Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye
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. Jas 5:16-18
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. Jas 5:16-18
Beginning with the first verse, confessing our faults, is an important point, to have a heart and spirit clear of known sin, or any situation we may have to deal with another, if there's any dispute or misunderstandings. Sin and contention with other's can obstruct our walk with the Lord, and hinder our prayers from being answered. The best practice is to make sure we've examined ourselves honestly first, and spent time with God, and know we have made sure there's nothing between us and Him, before coming to Him in presenting prayer of intercession or any petitions.
If we develop a daily habit of going before the Lord, and asking Him to show us if we've done something that is sin, and are in need of repentance, or going to someone to make amends, this becomes part of abiding in Christ, in a constant pattern. However, it may be necessary to make sure we forgive our adversaries, and leave it to God. It's not always wise to attempt face to face encounters.
John Wesley put it simply, and clear- "Confess your faults - Whether ye are sick or in health. To one another - He does not say, to the elders: this may, or may not, be done; for it is nowhere commanded. We may confess them to any who can pray in faith: he will then know how to pray for us, and be more stirred up so to do. And pray one for another, that ye may be healed - Of all your spiritual diseases."
If we develop a daily habit of going before the Lord, and asking Him to show us if we've done something that is sin, and are in need of repentance, or going to someone to make amends, this becomes part of abiding in Christ, in a constant pattern. However, it may be necessary to make sure we forgive our adversaries, and leave it to God. It's not always wise to attempt face to face encounters.
John Wesley put it simply, and clear- "Confess your faults - Whether ye are sick or in health. To one another - He does not say, to the elders: this may, or may not, be done; for it is nowhere commanded. We may confess them to any who can pray in faith: he will then know how to pray for us, and be more stirred up so to do. And pray one for another, that ye may be healed - Of all your spiritual diseases."
The Force of Prayer
Let it be understood clearly that the prayer of which James here speaks is intercessory prayer—prayer for others. What is intercession? It is simply “a coming in between”; we know the word well in Roman political history as the tribune’s veto. The patricians propose some law that seems likely to injure the people; the tribune intercedes; he stands between the people and the threatened danger; and their rights are saved. Again, a great patrician general has become the object of the envy and ill-will of the populace: he is brought to trial: he is in danger of being banished from the country which he has saved. A Tiberius Gracchus intercedes, and Scipio Africanus is saved. In its widest sense it may be applied to every act in which one human being is able to come in between another and some evil that might befall him. We may extend it even more widely still to the whole principle of mediation, by which one man is used to convey blessings to another.
In what ways, then, can intercession be a great force for blessing? Lock suggests three ways.
It is a great force because it compels us to keep up a true ideal of what those for whom we pray may be. It makes us, in George MacDonald’s striking phrase, “think of them and God together.” If I pray for any one, that implies that I have faith in him, that I believe he may be better than he is. If I pray thoughtfully for any particular blessings for him, then I have considered what are the right blessings to ask for him; I must know what God means him to be; my imagination must picture to itself what his true self is, what it can develop into.
Intercession is again a great force, because it pledges us to do the best we can for those for whom we pray. We cannot, for very shame, ask God to help those whom we ourselves are refusing to help when that help lies within our power; the very fact of intercession reminds us of the truth of the dependence of man upon man; we ask God to bless those for whom we care, and again and again He reminds us that His blessings are given through men, and the answer to our prayer is that we are sent on His errand of mercy. Even more than this, the prayer returns into our own bosom; we cannot pray for any one, or for anybody for whom we care, without being driven back to look at our own lives. Do we pray for our parents? At once we feel that one of the greatest blessings that can happen to them is that we should be true sons to them. “A wise son maketh a glad father: but a foolish son is the heaviness of his mother.”
Intercession is also a great force because it brings into action the power of God; just as the tribune’s veto obtained its force from the fact that it was not spoken by him on his own responsibility. It was strong because armed with the strength of law; it was strong, not with the strength of even a Tiberius Gracchus, but with the power of a sacrosanct authority; so our prayers are strong because they have the promise and the power of Christ behind them. Intercession makes God, God’s purposes, God’s plans, the centre of our thought. This is of the very essence of all prayer; this it is that lifts it above a mere calculated selfishness into an act of faith.
Great as is the admitted mystery of prayer, there can be little doubt that much of its secret lies wrapped in the co-operation of the Divine and human will. In prayer man is “a labourer together with” his God. We have had enough in our day of the shallow evangel of labour, man’s gospel preached to man; we have been told till we are weary of hearing it, that “he who works prays”; but let us lift up our hearts high enough to meet a fuller, deeper, richer truth; let us learn that “he who prays works,” works even with his God, is humble enough, is bold enough to help Him who upholds all things with the word of His power. (Dora Greenwell, Essays, 144)
In what ways, then, can intercession be a great force for blessing? Lock suggests three ways.
It is a great force because it compels us to keep up a true ideal of what those for whom we pray may be. It makes us, in George MacDonald’s striking phrase, “think of them and God together.” If I pray for any one, that implies that I have faith in him, that I believe he may be better than he is. If I pray thoughtfully for any particular blessings for him, then I have considered what are the right blessings to ask for him; I must know what God means him to be; my imagination must picture to itself what his true self is, what it can develop into.
Intercession is again a great force, because it pledges us to do the best we can for those for whom we pray. We cannot, for very shame, ask God to help those whom we ourselves are refusing to help when that help lies within our power; the very fact of intercession reminds us of the truth of the dependence of man upon man; we ask God to bless those for whom we care, and again and again He reminds us that His blessings are given through men, and the answer to our prayer is that we are sent on His errand of mercy. Even more than this, the prayer returns into our own bosom; we cannot pray for any one, or for anybody for whom we care, without being driven back to look at our own lives. Do we pray for our parents? At once we feel that one of the greatest blessings that can happen to them is that we should be true sons to them. “A wise son maketh a glad father: but a foolish son is the heaviness of his mother.”
Intercession is also a great force because it brings into action the power of God; just as the tribune’s veto obtained its force from the fact that it was not spoken by him on his own responsibility. It was strong because armed with the strength of law; it was strong, not with the strength of even a Tiberius Gracchus, but with the power of a sacrosanct authority; so our prayers are strong because they have the promise and the power of Christ behind them. Intercession makes God, God’s purposes, God’s plans, the centre of our thought. This is of the very essence of all prayer; this it is that lifts it above a mere calculated selfishness into an act of faith.
Great as is the admitted mystery of prayer, there can be little doubt that much of its secret lies wrapped in the co-operation of the Divine and human will. In prayer man is “a labourer together with” his God. We have had enough in our day of the shallow evangel of labour, man’s gospel preached to man; we have been told till we are weary of hearing it, that “he who works prays”; but let us lift up our hearts high enough to meet a fuller, deeper, richer truth; let us learn that “he who prays works,” works even with his God, is humble enough, is bold enough to help Him who upholds all things with the word of His power. (Dora Greenwell, Essays, 144)
Persistant Effectual Prayer
This effectual prayer of Elijah’s was a prayer of faith. He had for argument in prayer the unequivocal Divine promise, “I will send rain upon the earth.” Upon this promise his faith laid hold, and this weapon of promise he wielded valiantly in his audience with Deity. You can almost hear him pressing the promise as you read of him lying prone there on Mount Carmel. This is the prayer of faith, and so the effectual prayer—a prayer which takes God at His word, and then reverently but really holds Him to it. We do not need to stretch and strain in a spasmodic attempt at more faith. The ground for faith is the Divine word. That is something upon which we can lay hold. And the prayer of faith is simply this—that when we pray we fully believe that God will be true to all that He has promised. “If ye abide in Me, and My words abide in you”. This effectual prayer of Elijah’s was a prayer out of a consecrated heart. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much. James brings forth Elijah as a specimen of such a righteous man. One thing Elijah was intent on; to one thing all his powers were consecrated—the Divine service. He was a man given up to God, and so, in the highest sense, righteous. The test of his consecrated righteousness is his obedience. Mark Elijah’s exact obedience to the Divine commands in the whole Old Testament story. This effectual prayer of Elijah’s was specific prayer. It was for a definite thing. We pray too much generally, not enough specifically. This effectual prayer of Elijah’s was untiring prayer. Though the cloud did not immediately appear, he kept on praying. This effectual prayer of Elijah’s was expectant prayer. Notice in the story how many times he sent his servant. He was on the look-out for answer.— (Anon)
Elijah’s waiting on his Prayer.—James suggests an historical illustration of the power that lies in fervent and believing prayer. The Jews had a great admiration for the prophet Elijah, and were never tired of hearing of his doings. They lived in constant expectation of his reappearing as the precursor of Messiah. James finds in his story impressive illustration of the power of prayer; but we have no record of Elijah’s acts of prayer when he would have the rains kept away. His prayer for the rains to return is a part of the grandest day in his career. The witnessing fire of God had descended upon Elijah’s sacrifice; and at the sight a sudden shout had risen from the vast watching crowd, “Jehovah, He is the God! Jehovah, He is the God!” So intense was the excitement, and so absolute, for the moment, was the authority of the Jehovah-prophet, that only a word was needed to make that crowd seize the four hundred false prophets of discomfited Baal, hurry them down to the stream of the Kishon, and slay them there, that their bodies might be swept out to sea on the coming floods. But the day’s work was not then complete. The return of the rain showers upon the thirsty earth was virtually pledged in this return of the nation to Jehovah; and he who had prayed for the fire, and knew that he was praying according to the will of God, and had been graciously answered, must pray again for the rain, pray with the assurance that sending the rain was the will of God, and he must wait upon his prayer with the confident expectancy of hope. But the sight is a strange and a striking one. Elijah now goes away from the crowd and from the king, finds a sheltered spot under the crest of the hill, and there he might have been seen, crouching on the ground, his head bent upon his knees, and his cloak thrown over his head, as if to hide everything away that might disturb his intense supplications, absorbed in prayer until the youth sent to look out from the highest point could tell of a little cloud rising on the western edge of the sea. Then Elijah knew that the “effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.”
Prayer availing in its Working.—“The supplication of a righteous man availeth much in its working.” These familiar words are somewhat puzzling when careful thought is directed to them. To speak of effectual prayer that avails is an evident repetition, and unnecessary. If it is effectual, it does avail. And the combination “effectual fervent” is unusual. It seems to be two words, and to describe prayer as both effectual and fervent; but there is only one word in the original, and it neither means “effectual” nor “fervent,” nor both terms as combined. The word means “working,” and St. James speaks of the “working prayer of a righteous man” as “availing much.” The Revised Version gives a precise rendering of his meaning thus—“The supplication of a righteous man availeth much in its working.” Then the appropriateness of the illustration from Elijah comes at once into view. Elijah’s prayer did something in its working. It held the rain off; it brought the rain back again. It will be seen that this working power of prayer is precisely what St. James is speaking about in these closing words of his epistle. “Is any afflicted? let him pray,” for prayer can work him both strength to bear, and wisdom to guide him through, his difficulties. “The prayer of faith” can work a blessing for the sick. It “shall save the sick.” Whatever may be the faults and failings spoiling Christian fellowship, “pray for one another,” for prayer can work wondrous healings of broken relations; the supplications even of one good man in a Church can avail much in its working. We may well be thankful to the Revisers for giving us so important and so suggestive a change. It brings before us quite a fresh view of prayer. We had hardly thought of it as, in its very nature, a thing that works. We know that it brings down to us Divine blessings. We know that it has a gracious influence upon the man who prays. But prayer as really an active force, as having in it an actual power of working—prayer as a kind of holy leaven, moving, influencing, wherever it goes—has hardly come into our thought. If it did, and could be worthily apprehended, it would give us a new joy in prayer, and the consciousness of possessing a tool, an instrument, a force, which we might more worthily use for God and for men. We might more constantly set prayer upon doing its work, its own precise, appropriate, and gracious work. (Preacher's Homelitical)
Elijah’s waiting on his Prayer.—James suggests an historical illustration of the power that lies in fervent and believing prayer. The Jews had a great admiration for the prophet Elijah, and were never tired of hearing of his doings. They lived in constant expectation of his reappearing as the precursor of Messiah. James finds in his story impressive illustration of the power of prayer; but we have no record of Elijah’s acts of prayer when he would have the rains kept away. His prayer for the rains to return is a part of the grandest day in his career. The witnessing fire of God had descended upon Elijah’s sacrifice; and at the sight a sudden shout had risen from the vast watching crowd, “Jehovah, He is the God! Jehovah, He is the God!” So intense was the excitement, and so absolute, for the moment, was the authority of the Jehovah-prophet, that only a word was needed to make that crowd seize the four hundred false prophets of discomfited Baal, hurry them down to the stream of the Kishon, and slay them there, that their bodies might be swept out to sea on the coming floods. But the day’s work was not then complete. The return of the rain showers upon the thirsty earth was virtually pledged in this return of the nation to Jehovah; and he who had prayed for the fire, and knew that he was praying according to the will of God, and had been graciously answered, must pray again for the rain, pray with the assurance that sending the rain was the will of God, and he must wait upon his prayer with the confident expectancy of hope. But the sight is a strange and a striking one. Elijah now goes away from the crowd and from the king, finds a sheltered spot under the crest of the hill, and there he might have been seen, crouching on the ground, his head bent upon his knees, and his cloak thrown over his head, as if to hide everything away that might disturb his intense supplications, absorbed in prayer until the youth sent to look out from the highest point could tell of a little cloud rising on the western edge of the sea. Then Elijah knew that the “effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.”
Prayer availing in its Working.—“The supplication of a righteous man availeth much in its working.” These familiar words are somewhat puzzling when careful thought is directed to them. To speak of effectual prayer that avails is an evident repetition, and unnecessary. If it is effectual, it does avail. And the combination “effectual fervent” is unusual. It seems to be two words, and to describe prayer as both effectual and fervent; but there is only one word in the original, and it neither means “effectual” nor “fervent,” nor both terms as combined. The word means “working,” and St. James speaks of the “working prayer of a righteous man” as “availing much.” The Revised Version gives a precise rendering of his meaning thus—“The supplication of a righteous man availeth much in its working.” Then the appropriateness of the illustration from Elijah comes at once into view. Elijah’s prayer did something in its working. It held the rain off; it brought the rain back again. It will be seen that this working power of prayer is precisely what St. James is speaking about in these closing words of his epistle. “Is any afflicted? let him pray,” for prayer can work him both strength to bear, and wisdom to guide him through, his difficulties. “The prayer of faith” can work a blessing for the sick. It “shall save the sick.” Whatever may be the faults and failings spoiling Christian fellowship, “pray for one another,” for prayer can work wondrous healings of broken relations; the supplications even of one good man in a Church can avail much in its working. We may well be thankful to the Revisers for giving us so important and so suggestive a change. It brings before us quite a fresh view of prayer. We had hardly thought of it as, in its very nature, a thing that works. We know that it brings down to us Divine blessings. We know that it has a gracious influence upon the man who prays. But prayer as really an active force, as having in it an actual power of working—prayer as a kind of holy leaven, moving, influencing, wherever it goes—has hardly come into our thought. If it did, and could be worthily apprehended, it would give us a new joy in prayer, and the consciousness of possessing a tool, an instrument, a force, which we might more worthily use for God and for men. We might more constantly set prayer upon doing its work, its own precise, appropriate, and gracious work. (Preacher's Homelitical)
