Just a moment, verses 13 through 18. Apostle James had two names, you might say. He was known for two different attributes. Anybody know what those names were? Camelbeaks, that was one of them. Anybody know the other one? It is interesting how relations. something of bookends in the New Testament, first and last, James written first, Galatians second, James focusing so much on the outward appearance of our faith, and that's why there's such a heavy premium put in chapter two on our works. James was zealous for the law in the right way, not in the wrong way, not in the pharisaical lay, but he was known as a result as James the just. But as Michael said, he was also known as old camel knees. And you can imagine, or maybe you can't imagine, if you can't I'll tell you why he was known as Camel Knees. He was known as Camel Knees because he was a prayer warrior. He was always on his knees. And I don't know if you've ever seen pictures or videos of Jews at the Western Wall as they're praying, but if you have, you'll note that they do not pray standing still, but they pray moving. And certainly we can imagine that James being a faithful Jew on his knees would be moving around, robustly praying, fervently praying to the Lord and thus the calluses on his knees. And as I think of James, I think as we continue to think through prayer that he is a wonderful resource to go to as we think about prayer. So I want to consider tonight James 5, 13 through 18. Just a brief devotional, brief thought on these somewhat complicated and challenging verses. So let's listen to the Word of God tonight. James says, "'Is anyone among you suffering? Let him pray. Is anyone cheerful? Let him sing praise. Is anyone among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working. Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed fervently that it might not rain. And for three years and six months it did not rain on the earth. Then he prayed again, and heaven gave rain, and the earth bore its fruit." That's far the reading of God's Word. When I was in Mexico as a missionary, I had a very troubling experience. And what it was is I had traveled down to the south of Mexico. I and other pastors did this every year. There were about three other pastors. We would go down to the southern region of Mexico, and we would visit some of the churches that had been planted by the Mother Church in Ensenada, Baja California. And one of the churches that we visited was in Zacatecas, and the church planter's name there was Ruben. He was a dear brother in the Lord, a very manly man. He was in the Mexican army for many, many years. Had pictures in his house of him with AK-47s, and then a picture of Jesus, another story. But anyway, Ruben was by himself down there. And he had a theology like ours, but he was very lonely. And as a result, he befriended a number of charismatic preacher friends. He didn't have anybody else. And as far as he could tell, they pretty much believed the gospel, more or less. And he used them as sources of fellowship and encouragement. And he told me, he said, hey Josh, my friend Monty, this charismatic preacher, he wants us to go visit this family, and we're gonna pray over them. And I'm like, okay, whatever. So we went, and it was Ruben, and I, and Monty. And we come to this family, and my Spanish at that point was about 40%, so I could pick up most things, but what I could gather as they were talking is that they had, this family had a five-year-old who had brain cancer. And I found out that the reason we were going is because Monty, who was somehow connected to this family, was bringing Ruben, an elder of a church, and me, a visiting missionary, and apparently we were going to pray over the five-year-old. I didn't know this until we got here. That's kind of how the Mexicans work. They just, you know, kind of last minute let you know. And so anyways, this man, Monty, proceeded to pray, and his prayer somewhat sounded like James as he started. He said, Lord, we pray that you would heal this child, take the brain cancer away. But then it got really squirrely. Then he started saying, Lord, we are not simply asking you to do this. We are declaring that you will do this and that you have given us this promise that you will heal this five-year-old's brain cancer. And at that point, I got really, really uncomfortable. And what I found out later is that Monty was a health and wealth prosperity preacher. And he was doing the name and claim it thing, the word of power thing, the thing where basically you say it, and as a result of your faith, it will come about. And I left that home that night, and I told Reuben, my friend, I said, brother, what are you doing with this guy? I said, this is exceedingly dangerous. And I said, more importantly, I'm exceedingly concerned from this family because what that man just did is he just gave them false hope. Now, it's possible that the Lord is going to heal that boy's head of brain cancer and that he's going to be free from it. I don't know. But here's the thing that I do know. The Lord has not promised in His Word that He would do that. And this man, speaking for the Lord, or presuming to speak for the Lord, went in there and said precisely that, that the Lord declared that this child would be healed. Well, at the same time, I come to a text like this, and it says very clearly in verse 14, if anyone among you is sick, let him call for the elders of the church and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. And then verse 15, in the prayer of faith, we'll save the one who is sick and the Lord will raise him up. Now I'm not going to engage on a full-scale exposition here except to say this in verse 15. That word save is the typical word for save, sozo, in Greek. It's a word that is used to describe our salvation. But I don't know if you know this, but the word for save or salvation in New Testament Greek, koine Greek, really originally pertains to healing. That's really how it is originally used. It's used for wholeness. It could be wholeness of body, wholeness of spirit, wholeness of soul, wholeness of salvation. But here it's clearly referring to a medical healing. And James doesn't qualify this. And so is this text teaching what Monty presumed it was teaching? Can Monty go to this text and say, look, we clearly have a promise from God that if we go and pray over the sick person, the prayer of faith will make them saved. Well, as a hermeneutical and theological rule, what do we do when we come to texts like this? Well, we call upon what's called the analogy of faith. Scripture interprets scripture. And so we'll go to passages like 1 John 5, 14, and 15, which says, And this is the confidence that we have toward Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And we know that He hears us in whatever we ask. We know that we have the request that we have asked of Him. And we say, well, that's really what James is getting at. He just didn't say it, and John is kind of filling him out in that respect. Now, I'm not against the analogy of faith. In fact, we need to use the analogy of faith. But at the same time, you also want an author to be able to say what they really want to say. And James here doesn't qualify anything in verse 15, and so it leaves us with the impression that he's saying, if we just jump through these hoops, the elders get together, they get some oil, the person confesses their sin, and they pray a prayer of faith over them, that they will be saved. Is there any balance from the book of James itself? Well, the answer is yes, there is balance. And that's what I'd like to show you tonight, and then I'd like to draw from that some principles and application for how we can pray. Here's what James does. He puts forth, after he has given this example of the elders praying over the sick person, this is very interesting, he puts forth the example of Elijah. Now, when we look at the example of Elijah, we'll be able to get a fuller picture of what James is saying, and it will actually sum up for us everything that James has been saying in this book. So I would submit to you to start off tonight that James picked the example of Elijah for two reasons. Please mark them down. Number one. James used the example of Elijah because he was a man with a like nature such as us, or a nature like ours. He said this in verse 17. Elijah was a man with a nature like ours. I don't know about you, but when I think of Elijah, I don't think about the conclusion that James just drew in verse 17. In fact, when I think of Elijah, I think of the most epic prophet in the Old Testament. Elijah is the one that did the most outstanding miracles in the Old Testament. And I kind of want to say to James, maybe push back on James a little bit and say, James, couldn't you think of somebody more average? Couldn't you think of somebody more obscure? I don't know, some guy named Jabez or something like that. You know, somebody just embedded in a chapter hidden somewhere that we really don't know about that doesn't have a reputation for doing these miraculous things because You're saying that we should do what Elijah does, and that's like saying, well, if Elijah can do it, I can do it, and that's just not the case, James. So couldn't you think of somebody more obscure? I mean, for Pete's sake, Elijah raised the widow's boy to life. He caused the flour and the oil to sustain the widow. He called fire down from heaven to kill a total, not of 50, but of 100 of Ahaziah's soldiers. And if all of that weren't amazing enough, the guy didn't die. I mean, come on, James, help me out a little bit here. Elijah was taken up in a whirlwind, chariots of Israel. Elisha's just sitting there with his mouth agape, like the chariots of Israel, what in the world is going on? And James says, be like Elijah. But you know what's interesting? All the intertestamental Jewish literature, that is to say, the literature that the Jews wrote between the Old Testament and the New Testament, They make Elijah out to be this amazing super prophet, pretty much like I've been explaining to you. In fact, they depict Elijah like many people write biographies of Christian heroes today. Have you ever been reading a Christian biography and you're like, for Pete's sake, I mean, does this guy walk on water? I mean, you know, Corrie ten Boom, like she was just absolutely amazing, no warts, no failures, just all the good stuff, all the good stuff. And that's how the intertestamental period writings display Elijah. He was this super saint. And then James comes in, almost as if a response to that, pushing back on the intertestamental reputation of Elijah, and he says, You know, elders, call the elders, pray for the one who is sick and they'll be healed. And this, to give you an example of that, let me give you an example of Elijah. By the way, verse 17, he was a man with a nature like ours. A nature like ours means same emotions as us, same passions as us, same failures as us. In fact, the word in the Greek is the word from which we get the English word homeopathic. So why is James calling us to look at and consider the example of Elijah? Because he wanted to highlight the particular features of Elijah's prayers which Christians should imitate. I want you to think about this for a second. If you were James and you were writing, you were writing, an example of prayer, and you said, hey, get the elders together for somebody who's sick, pray over them, and they'll be healed. What example in Elijah's life would you have picked? This is an open forum. What example in Elijah's life would you have picked? If you wanted to give an illustration of praying for somebody and them getting well, which example would you pick? Anybody? Yeah, George. Sun, back from the dead, right? Perfect, exactly. A plus, you get the golden star. That's right. That's the example I would use. And many commentators, when you read the commentaries on the Book of James, they're like, it's a little funny that he wouldn't use that example. Why wouldn't he? Why would he not use that example, and why would he use, what example does he use? Somebody tell me. What example does he use? prayed that the rain would cease, three and a half years, and then prayed that the rain would come back, right? Now I want you to think with me, don't fall asleep, okay, stay here. Why would James use that example and not the example of raising the widow's young son? Now I'm not gonna sit here and have an awkward stare down, I'm just gonna tell you, okay? Here's the reason why. In the case of the widow's son, there was no promise from God that he would raise the son. In the case of the rain ceasing for three and a half years and the rain coming back, both of them have a promise in the Bible from God and Elijah was praying in accordance with that promise. That's my whole lesson right there. That is huge. In other words, Elijah was not just pulling something out of his Type A personality and saying, hey, I think it would be a really good idea if it didn't rain on Israel for three and a half years. No. You know why he prayed that way? Because Elijah knew his Bible. And Elijah knew that in Deuteronomy 27 and 28 in the Mosaic Covenant, God put half of Israel on Mount Gerizim and half of Israel on Mount Ebal. And on Mount Ebal, Israel was forced by God to repeat all the curses that would come upon Israel if she were disobedient. And on Mount Gerizim, he had them rehearse all the blessings that would come upon them if they were obedient. Elijah knew his Bible. Elijah knew, for example, that in Deuteronomy 28, this is Mount Ebal, the curses, Yahweh is working through what will happen if they're disobedient, and he says in Deuteronomy chapter 28, verses 22 to 24, this. The Lord will strike you with wasting disease and with fever, inflammation and fiery heat, and with drought and with blight and with mildew. They shall pursue you until you perish, and the heavens over your head shall be bronze, and the earth under you shall be iron. Elijah was ruminating on that deuteronomic curse, and then he looked at who was in power at that time. It was king Ahab, good, thank you. King Ahab and his wicked wife, whom people should not name their daughters after, who was? Jezebel, okay. And what was going on? Nobody has a kid named Jezebel in here, right? Alright, just checking. What was going on in that kingdom? According to Elijah in 1 Kings 19, everybody had bowed the knee to Baal. And the Lord had to remind them, oh, stop feeling sorry for yourself. There's still 7,000 that haven't bowed the knee to Baal. But you know, to Elijah's credit, still 7,000 out of all the people in Israel, that's still a lot of dudes and ladies who are bowing the knee to Baal. Why? Because Ahab had led Israel into worship of the Asherah, or the Asherim in Hebrew, in the plural, and the Baals. And furthermore, Jezebel was killing all the prophets of God. And so, what happened was, instead of following the Shema, hear O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one, Israel was following other gods. They were breaking the first commandment, the most important commandment of the whole Decalogue. Furthermore, they were foregoing the sacrifices to Yahweh, and they weren't giving him the evening sacrifice, for example. And so, what does Elijah do? He says in 1st Kings 17.1, there's not going to be any rain for three and a half years. And then something happens between then and 1st Kings 18.1 when God says through Elijah, rain is going to come. What happens? The Superbowl of the gods on Mount Carmel. The Super Bowl of the Gods where this is epic and this is connected to everything that's going on. Elijah basically says, all right Ahab, I want you to get all your prophets of Baal and I want you to bring them to Mount Carmel. And I'm gonna show you who the true God is. And then everybody gets there, all the prophets of Baal and all the people of Israel. I can't say that every single soul was there, but the majority of Israel was there. And at one point, I'm not gonna go through all the texts, but at one point at the beginning, Elijah looked at all of them and he says, you guys today need to stop wavering between two opinions and you need to decide whether you're gonna serve Yahweh or you're gonna serve Baal. Just tuck that away for a second. They were being double-minded. Seems like James talks about that somewhere in his book, doesn't he? You need to stop being double-minded. And it says in that very text that the people of Israel were silent. Why were they silent? because they were like my friend Bunky in San Diego. I call my friend Bunky and I'm like, hey Bunky, we're going to have a get together on Friday. And yeah, there's going to be adult beverages because he loves those. And I'm like, are you going to be there? And he's like, I'll let you know. That's Bunky's way of saying, unless a better offer comes along, I'll be there. That's what Israel was saying. We're going to be silent because the Super Bowl of the gods hasn't taken place yet. And we don't know if Baal has won or Yahweh has won. So we're going to wait. Israel was under the curse of God. And so you know the story, I won't go through it, but Elijah basically says, okay, he sets up the altar, and what's interesting about it is he sets up the altar with how many stones, anybody know? 12 stones. What do you think that refers to? The 12 tribes of Israel, that's right. The 12 tribes of Israel. So he sets up this altar with the 12 stones, Okay? And he tells the prophets of Baal, he says, okay, call out to your gods, and call your god, call Baal, to send fire down from heaven to consume the sacrifice. So what do they do? From morning until evening, from morning until evening, they're cutting themselves, and they're praying to God, and they're crying out to God, and nothing. And Elijah, he's just a little snarky. He says in there, well, keep crying out to him. Maybe he's musing. Or in the Hebrew, maybe his feet are covered. You know what that means? He's going to the bathroom. That's literally what that means. Maybe your God is on the john. I mean, it's beautiful in the Hebrew. That's exactly what he's saying. He's making fun of their gods. You know what's interesting? Elijah, and whoever put together this story, was very mindful of what he was doing. He waited until the evening, until he showed Yahweh to be the true God. Why? Because it's when the evening sacrifice was expected. For all these years under Ahab, they had not been given the evening sacrifice. But in that same place in Deuteronomy 27 and 28, on the other side of the ledger, in the blessing side, it says, if you are obedient, I will shower down rain from the heavens. If you are obedient. So Elijah says, you need to decide which one you're going to choose. You need to come back to the first commandment. And after he cried out to God and prayed to God, and fire came down and consumed the sacrifice, you know what the people said? The Lord is God. The Lord is God. You know what that sounds like? The Shema, the first commandment. Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. So they had been restored to their obedience to the first commandment. The evening sacrifice was restored. And then in first Kings 1841, you can look at this later, Elijah gives this really odd command to Ahab. He tells Ahab, he tells Ahab, go up, eat and drink. Does anybody know why he's telling Ahab to do that? I'll tell you why. In Exodus chapter 24, I won't go there, but in Exodus chapter 24, after Moses had come down from the mountain after the book of the covenant had been given, he took a bull, he slaughtered it, he took the blood, he sprinkled half of it on the book, and he sprinkled half of it on the people, this was a covenant renewal, and then he called all the elders to come up to the top of the mountain and do what? Anybody remember? Eat. And 70 elders communed with the Lord on the top of Mount Sinai. What was that? It was a covenant renewal in the second generation of the wandering Israelites. They renewed the covenant. And now that Elijah has led Israel from the curses of Mount Ebal to the blessings of Mount Gerizim, he now needs Ahab to go up and eat to renew the covenant so that what can come? Rain. And in 1 Kings 18.1, that's exactly what happens. 1 Kings 18.1, Yahweh says, you go and tell Ahab that I'm sending rain. When James tells us to pray like Elijah, he is telling us to pray in accordance with God's will. He is telling us to pray according to God's promises. And James, by the way, just so we remember that we need to be hermeneutically sound and read the Bible within context, James himself says, don't say I'm gonna go here tomorrow or next year and start a business and do this or that, but say if what? If the Lord wills. And if you live that way, how much more should you what? Pray that way. So in James chapter five, James is not saying if you just jump through these hoops and the elders come up and they anoint them with oil and they confess their sins, they will be healed. Because I'll tell you right now, 12 years ago, my wife went up to the front of our little Reformed Baptist church that we planted in California and she was anointed with oil by the elders and they prayed over her after she had confessed her sin and they prayed that the Lord would take away her migraines. And it never happened. Does this mean that James is a liar? Does this mean that God's promises have fallen to the ground? No. Because we recall the example of Elijah. If it be the Lord's will. If it is according to God's promises. Now that may happen. That may happen before the Lord comes back. But this is how we are to understand James chapter five. And if I can just give a simple application as I end tonight, it would be this. As you think through your prayer life, just think for a moment through your own prayer life, your own personal prayer life, how many prayers do you pray in response to the promises that God has already given? Can I just point out that with Elijah, God promised that it would not rain because of the disobedience and the curses that would come, and yet he prayed. That prayer is not recorded in the Old Testament, but James says he did, so it's oral tradition. God promised through the blessings that rain would come through obedience, and then he said in 1 Kings 18.1 that it did come, and yet we get this beautiful image of Elijah with his head between his knees, which meant that he was probably bent down in fetal position, praying fervently, and he tells his servant to go and look on the horizon how many times? Seven times. He fervently prayed. He fervently prayed, even though God already said He would do it. You know what lazy Calvinists do and hyper-Calvinists do? They say, God already said He's going to do it, so I'm not going to do anything. I call that a sinful Christian. Not a lazy Calvinist, not a hyper-Calvinist, but a sinful, unbelieving Christian. Christians pray according to the promises that God has given us. Has God promised it to us? Yes, but we pray that He would do what He would promise, and you know what? I think God, if I could just use a little sanctified imagination, you know what I think God was saying to Elijah in some sense? He was saying, Elijah, you do not know how long I've been waiting for somebody, listen, to take me Do you take the Lord at His word tonight? Do you pray according to God's promises? How many of your prayers are promise-driven? Does that mean that it's wrong to pray for things that God hasn't promised in Scripture? Absolutely not. Absolutely not. And we have such a wonderful Father that He wants us to even do that. But what would life be like if the main warp and woof and contour and texture of our prayers was predominantly according to the promises of God? God, you promised that you would sanctify me. You promised that I would have victory over my sin. Lord, give me victory over this sin. And if you started to pray in that direction, you started to take it exceedingly seriously. Not that you don't. How would that transform your life? How would you begin to look more and more and more like Jesus because the general tenor of your prayers was that you conform to the promises of God? How beautiful, how beautiful would that be? May the Lord give us grace to pray according to the promises of Scripture. Let's pray.