consider to be great. We're all
centers before God. But some men are in positions
God has placed them in positions of great authority. It's not
easy to get an audience with those people, many of them. There
are certain protocols you must go through. And you may or you
may not be allowed into their presence. But you and I, as God's
children, we have the privilege to speak to him who has all authority,
who rules and reigns over all things. Listen to this verse
in Ephesians 2. Ephesians 2 and verse 18, such
a beautiful text of scripture, in which we see the Trinity,
God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. And
it speaks to us about prayer. Let me read it to us. For through
him, this is through Christ, through him, we both, both Jews
and Gentiles, those who are saved, who were naturally the seed of
Abraham and those of us who were Gentiles, for through him, we
both have access by one spirit unto the Father. What a blessing,
right? What a blessing, through Christ.
There's no other way to approach God, but through Christ we have
an audience. We may have an audience with
the Father. We may pray and make our requests
known unto Him at any time of the day, in any place, in any
situation. What a great privilege is prayer. It's through Him. We both have
access by one Spirit, God the Holy Spirit. He lives in us making
intercession and God the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, He's at
the Father's right hand making intercession for us. The second thing to consider
about prayer, consider how God sometimes uses affliction to
move us to pray. Sometimes. You say, why would
God allow that? Well, maybe he allowed it to
cause you to pray. You know, there's a Psalm, Psalm
107. We're all pretty much familiar
with it, I'm sure. But James here in our text says,
is any among you afflicted? What do you do? Pray. Is any
among you afflicted? What do you do? Go to your friend. Go to someone that has a lot
of wealth or something like that. What do you do? Pray. Pray. That psalm I mentioned,
Psalm 107, it brings out to us how that all of us, I started
to say most of us, but I want to change that, all of us need
affliction many times to cause us to pray. Let me read you a few verses,
three verses there from Psalm 107. Hungry and thirsty, their
soul fainted in them then, not before, not before. But when their soul fainted in
them, when they were hungry and thirsty, then they cried unto
the Lord in their trouble. And then further down in that
psalm we read they fell. They fell down and there was
none to help. They looked on the right hand,
there was no one here to help. They looked on the left hand,
there was none to help. No help! Then, and not till then, did
they cry unto the Lord. They cried unto the Lord in their
trouble. And then again in that same psalm,
they draw near unto the gates of death. Then, then, they cry
unto the Lord in their trouble. Is any afflicted among you? Let
him pray. All right, number three, consider
how sickness calls us to prayer. Notice that in verses 14 through
16. Is any sick among you? Let him
call for the doctor. Sure, but don't forget that all
healing comes ultimately from God. You know, there's so much to
learn in these three verses here about sickness and praying for
recovery. What about the gift of healing?
We look at this passage of scripture We might ask, what about the
gift of healing? We note in 1 Corinthians chapter
12, the apostle Paul wrote about several gifts that were in the
early church associated, let me say this, associated with
the apostles. One of those gifts was the gift
of healing. Well, James doesn't mention that
here, does he? He says, as any sick among you,
let him call for the elders of the church. What about the gift
of healing? You know, the Apostle Paul, he
had the gifts of an apostle, and one of those gifts was the
gift of healing. We have several instances when
the Apostle Paul was used of God in the healing of someone,
of some sickness. In Acts chapter 28, here's one
example. We read, it came to pass that
the father of Publis lay sick of a fever and of a bloody flukes,
to whom Paul entered in and prayed and laid hands on him and healed
him. Paul had the gift of healing,
just as he had the gift of speaking in foreign, in other languages. I started to say foreign languages.
other languages. There was gift, miracles. You
read about it in 1 Corinthians chapter 12. We know these gifts
were temporary. Why? Because the apostles were
temporary. The apostles died and with them
these gifts passed away. Why? Because that which is perfect
had come. And you say, what was that? The
word of God. The complete written Word of
God. It's complete. And God pronounces
a curse upon those who would add to His Word and those who
would subtract from His Word. Yes, Paul had the gift of healing,
and that instance I just read there, he healed that man's father.
But then we read in 2 Timothy chapter 4 and verse 20, These
are the words of Paul. He was writing, trophimus, trophimus,
have I left at Miletum sick? Well, Paul, why didn't you heal
him? You had the gift of healing. Why was he not healed? All healing
ultimately has to do with the will of God. You know, you hear
these People today, they talk as though everyone had the gift
of healing, and that God heals everyone that people pray for,
lay their hands on. No, no, that's not true. It never
has been true. If it were true, and I asked
one of those men one time when I used to go out to that television
studio to make the television tapes, I said, when does it end? This healing, this miracle of
healing that you claim that you have, when does it end? Does it end when a man reaches
50 or 60 or 70 or 80 or 90 or 100? You're telling me that it's
always God's will to heal. When does God's will change? Do you reach a certain age? That
doesn't work anymore? No. God heals whom and when and
as He will. He's sovereign in that, just
like He's sovereign in salvation. Sometimes He heals without means. And sometimes He uses means. But ultimately, it all comes
from Him. And that's the second thing we
see here in this text. What about the anointing with
oil? Now, oil at this time, we know
it was medicinal. Remember in our Lord's parable
of the good Samaritan that found that man and saw that man over
in the ditch? The priest had passed him by,
the Levite had passed him by, and the Samaritan who the Jews
called dogs, didn't want to have anything to do with them. But
this Samaritan saw the man over in the ditch and he came to where
he was. I always like that, don't you?
He came to where he was. Where was he? He was in the ditch. The Lord God Almighty, the Son
of God, came to where we were. We were in this world. lost,
without hope, could not help ourselves. And he came to where
we were. He came into this world as a
man. And he comes to his people through
the preaching of the gospel, doesn't he? And saves us. But
anyway, in that parable, what did the man do? To help the man
who was bruised, he poured in oil and wine. Both of those were used as medicines
in that time. And here the same may be true.
To anoint with oil is to use the means, the means that God
has given us. It might be to take someone to
the doctor. It might be to pay for someone
to go to the doctor. Anoint him with oil. Pray for
him, yes. And use the means that God has
given you. What about the subjects of sins
and faults? It says here, confess your faults one to another
and pray one for another that you may be healed. Look with
me in 1 Corinthians chapter 11. We have an example here of some
who were sick because of their faults. First Corinthians chapter
11 in verse 30. Paul said, for this cause, he's
writing to the church, those in the church at Corinth, for
this cause many are weak and sickly among you and many sleep. Now what was the cause? They're
false. They had taken or partaken of
the Lord's supper unworthily. Now, I've never known any believer
who didn't read that and think, well, I'm not worthy. But that's
not what he said. He said unworthily. That's an
adverb. It's not an adjective. We're
all unworthy. We're all unworthy. that Christ
would die for us. No, what he's talking about here
is they didn't discern the Lord's body. In other words, they would
have a dinner on the grounds, if you please, and call that
the Lord's supper. They would eat together and some
would have an abundance and some would be drunken because they
would drink too much and they were doing the taking the Lord's
table unworthily in a manner that was not the manner in which
God had laid down for us to observe the Lord's table, to discern
the Lord's body, that this bread is bread, but it's not a common
meal. It's a special meal when we take
the Lord's table. Confess your faults, James says,
one to another. And the prayer of faith shall save the sick. And that's the third thing, but
number four, consider how many examples we are given in the
word of God about prayer. Examples about effectual prayer. And these examples
are given unto us to encourage us to pray. He mentions only one, and that
is Elias or Elijah. Elijah prayed, James tells us,
he prayed that it would not rain for three, would not rain and
it did not rain for three and a half years. Now, something
about faith you must recognize. We don't have Elijah's prayer. It's not recorded for us. And
even when Elijah prayed that it might rain, we say he's in
the position of prayer. Yes, but we are not told what
he prayed. The one time that I can think
of on this subject of praying for rain or not praying for rain,
that the prayer of Elijah is recorded, is when he confronted
those false prophets on Mount Carmel. And remember this, in
his prayer he said, that I have done this according to thy word. All that he had done when he
confronted Ahab and said, it's not going to rain until I speak,
until I give the word. He had done all of that according
to what God had told him. And I say that to say this, faith,
the prayer of faith, faith must be based upon the word of God. Faith must have a foundation.
And the foundation is the written word of God. When you read something
here, God gives you a promise. You can take that to God and
claim that promise. Before we move to the second
part of the message, I want us to consider how these verses,
these few verses here, explode two lies of Satan. The Roman
church claims that they have seven sacraments, and two of
those sacraments, confession and extreme unction. Notice how
these words just explode those two teachings. A person must confess to, now
this is official doctrine, a person must confess to and be forgiven
by a priest his mortal sins at least once in a year. In other
words, to be saved at least one time in a year, you've got to
go to a priest and go into that little box and priest on one
side and you're on the other side, get down on your knees.
You must do that at least one time in the year They prefer
you do it more often, but at least one time if you're going
to be saved and confess your sins to the priest and the priest
forgives you. Teaching something that isn't
taught in the scriptures. But as I looked at this, I thought,
well, how they use this passage of Scripture confessing your
faults one to another to support that teaching. But let me ask
you this, does the priest ever confess his faults? Does he? No. He's there to hear you confess
your faults. But this verse tells us confessing
your faults one to another, and then that teaching of extreme
unction. They've come up with, you know,
when a person, according to them, is close to death because of
sickness, they anoint him with prayer. The priest comes to the
hospital or he comes to the house. I remember visiting a man one
time in the hospital and after I left, he told someone, he said,
I thought that man had come to to administer extreme unction.
He thought I was a priest. No. I did pray with him, pray
for him, read the scripture with him. But in extreme unction,
the priest comes in, and with some holy oil, gotta be holy
oil, how does he get holy? Oh, he's gotta make it holy,
that's for sure. And he anoints his eyes, and
he anoints his ears, he anoints his nose, he anoints his hands,
and he anoints his feet, and now he prays he's ready to go. Ready to go, ready to meet God.
This passage of scripture here speaks of anointing with awe.
It's not talking about dying, it's talking about being healed. They can't use this to teach
extreme unction, that tradition and that so-called sacrament. Now the second part of the message,
and very briefly, the restoration of an erring brother here in
verses 19 and 20. Brethren, if any of you do err
from the truth and want to convert him, let him know that he which
converteth the sinner from the error of his ways shall save
a soul from death shall hide a multitude of sins. You notice
again, he uses that term brethren, brethren. Just like John in his
first letter, if any man sin, if any man sin, we have an advocate
with the Father. The teaching of sinless perfection. There's so many scriptures that
shows that That's another lie that Satan has taught. Somehow
that a believer, a child of God, can get to a point in this world,
in this life, that he lives or she lives above sin. It's so, so discomforting to any true
child of God to hear something like that. Why? Not most, all of God's children. We recognize our imperfections,
don't we? We see our sin. We've become
more aware of our sins as we grow in grace and knowledge of
the Lord. And then someone says, well,
that doesn't bother me anymore. I've got above that. I'm above
that now. No, that's deception, isn't it? If any man sin, we have an advocate
with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, who is the propitiation
for our sins, and not for our sins only, but for the whole
world. There's only one effectual propitiation
for sin, and that is the blood of Jesus Christ. The conversion spoken of in this
text, if any of you do err from the truth and one convert him,
that's not a person's initial conversion experience. The night
before the Lord was crucified, after Peter had confessed and
followed him for several years, our Lord told Peter, I have prayed
for thee that thy faith fail not. And when thou art converted,
strengthen thy brethren. Peter's repentance and renewed
faith in Christ was there called his conversion. And that's what
James is speaking of here. Our God is a God of new beginnings. He really is. The airing from
the truth here. If any of you do air from the
truth, it might be in doctrine. It might be in practice. Any of us are subject to error. But thank God, God has provided
forgiveness, restoration. We know we should interpret scripture
with scripture. And when I look at this passage,
I think of that in Galatians where Paul said, brethren, if
a man be overtaken in a fault, You which are spiritual, restore
such an one in the spirit of meekness, considering thyself,
lest thou be tempted. Bear one another's burdens, and
so fulfill the law of Christ. The only way of hiding or covering
a multitude of sins is with the blood of Christ. Actually, the
word atonement, that's what the word means, covering, covering. The blood of the Lord Jesus Christ
covers our sins, makes atonement for the sins of his people. You
which are spiritual, restore such a one. In other words, speak
to him. Love him. Don't turn your back
on him. Don't just write him off and
say, well, I never thought he had anything to begin with. No. For brother, is overtaken in
a fault or errs from the truth, then deal with him. And God gives
us in the letter of Matthew, doesn't he, how the process is
to be done. Go to him in private, first of
all, and speak to him. And then if he doesn't hear you,
then let some from the church, several, go and speak to the
person. And then eventually, if he will
not hear anyone, then a person is subject to church discipline. We know that. But anyway, when
I began several weeks ago preaching from James, I said, there's so
much practical truth here. This is a reason that I wanted
to go through it once again on Sunday morning, because I feel
like there's just practical teaching that all of us need and all of
us need to be reminded of from time to time. I pray that the
Lord will bless His word to all of us here this morning.