James 5:15

James 5:15

And the prayer of faith will save the sick, and the Lord will raise him up.  And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven.

In the last post we talked about anointing.  Something this text helps us to understand is that phrase "prayer of faith will save the sick." 

In the Bible is a story about a little girl.  She had become very sick and close to death.  Her father sent for Jesus to come heal her in hopes of saving her.  While Jesus was coming, she passed away.  Her grief-stricken family began their mourning.  Jesus kicked them out, went inside, and raised her back to life.

He knew that the family had no faith in him.  They had to leave.  Faith is a powerful verb.  Something we practice daily in our lives... or don't practice.  If you pray for someone with the faith in God that He can do something, He won't let your prayer or that situation go to waste.  Good will come of it.  In the case of this girl, He saved her in two ways.  The first was physically.  She didn't die in the end (you know what I mean... I can see you about to pull a smart remark on me.)  The second was her soul.  Do you doubt that the girl would choose to not believe in Jesus after He woke her that day?  Her heart she most likely freely gave Him. 

Then there is always that group of people, even in today's society, who claim that the bad stuff that happens to us occurred by the action of God.  No one suspects that perhaps the devil is responsible for the bad stuff.  Nope.  God gets the blame.  Quickly, I must simply comment that God is a God of Choice.  We wouldn't love a dictator.  He let's bad people have the choice to do bad things and everyone gets stuck suffering the consequences of their actions. 

During ancient times, it was assumed that if something bad happened to you then God was punishing you for a sin you committed.  The worse the situation, the worse the sin you committed. 

So if someone was sick, then they had committed a sin to be in that situation in the first place.  By being prayed for, God is not just healing you physically but also emotionally, spiritually, and in the case of being judged as a sinner and thus becoming sick... socially.