James ch. 5, vs. 16b. The prayer of faith

Our most powerful weapon

I have been writing a lot about James in this blog(I’m talking about the epistle). Tradition tells us that James spent a lot of his waking hours on his knees in prayer to God. Prayer is putting faith into action; prayer can be a lot of work sometimes…it requires human effort. Romans 8:26,27 lets us know that the Holy Spirit will help us pray…”Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weaknesses, for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but the Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words. And God, who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.”
The King James calls it “groanings which cannot be uttered”
Groaning in the Spirit….I think that is what James is referring to when he said “the effectual prayer of a righteous man availeth much”……ch. 5 vs. 16b.
That is the greatest and most effective thing we can do in our churches, reestablish the prayer room. I’m talking about the kind of prayer that gets heaven’s attention…the kind of prayer, faith believing prayer that moves the hand of God.
Oh’ you say a person needs to be quiet before the Lord Do you think Elijah was quiet when he called down fire from heaven and God answered with fire? I’ll bet there was a lot of shouting , in fact the Bible says that there was a lot of shouting as the Israelites saw what God was doing . They were shouting aloud, “The Lord He is God…the Lord, He is God.” In the early days of Pentecost in our city, meetings were marked with shouts of victory and folks prayed aloud in effectual fervent praying; faith believing praying. Even years later, it was like that.Yes, there is always a time to be quiet before the Lord but I think our prayers have been silenced long enough, let’s return to that fervency that James refers to in his letter to the twelve tribes scattered abroad.

Righteousness; the fruit

"Now the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace, James 3:18. In the 4th. chapter of James epistle he is talking about wars and fights. Now it is important to remember that the people that he is addressing are primarily Christians, and yet he speaks of wars and fights coming from among them. Look at these verses and consider where you are today. Consider the church today in North America, perhaps the one you attend. Verse 1 says these wars and fights come from within, that is from our own desires for pleasure and in verses 2&3 we see James describing a deplorable condition that existed, one of lust and murder and asking amiss(not in the will of God) and verse #4 just gets worse naming some as adulterers and adultresses. He concludes this by saying that friendship with the world is to be an enemy of God.
I started this entry by quoting from verse 18 of chapter 3, "Now the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace." Backing up just a little to verse 16, "For where envy and self-seeking exist, confusion and every evil thing are there."Direct opposites, the fruit of righteousness and envy and self-seeking. The fruit of righteousness is sown; it has to be planted first, that's how you grow things; perhaps I should say that is how God grows things, we sow the seed and He does the growing. We sow seeds of peace and He grows the fruit of righteousness in us. To sow something, in this instance seeds of peace requires work, "faith without works is dead." Jesus said in John's gospel, "Peace I leave with you. My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid." Christianity is not passive, grace is not passive, you must ask for His grace and it is power, power to live an effective Christian life. Keep on believing and be encouraged to walk close to Him at all times.

Looking at James and Salvation by works

You may think that my title contradicts what I have said in past blogs, that being salvation is through grace and grace alone, not of works says the apostle Paul in his letter to the Ephesians.. Those verses are found in Ephesians 2:8,9:” For by grace are you saved through faith, and that (faith) not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, 9/ not of works lest anyone should boast.” My title therefore is some what misleading because I for one do believe that salvation is a free gift of God bought for me “by the precious blood of Christ as a lamb without blemish “
But is James really saying that we are saved by works or is he in agreement with all the other Bible writers who say that we are saved by faith and His marvelous grace? James is talking to Christians already saved and he is essentially telling them the same thing as Paul tells the Philippians in chapter 2:12-17
Philippians 2:12-17 (New Living Translation)
Shine Brightly for Christ
12 Dear friends, you always followed my instructions when I was with you. And now that I am away, it is even more important. Work hard to show the results of your salvation, obeying God with deep reverence and fear. 13 For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him.
14 Do everything without complaining and arguing, 15 so that no one can criticize you. Live clean, innocent lives as children of God, shining like bright lights in a world full of crooked and perverse people. 16 Hold firmly to the word of life; then, on the day of Christ’s return, I will be proud that I did not run the race in vain and that my work was not useless. 17 But I will rejoice even if I lose my life, pouring it out like a liquid offering to God,[a] just like your faithful service is an offering to God. And I want all of you to share that joy.
Pretty well says it all, don’t you think? Not much I can add except that James and Paul are both talking to Christians(as one lady said in Bible study the other night, “Christian is the key word), people who are already saved and working because they want to, because of their love for Jesus. That is what James means when he says “faith without works is dead because it is inactive.(my word)
Haven’t heard from that many people of late via comments in the blog space, although folks have e-mailed and told med personally that they read the blog and get something from it however I would encourage you to offer a comment.
Salutations…..RC

More from the epistle from James

More from James' letter to the dispersed Jewish Christians. The other day we were sitting in the Vancouver I'ntl airport and waiting for our flight that would take us to Fairbanks, Alaska. As I was sitting there, my mind went to the verse in chapter two that says, "as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also." It is true that when the body dies, the spirit of that body goes back to God and the body is truly dead.


James, here has compared the body,first part of the equation no.1 to the faith we all have been given in equation no. 2, and he compares in equation no. 1 the spirit to works in equation 2 , in other words just as the spirit gives life to the body...so works makes our faith come alive. Let me repeat what James is saying here. He is saying that works is the life that faith requires.Think on this for a while and let the Holy Spirit guide you.
Now I would have thought when considering these things that James would associate the body with works and the spirit with faith, (remember the spirit gives life) but he uses this illustration to show us that faith is useless until you put it to work. He says in verse 18, "but someone will say , you have faith and I have works." Remember the old secular song, "love and marriage...you can't have one without the other?" Well that is faith and works, you can't have faith without works....you can however have works without faith and that's no good either. You must have both says James. Abraham had both and he was called the friend of God. Rahab was a hooker and she was justified by her works because she acted in faith when she received the spies. So you need to believe but you need to act on it also. It can be action by prayer. We all say the church needs revival but if we do not repent and if we do not pray earnestly, then nothing happens. James uses another example in chapter 5 and it is just what I am saying....Elijah was a man just like we are and he prayed. We will consider this in a later blog.

Part 2: A BIG GOD
As I said in my last entry, we have a big God and He has lots and lots of grace, immeasurable whereas Denali is measureable, 6.2 million acres , Alaska is measurable, but God’s grace cannot be measured by any standard of measurement known to man. In Alaska, because of it’s rich oil reserves, each resident receives a dividend check every year. God has a dividend for you and I because of the riches of His grace and it is available because of the shed blood of Jesus to everyone. on the planet , but you must ask for it. It seems like a lot of people come to the north for various reasons…perhaps to escape the so-called rat race of the south or for many other reasons, maybe just modern living pressures and Alaska is a big place to sort of hide in and really get away from it all. Some people think they can commit sin and try to excuse their sin using GOD’S grace, but it doesn’t work that way. John says that if we sin we have an advocate with the Father, the man Christ Jesus, and he also tells us that if we confess our sins that He will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. That is grace. But we cannot use grace as an occasion to sin, we have to be sincere and forsake sin in our flesh. Maybe James has these thoughts in mind when he talks about faith without works being dead,; when he talks about being doers of the Word and not just hearers; when he talks about being tempted by our own lusts and when he tells us to lay aside all filthiness and overflow of wickedness, and receive with meekness the engrafted word, or the implanted word of God. When he tells us that we need to bridle our tongues. Jesus said to the woman who had committed adultery, “go and sin n more.” FAITH WITHOUT WORKS IS DEAD”

A BIG GOD

We are in Alaska and have just returned from Denali Notional park It is beautiful and it is vast covering 6.2 million acres. It is also untapped. It reminds me of the grace of God....vast and beautiful and untapped by most people. A lot of the people we met here i Alaska are from some other state or country originally. In Newfoundland they call everybody that is not from there, people from way. it seems that an awful lot of people are like that, spiritually speaking far from God..people from away.We were all like that before we met Jesus, before H came into our lives. It's like Denali, until you go there and experience it you will never know just how great it is. That is like the grace of God, until you experience it you will never know how great He really is.

Body or spirit?

While sitting in Vancouver International airprt, my thoughts went to the epistle of James chapter 2 where it says in verse 17, "as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also." It is true what James says about the body, we know that when the spirit leaves the body, there is a death So also it is true what James asserts that just as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead. But do you see the lesson James is giving us? THE COMPARISON? Faith equals body and spirit equals works. Now I would have thought of the body as a likeness of works , but James equates the spirit as works. In other words once works come into the picture and energizes the spirit, life occurs; body without spirit equals faith without works it becomes dead in either case. Jesus said to go and produce fruit that would remain. Faith without works is dead