The Ministry of Prayer

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I invite you to take out your Bibles and turn to James chapter 5.
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We have, for the past few weeks, talked about the subject of prayer.
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And in that time, we have made reference to James 5, but I have yet to give an exposition of it.
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Because as I said in those lessons, when you talk about the subject of prayer, people bring a great deal of baggage into the conversation, often incorrect baggage, misunderstandings about prayer.
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And so, I felt it was incumbent upon me as a teacher, pastor, to come in and say, okay, this is what we need to understand about prayer.
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Before we even go into the text, we need to understand these principles.
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Prayer is an act of worship.
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Prayer is the means by which we grow spiritually.
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And prayer is an avenue for petition.
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Those are the three things that we focused on the last couple of lessons.
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Well, tonight, we're going to actually look at chapter 5 of James verses 13 to 18.
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And we're going to do so with the understanding that this particular passage has been a passage where there have been a lot of debate and battles over its interpretation.
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So, let's read the passage together, and then we'll begin to talk about what those battles and debates are.
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It says in verse 13, Is anyone among you suffering? Let him pray.
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Is anyone cheerful? Let him sing praise.
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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.
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And the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up.
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And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven.
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Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another that you may be healed.
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The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it's working.
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Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed fervently that it might not rain.
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And for three years and six months, it did not rain on the earth.
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Then he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain, and the earth bore its fruit.
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May God add his blessing to the reading and the hearing, and prayerfully the understanding of his word.
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There's an area right there if you'd like to come right there on the end.
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I don't have a handout this evening.
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I apologize, I did not, I didn't prepare one, only because we're still in the same passage that we did on the first handout.
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Normally, I would have.
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I should have printed more knowing that it's been so many weeks since I gave it to you the first time.
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Would you like some paper though? Would that help you? Yeah, well, I was gonna say, Carol or Don, would one of you guys go get just a few sheets of paper out of the copier? We can hand them out if anyone, that would be helpful.
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I don't mind.
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I mean, if you want to take notes, I want you to take notes.
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That's a good thing.
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Thank you, dear, for doing that.
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I appreciate it.
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But as I said earlier, there are certain passages in Scripture that are in themselves battlegrounds for controversy.
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Scholars have debated them, often created serious tremors in the church, and sometimes those tremors have become full-blown divisions within the body.
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Such is the case with our passage today.
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It is one that has created great division, as it's been used by various groups as a proof text for their particular doctrines.
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It's been used incorrectly by two very specific groups.
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The first one is the Roman Catholic Church, and the other is what we call the Word-Faith Movement.
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Now, normally you don't put these two together.
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Normally the Roman Catholic Church and the Word-Faith Movement, you wouldn't necessarily put together.
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And I'm not putting them together.
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I'm saying these are two groups that have used this particular passage to teach something that I would say is incorrect.
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With the Roman Catholic Church, it is part of the sacraments.
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If you remember in my teaching on Roman Catholicism, the Roman Catholic Church has seven sacraments that are means by which God imparts grace to an individual.
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One is the Eucharist.
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One is baptism.
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Marriage is one of the sacraments, and so on.
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Well, one of the sacraments is called extreme unction.
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Extreme unction.
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How many of you have heard the word unction before? Have you ever used the word unction? Well, unction is an older term for anointing.
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So you'll hear in some churches, they'll talk about the pastor really had unction when he was preaching under the anointing of God.
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It's just an older term for that particular word.
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And the focus of the Roman Catholic teaching is that this anointing differs from others, which might include the anointing of someone to service, anointing someone to priesthood, etc.
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That this is used in extreme circumstances, as in the time of a person who was very ill.
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And it's often called the extreme unction or the unction of the sick.
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It's extreme unction, meaning extreme circumstances, or it's called sometimes the unction of the sick because it's referencing specifically those people who are sick.
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The problem with this is not the desire to place oil upon the sick, which we're going to talk about later, or to see someone be healed, which of course, no one has a problem with that.
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But as often is the case with Roman fellowship, it's the meaning behind the sacrament that makes it not biblical.
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Within the Roman Catholic system, the sacrament of placing oil upon a person is given the power to communicate the grace of God.
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Thus, rather than being symbolic, much like in the Eucharist where the cup literally becomes the blood, the bread literally becomes the body, well, in this situation, the oil becomes the means by which God's grace is imparted.
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And thus, it becomes a physical means of grace.
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And rather than being symbolic of the work of the Spirit, or rather than being symbolic of grace, it is in fact grace itself.
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And as we're going to see as we go through the text, such a lofty understanding of the use of the oil is certainly not within the realm of anything James is saying, but it is how it has been understood in the Roman Catholic Church.
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This is one way extreme unction or the unction of the sick or the anointing of the sick is one of the sacraments of the Roman Catholic Church.
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The word faith movement, however, is another group that misuses this passage in James because they have long used James chapter 5 to allow them to teach the unconditional and certain healing for all people who possess any form of illness simply because they have faith.
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How many of you have heard this? Well, if you just have faith, you'll be healed.
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And if you don't get healed, guess what the cause was? You didn't have enough faith.
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And if you don't think that that is what it's taught, just go home and turn on your little television and watch for a little while.
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There's a big name coming to Jacksonville this weekend.
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And if I wasn't teaching at the Hurry Conference, I would be with Mike outside preaching against it.
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Big name coming to Jacksonville.
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Who all knows who it is? Benny Hinn.
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He's going to be in Jacksonville this weekend.
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He is one of the most dangerous heretics, one of the most dangerous false teachers in the world.
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And he's going to be in our little slice of heaven preaching his false message.
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If one simply reads one single verse without applying a context, as is often the case in the word faith movement, then the argument for absolute healing based upon faith can be derived from this passage in James, but only if it's misunderstood and read out of context.
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What we must understand is that by misunderstanding, by this misunderstanding, the word faith community has brought about a dangerous and improper interpretation.
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Because it goes against the Bible's clear teaching on the subject of divine healing.
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And so as we enter into the subject tonight, I just want to ask a question.
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What does the Bible teach about divine healing? Well, I want to give you a few things to consider.
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Number one, God can and does heal.
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There's no doubt.
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God can heal.
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God does heal.
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He is called Yahweh Refekah, which means the Lord who heals.
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All healing is divine in nature.
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We know that God heals.
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The second thing, though, is that the Bible describes different methods for healing.
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The Bible describes different methods for healing.
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The body will generally heal itself if it's sick or injured.
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This is a result of God's creative genius.
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If you get a cut on your arm, it'll pretty much work itself out unless it gets infected, right? So what do we do? We keep it clean, keep it free of infection, and pretty much it will heal itself over time.
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No other machine in the world functions that way.
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But our bodies do.
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The bodies of God's creation does.
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We can't make a machine that heals itself.
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God did.
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God made us.
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We have a natural healing ability.
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The Bible also describes the use of medicine.
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People don't often think about this, but Timothy is told in 1 Timothy 5.23 that he ought to take a little wine for his stomach and for his frequent infirmities.
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This doesn't mean go get drunk so you don't hurt your stomach, but the use of wine was a way to alleviate some of the pain that he was dealing with, which what we assume was ulcers, probably from ministry.
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Yes, we understand.
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But dealing with the problems that he had, his infirmity in his stomach, his weak stomach, Paul said take a little wine for that because it has a medicinal value.
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Arguments are often made that James, when he tells to use oil in this passage, is referring to medicine.
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I'm going to talk about that later.
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I don't think that's necessarily the case.
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I don't think it's blasphemy to interpret that way.
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I don't think that's what he means.
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But some people do think that the oil that James talks about is medicinal.
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Could be, but that's not the argument I'm going to make.
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But Jesus did allude to something one time that I think is important.
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He said the well do not need a physician.
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Who do? Who needs a physician? Sick people.
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So what was Jesus inferring in that statement? There's a place for doctors.
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What was Luke's profession? He was a physician.
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He was a doctor.
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God has made this world amazingly complex to the point that there are medicines that grow out of the ground.
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That there are ways to combine two or three different things that grow out of the ground into a synthetic medication.
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It's amazing the way God has created this world.
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And I know people who say you should never take medicine, you should just rely on faith until they get sick.
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Now some people will hold that line out.
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But generally that's good for other people, not for them.
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So we see God build our bodies to heal.
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God gives us medicine to heal.
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Comes out of the ground.
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He gives men the minds to be able to produce those things.
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But there is miraculous healing as well.
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The gospels show the accounts of Jesus's miraculous healing.
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The apostle Paul healed miraculously.
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Peter healed miraculously.
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But that is not the exclusive way in which God has ordained people to be healed.
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Nor does the Bible teach that every person will be healed.
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That's the hard one.
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I remember one time years ago, and I've told this story before, but some of you haven't heard it.
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I went to the hospital with a man.
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We stood next to the bedside of a man.
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And I prayed over this man because he was very sick.
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And I said, Lord, if it be your will, please heal this man.
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And we, amen, you know, went through the end of the prayer.
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Walked outside with the man that I was with.
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Went to another church.
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Charismatic, word faith church.
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We got down to the car and I could tell he was a little agitated.
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And I said, what's wrong? He said, why'd you say that? If it's your will.
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It is God's will to heal that man.
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I said, who told you? I said, you mean? He said, it's wrong to say if it be your will.
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I said, if it was wrong, Jesus wouldn't have said it in the garden when he said, nevertheless, not my will but thy will be done.
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Don't tell me it's wrong to pray that God may we be submissive to your will.
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That's foolish.
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It is not always God's will to heal.
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I want to give you a few verses on this.
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Paul left Trophimus sick at Miletus in 2 Timothy 4.20.
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Left him there sick.
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Now, some people say always miraculous healing.
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Well, Paul could heal.
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But he left a man sick at Miletus.
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Look it up.
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2 Timothy 4.20.
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Epaphroditus was sick and almost died in the service of the Lord according to Philippians 2.30.
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Paul himself had a thorn in the flesh that God did not remove.
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2 Corinthians 12, 7 through 10.
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We don't know if that was a person or an ailment.
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Because there are some people that assume that the thorn in the flesh was an individual.
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I did have a person tell me one time that God had put them here to be my thorn in the flesh.
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That was nice.
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I said, thank you.
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If it were always God's will to heal, then we wouldn't see this in the scriptures.
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We wouldn't see God or Paul telling Timothy to take a little wine for your stomach.
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He would say, Timothy, your stomach has a problem because you don't have enough faith.
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Wouldn't he? If that was what the Bible taught about the word-faith movement.
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Finally, it is untrue.
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If any word-faith teacher says that failure to be healed indicates a lack of faith, that is not always the case.
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In fact, I would say it's rarely the case that your healing has anything to do with your lack of faith.
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Here's the thing that most people don't even get around to having the conversation with these word-faith guys.
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Is everyone's going to die eventually anyway.
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One of the worst word-faith heretics in the world just died a week ago.
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I talked about her in my sermon.
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She's dead.
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She did not survive the stroke.
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But according to the theology, she should have.
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Because if you believe that God's going to heal you from everything because of your faith, you're not going to die.
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And that's just foolish.
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So again, sometimes it is not God's will to heal.
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We don't like to hear that when we're sick.
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Absolutely, it's God's decision.
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We don't like to hear that, but it's the truth.
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So ultimately, I've described these two misinterpretations as my introduction because I felt the need to ensure that we do not misread James's words.
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As I've said, there's a context here that we need to understand.
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And I believe that if we interpret James according to his context, there will be no question as to the meaning of his message.
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What is the context of James chapter 5 verses 13 through 18? Well, it begins back in verse 1.
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If you'll turn with me very quickly, just back to verse 1.
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He says now in verse 1, Come now, you rich, weep and howl for your miseries that are coming upon you.
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Your riches have rotted, your garments are moth-eaten, your gold and your half-crowded.
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Remember, we studied that.
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And what does he go on to say? He goes on to say, Behold, the wages of the laborers who have mowed your fields, which you've kept back by fraud, are crying against you.
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And the cries of the harvest have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts.
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Here we have the exhortation in this particular passage, the exhortation regarding the subject of someone who is being mistreated, someone who is being downcast or downtrodden.
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This person is being mistreated by a rich person.
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And so we see here this person is being mistreated.
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Then in verse 7, where are we at? He calls for patience.
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He says, Be patient therefore, brothers, until the coming of the Lord.
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He's exhorting them to be patient.
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He calls them to lives of integrity.
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Verse 12, he says, But above all, my brothers, do not swear either by heaven or by earth.
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Be people of integrity.
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Don't lie.
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Be truthful.
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And now he brings them to a subject of comfort.
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All right, you're dealing with hard times.
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Be people of integrity.
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Now, how do you deal with your suffering? How do you find comfort in suffering? Well, verse 13, Is anyone among you suffering? He asked the question.
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Is anyone among you suffering? Is anyone among you dealing with these problems? Is anyone among you having a problem? Let him do what? Let him pray.
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I find that interesting just because, Oftentimes, oftentimes as a minister, I will say this and I always kick myself right in the leg when I say it.
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I'll say to somebody, Hey, can we do anything for you besides pray? You've said it.
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I know you have.
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I see you smiling.
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And what I mean by that is obviously we're going to pray.
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But can we do anything else? Can we bring you food? Can we provide you with something? But in saying it that way, I'm sort of backhand diminishing the reality of the value of the prayer.
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It's interesting that James, Is anyone suffering? Pray! You know, I think some people do get disappointed in me sometimes because they'll come and tell me something really tragic or something really hard.
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And sometimes all I have to give them this prayer.
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I don't have anything else.
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But you know what? It's enough.
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That's what we're supposed to give them.
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You know, I can't solve all your burdens.
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I can't give you back your loss.
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I can't mend every broken bone or heal every open wound.
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But I can.
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But his grace is sufficient and I can pray to him.
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So he says the first thing is anyone suffering? And the word suffering here means in the Greek language to endure evil by others.
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This is why I connect it back to the earlier passage.
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These are Christians who are enduring the evil of others.
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They are suffering at the hands of wicked people.
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And this is why I want to point out to you right now.
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I do not think and I hope to show you this tonight.
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I do not think that this is about sickness in the way that we normally think sickness.
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And I'm going to I'm going to show you how I don't even think the word sick is the right way to translate the word.
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We'll talk about that in a minute.
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But just this word suffering.
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Oftentimes we immediately think of suffering in regard to.
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Is any of you dealing with a sickness? It's not what he's talking about here.
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He's talking about people who are undergoing difficulty in their Christian life, particularly because of the onslaught of someone else.
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Think about the context that he's already talked about.
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Go back to the beginning of James.
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What did he say? Take joy in your trials, knowing that your trials are meant to encourage patience.
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This whole book has been about how to walk the Christian walk.
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The title of our series is Wisdom for the Walk.
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What is one of the things that we have to deal with as Christians? Persecution from the outside.
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Now, we live in America where there's not somebody standing at the door with a rifle about to come in and take us all to the gulag for participating in a Bible study.
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But, you know, there are places in the world where that still happens.
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I showed my children just the other night a video on communism.
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And how many how many millions of people have been murdered because of the bad and faulty idealism of Marxism? I mean, you can't imagine the number.
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It boggles the mind.
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But I show my children that because I want them to see why we stand against the awfulness of communism, the awfulness of socialism, what it does.
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Because you know what? It's one of the first things to go in those societies is faith.
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Because we don't want you trusting in God.
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We want you trusting in the state.
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All right, so we throw that out.
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So my point being, we look at this.
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There are people around the world right now who are suffering for their faith.
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And what does James admonish them? If you are suffering, pray.
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The next thing he says, is anyone cheerful? And this is a great thing because not everybody was suffering all at one time.
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There were some people that were enjoying the benefits of something in their life.
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There were people who were cheerful.
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Maybe there were young Christians in the church who had just been married.
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You know, people are still being married here.
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Paul talks about it in 1 Corinthians.
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And you know, if you have a desire to marry, be married.
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You know, Christian marriage, it's happening.
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I just went to a wedding last Sunday evening.
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A friend, one of our karate guys who comes here, doesn't go to church here, but comes karate, got married and he's in Italy right now.
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Isn't that amazing? You know, they had saved up, two good young Christian people saved up money, courted one another for the last two years.
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Now they're off to Italy for their honeymoon.
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Beautiful.
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And he says, if you're cheerful, what do you do? You sing praise.
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You know why that part is in there, I think? Because if he just talked about the suffering, because he goes right back to talking about sickness in verse 14.
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He says, if anyone is suffering, let them pray.
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If anyone's cheerful, let them sing praise.
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If anyone is sick.
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So it seems like that cheerful is sort of sandwiched in to two bad things, suffering and sickness.
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And then you got cheerful right in the middle.
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You know why I think he puts the cheerful in there? Because oftentimes when we're sick or we're suffering or we're hurting, we go to God.
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But when we're cheerful and happy and things are going great, we don't.
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So here he says, if you're suffering, go to God.
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If you're cheerful, still go to God.
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If you're suffering, pray.
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If you're cheerful, sing praises all the way to Italy.
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You know, be happy in the Lord.
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Don't allow your good times to have a disconnect.
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But remember that even in your good times, praise God from whom all blessings flow.
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But then he says the next one, and this is the one that I really want to help you understand, because he says, is anyone among you suffering? Let them pray.
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Anyone cheerful? Let them sing praise.
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Is anyone among you sick? Now, in the English, the word sick, we all know what sickness is.
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Sickness is an infirmity in the body brought about by disease.
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And it can be great or it can be to a lesser extent.
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But it's sickness is sickness.
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And generally, that's what it is.
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Astaneo, astaneo in the Greek, is not the normal word that we would think of as sick.
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Astaneo in the Greek means weak, powerless, or feeble.
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Now, turn over to 2 Corinthians chapter 12.
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Wow, I opened up right to it.
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That won't happen again.
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2 Corinthians chapter 12 and verse 10.
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Most of you are probably fairly familiar with this passage.
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Paul is talking.
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I'll let you get there.
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2 Corinthians 12, 10.
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For the sake of Christ, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardship, persecution, and calamities.
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For when I am astaneo, weak, then I am strong.
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So, here it is translated, no doubt, astaneo.
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It's not translated sick.
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It is translated weak.
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And there's another passage, and I do not have it written down, but there is another passage later in Revelation.
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Same thing.
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It's translated as weak, not as sick.
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So, of the three times it's translated, two times it's weak, and only once do we have it as sick.
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So, it kind of leads to the question.
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Well, why is it translated as sick? Well, sometimes translations become popular.
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It's easier to translate something a certain way, to try to put across a certain point.
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And obviously, there are people who do believe that this is talking about physical disease.
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But I believe that James is moving beyond the suffering to the weakness that results from the suffering.
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Those who are dealing with the difficulties of living the Christian life, they are weary, they are depressed, they are defeated, they have lost the motivation, the ability to call on God themselves.
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They have been brought low in their faith, and perhaps they have even allowed sin into their lives because the very next thing in verse 15, he's going to say, or I'm sorry, later on, he's going to say, confess your sins.
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He's going to bring sin into it and address sin.
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But just for this right now, he says, is anyone among you weak? What do you do? And by the way, let me just, let me back up a second.
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Have any of you ever dealt, and you don't have to raise your hand, I'm not asking for anyone to embarrass or be embarrassed, but have any of you ever dealt with spiritual weakness, depression, anxiety, or struggle in your walk with Christ? Again, I'm not asking you to, some of you are shaking your head and that's fine.
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I've shared mine on several occasions, times where I have felt and dealt with great anxiety in my walk with Christ.
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I try to be honest with these things so that people don't ever put me on a pedestal.
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It's too easy to get knocked off.
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I really believe in my heart that these are the people that James is speaking to here.
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I do not think that this is limited to physical disease.
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In fact, I don't even really think physical disease is the focus.
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I think the focus here is spiritual weariness.
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Because of the very next thing, is anyone among you, and I'm going to say, I'm going to say, is anyone among you weary? Let him do what? Let him call for the elders of the church and let them pray over him.
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Years ago, I was dealing with what seemed to be an extra difficult battle with depression and anxiety.
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And if that disappoints you and me, I'm sorry.
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I share these things fairly openly.
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Charles Spurgeon wrote about his, called it the dark night of the soul.
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So if I'm less spiritual than you, I'm not less spiritual than him.
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So that's fine with me.
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But in dealing with that, I remember a night very specifically, a night much like tonight, it was a Wednesday night and I just could not get out of my chair.
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I was in Jack's Sunday school room.
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I was bawling into the chair.
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And I did not want to get up.
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And here comes Byron.
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And here comes Jack.
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And here comes Richard.
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You remember this? You remember this, Richard? And they prayed me up out of that.
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And I was able to come teach.
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Had I been alone, I don't know how I would have dealt with that struggle.
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But by God's grace, I wasn't alone.
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I had the elders of the church to pray over me and lift me up out of that.
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This is why I don't think that this is particularly dealing with things like physical disease.
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I think this is the spiritual weariness that a stronger brother who's stronger at the moment, because they may be weaker at another time, because I might be stronger for you now and you might be stronger for me another time.
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You understand? That can change.
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But at that moment, my stronger brothers came alongside me and lifted me up and pushed me forward.
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And that's what is supposed to happen.
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I think that on Sunday, when Anne came forward and she asked for the elders to pray for her, I think she needed just as much spiritual encouragement as she did physical health.
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And that's what we provided to her in laying hands on her and praying for her, you see.
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And the issue of anointing, this is interesting.
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And I will tell you, this is something I only recently realized.
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The word for anointing here is not the typical word that we would think of when we think of a religious ceremony of anointing.
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You know, the religious ceremony of anointing is where they pour oil on people.
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And we see it in the Old Testament and the New Testament.
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It was a part of the ceremony of anointing priests, anointing kings.
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It was part of the ritual.
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The word for that is krio.
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I think of shrimp krio.
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That's not the same thing, but that's the way I remember it.
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It's oily.
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But the Greek is krio for that.
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And that's that religious ceremony.
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This is not the way that the term that is used here is not that.
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In fact, let me look at the Greek real quick.
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That's in verse 14.
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Verse 14, my Greek text here.
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Eleo is the oil here.
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It's not krio.
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It's not the traditional religious ceremony.
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I know that there are people who do that.
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I know that when people get sick, there are some churches that pour oil on people's head and they say it's symbolic of the Spirit.
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And if somebody asked me to do that for them because that was something they needed to encourage them, I would do it.
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I actually have a little bottle of olive oil.
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But I don't think necessarily that that's what James is talking about here.
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But if somebody was convicted in that area or just felt like they needed it and that's what they needed to encourage them, that's fine.
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Other people think that it's medicine.
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I don't necessarily think that either.
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Because the word that is used here, it literally means to oil them.
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To rub oil on them.
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And in that particular sense, you could say, well, it's medicinal.
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They're rubbing oil on them as a medicine.
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But part of the hospitality and the way the first century works was they would use oil as a way to comfort guests.
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Remember when Jesus challenged the Pharisee? He said, I came into your house and you didn't give me water to wash my feet.
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She's washed my feet with her tears.
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You gave me no oil for my head and she has anointed my body with the oil that she brought.
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You remember that? You remember the story, right? He said, you gave me no oil for my head.
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That oil was not religious in nature.
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It wasn't symbolic of the Holy Spirit.
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Neither was it medicinal in nature.
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It was comforting.
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It had a pleasant smell.
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When it was rubbed in, it gave a pleasant, soothing feeling.
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And I really think that that's the purpose of the text.
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I think that James is saying when somebody comes to you who's suffering, somebody comes to you who's hurting, you give them comfort and prayer.
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You provide them a place where they can be comforted.
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You give them, and in our context, maybe you give them something a little different because oil is not the way we comfort one another anymore.
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But I think that's the view here.
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And if you have a different perspective on it and you want to challenge me later, that's fine.
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My email's on all night.
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But I really don't think it's medicinal, though it could be.
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And I really don't think that it's the symbolic spiritual, even though it could be.
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I think it's a comfort.
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I think it's providing the physical comfort along with the spiritual prayer.
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Yeah, that's exactly what I'm saying.
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It provides to them the knowing.
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You ever rub somebody's shoulders? You ever have somebody that's hurting and you just come up behind them and you put your hands on their shoulders and you reach down and you say, hey, I'm here for you.
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And you're not doing anything but just giving them a good touch and a reminder of that love that you have for them.
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You do it with your kids, right? You rub their shoulders, you rub the back of their neck, you hold their hand.
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Because that physical touch provides a comfort.
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I think that that's part of what we see here.
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And he goes on to say, and the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick.
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And the Lord will raise him up and if he has committed sins, he'll be forgiven.
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Now, here's where the interpretation, again, is very important.
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Because so many in the Word Faith Movement especially cling to that part They say that's proof.
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If you pray in faith, God will save you if you are sick.
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But guess what? That's a totally different word.
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This isn't even the same word from before.
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The word from before meant, as I said, weak, powerless, feeble, right? Asteneo.
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Well, this is a different word.
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This is camno.
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Camno is a different word.
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Guess what it means? Fainthearted.
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I want to show you.
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Actually, weary or fainthearted.
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Turn with me to Hebrews chapter 12.
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Hebrews 12 and verse 3.
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Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow camno.
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Same thing.
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Weary or fainthearted.
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It reinforces the point, I think, that this is not dealing with physical sickness.
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Camno is only used one other time in the New Testament.
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It's in the context of spiritual healing.
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This is the only other time.
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It's used in Hebrews chapter 12, James chapter 5.
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In Hebrews, it's not talking about physical sickness, and I don't think it is in James either.
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When James says the prayer of faith will restore, that's what the words say there, Soter.
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It's restore the one who is weary.
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There is without a doubt that that will be done.
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Ultimately, by seeking out the elders, by being prayed for, this weak brother is lifted up in his faith.
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And consider what else.
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And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven.
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Why is that there? Well, oftentimes, our greatest spiritual droughts are either the cause or the result of some sin.
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We are dealing with something in our life that has brought about our anxiety or depression or whatever.
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This is an opportunity.
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You go to the elders.
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They pray for you in your weakness.
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And what do you do? You confess your sins.
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That's what the next verse says.
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Therefore, confess your sins to one another.
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And pray for one another that you may be healed.
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The word therefore, by the way, indicates a transition in thought.
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James will now apply what he has said in a practical prescription for the body.
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Confess your sins to one another.
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Why? Because your sins can cause you to fall into spiritual weariness.
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Your sins can cause you to fall into spiritual depression and anxiety.
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Be honest with one another about your difficulties that you might lift one another up.
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Pray for one another.
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You know, I'm going to talk about this Sunday, but here's a preview.
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One of the things that is starting to become a major dilemma in the life of the modern church is the unwillingness people have to be face to face with one another.
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They're oftentimes interacting through this or through this, but not like this.
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And by the way, since the recording didn't record any of that, I did a text message, I did typing on a keyboard, and I did my mouth.
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I just thought about that.
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So much of communication today is nonverbal.
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We do it through texting.
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We do it through the phone.
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And if you go to the end of 2 John, which is where we are Sunday, we're preaching.
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He says, I have so much more I want to write to you, but I don't want to do it with pen and ink.
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I want to do it face to face.
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You know, one of the great things about being the church, not being in a church, but we are the church.
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One of the great thing about being the church is the fact that we are in a fellowship with one another.
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And if I am broken, I should be able to talk to you about that.
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And if you're broken, you should be able to talk to me about that, where we can seek to restore and pray for one another in our weaknesses and in our brokenness.
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That we may be restored, that we may be healed, that we may be lifted up.
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That word, IOMI, means to make whole, to be free from sin, is actually the more appropriate way.
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It's the same idea in 1 John.
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What does 1 John 1.9 say? Good Bible students, you all should know this.
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If I start it, you'll finish it.
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If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to do what? Forgive us and cleanse us of all unrighteousness.
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But we're supposed to confess our sins to God, right? But we also have the responsibility to confess our sins to each other.
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You might say, well, where does that begin and where does that end? Well, primarily, if I sin against you, I should confess that to you.
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It doesn't have to become public.
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Private sin, private confession, right? That's sort of the rule.
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Public sin, public confession.
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There are times when no one will know about it except us.
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I sin against you, I don't know it.
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You come and tell me, I repent to you and before God and that's it.
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Shouldn't be anybody else.
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But if we confess our sins, God is faithful and just.
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To forgive us and cleanse us of all unrighteousness.
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That's the promise of Isaiah 53.
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He was wounded for our transgressions.
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He was crushed for our iniquities.
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And upon Him, the chastisement that brought us peace.
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And with His stripes, we are what? Healed.
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Let me tell you something about that verse.
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That verse, Isaiah 53, verse 5.
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By His stripes, we are healed.
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If that is a passage that has not been misused and taken out of context by the word faith movement, I don't know one.
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Because they've taken that passage out of context.
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Beat it like a sick monkey and put it back.
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And beat it again.
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And beat it again.
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And beat it again.
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They are terrible with that passage.
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Because they'll say, if you're sick by His stripes, you're healed.
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If you're sick by, I've heard people shouting at people who are sick by His stripes, you're healed.
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The context of Isaiah 53, verse 5 is spiritual healing from your sin.
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It is the restoration of your soul before God.
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It is not the healing of your bad back or your tendonitis or your bad anything.
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It's your spiritual deadness has been brought to life in Christ.
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That's the healing that's involved there.
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And I think it's the same healing in James chapter 5.
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I'm not saying God doesn't heal.
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I'm not saying He doesn't use miraculous healing.
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But when it comes to the issue of physical disease, I do not believe that that's the subject that James is concerned about.
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I think that he is concerned with spiritual weariness in the church that is so easily able to overtake the believer.
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Finally, he ends with an illustration.
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And this is where we'll close.
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He said, Elijah was a man with a nature like ours.
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And he prayed fervently that it might not rain him for three years and six months.
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It did not rain on the earth.
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Then he prayed again and the heaven gave rain and the earth bore its fruit.
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Now, why tell that story? It's from 1 Kings 17.
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Why tell that story? Here's the reason why.
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Because earlier he said this.
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He said, the fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.
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That's the way it is in the King James.
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In the ESV, it says it a little different.
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The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it's working.
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I don't like that as much as I like the King James.
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The fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.
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Who's the righteous man? He's the man the weak man's going to in his moment of need.
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Whether it be the elder or another church member, he's the person that this person's leaning on.
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John MacArthur tells a great story.
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He says one time this man came to him and he was broken.
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He was at a seminary and he was overwhelmed and he felt like he was going to abandon the ministry and he was broken.
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And he said, Mr.
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MacArthur, Dr.
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MacArthur, I just want you to pray for me.
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So he said, okay.
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So he pulled two chairs together in his office.
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They were going to kneel down together side by side and pray.
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And John MacArthur said he got on his knees, put his hands down to pray.
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And the next thing he felt was this big man laying across his back.
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He said they were supposed to pray side by side, but this guy, he just laid across him.
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And he said, what a great picture of what's really happening.
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At this moment, I'm the strong man and he's the weak man.
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And he can come lay on me and use my strength in his time of need.
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The effectual, fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.
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That's that.
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It's got that purpose and use there.
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And someone else is weak, we're strong, and we're able to lift them up in their need.
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And the reason for verses 17 and 18, I believe, about Elijah is simply to say this.
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Elijah was just a man.
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And look what his prayers did.
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His prayers shut the gates of heaven for three and a half years and then opened them again.
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And you don't think your prayers matter? He wasn't Jesus.
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He wasn't the Son of God.
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He was a man like us.
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That's what he says.
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He was a man with a nature like ours.
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And yet when he prayed, God shut the heavens.
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Don't you think your prayers matter too? Don't you think God can use your prayer too? He was a man.
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You're a man.
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He prayed.
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God used that.
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You pray because God will use yours as well.
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So that's the ministry of prayer in the church.
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That's what this is all about.
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How does the ministry of prayer work within the church? We pray for one another as each of us has need.
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And it applies to the sick in regard to when the sick person comes and has a need.
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We pray for them as well.
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But we always pray, Lord, we know, regarding illness and disease.
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You will in your time.
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You have written our days in a book.
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You fashioned them before we ever were created.
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You know when our end is.
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We cannot manipulate you.
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But we pray for strength for us and for this person as they go through this.
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And we pray for healing in accordance to your will.
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And that's what we do.
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I pray and hope that this has been helpful to you.
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Maybe to help understand it a little better.
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And next week, Lord willing, we will finish, James, by looking at verses 19 and 20.
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Let's pray.
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Father, I thank you for this opportunity to study through the epistle of James again.
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I pray it's been fruitful and helpful to your people.
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In Jesus name, Amen.