Published: May 4, 2023 | Speaker: Chuck Hartman | Series: The Epistle of James - Part 14 | Scripture: James 4:17; 5:13-18, 19-20
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you again for this time that we have together as fellow Believers it's time that we have in your word we pray that your spirit would open your word to our understanding and that as we
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read about things that were done in the early church that you would help us to understand what they did why they did it and whether we're to continue doing it
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give us wisdom for your certainly encouraging us to ask for that in the Book of James so we ask that you would grant us wisdom to understand your word and to apply it to our lives as
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individuals but also and perhaps even more so as a Community of Faith as a body we ask this in Jesus name amen
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tonight we uh we're in chapter 5 of James somewhat it's not really a wrap up because as we've mentioned many times James is
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not really a letter and chapter five doesn't have the typical greetings and salutations and encouragements and rebukes that you have with a letter in fact it seems to end
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very abruptly very abruptly with verses 19 and 20 but in fact starting in verse 7
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of course the verses James did not versify his letter but our verse 7 of chapter 5 on to the end of the chapter it really is a very powerful summary of
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all that all that James has already written and an application of it as well so we're going to start by just looking at a broad overview many commentators I think
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look at James as just a mishmash of this and that piece together sewn together very rarely do contemporaries
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consider that it was actually written by one author one author um very rarely do they think it was written by James the Lord's brother very rarely do they think he was written in the first century so all of that is is
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um it's just simply not reading the book as it was intended to be read it's not recognizing that James is not a letter it is a it is a piece of wisdom
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literature but they come to chapter five and you'll read many commentaries just say that again it's just a hodgepodge of
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little vignettes but in fact and and I'm not I'm not bringing this out of my own mind there are some other commentators that that have seen this as well if you look at verses 7 through 12 especially seven
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through eleven through eleven you see that the emphasis is on patience and endurance and endurance which is how he began the whole letter back in chapter one but
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he says be patient therefore Brethren behold the farmer waits for the precious produce of the soil being patient you two be patient strengthen your hearts for the coming of the Lord is at
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hand verse 11 or verse 10 as an example Brethren of suffering and patience take the profits the profits um and we be we count those blessed to endured you have heard the endurance of
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job and so it's kind of a rapid fire but then starting at verse 13 through Verse 18 it's all about prayer which again if any man lacks wisdom let
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him ask of God chapter 1 verse 5. patience and prayer prayer for patience endurance through prayer that's essentially the underlying theme
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at least from a standpoint of Christian behavior in this life and so what James says in chapter 5 is really a culmination a summation of
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what he's been saying all along he leaves out the negatives he's not chastising the rich people or those who are showing favoritism he's already done that but it is also interesting the way
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he's now applying it look at verse 13 is any among you anyone among you verse 14 is any among you
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um verse 19 my brethren if any among you you know that common phrase repeated and is also in chapter verse
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let's see there's one more well it's chapter 13. it's kind of twice the same Greek phrase is three times in those five verses but then in chapter verse 13
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He also says is anyone cheerful but there's any among you any any within your midst your midst the focus is the community
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and he's talking about pretty much in a general sense whatever might befall you whether it be
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suffering trials persecution or joy success happiness whatever really he's kind of saying the same
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thing Paul says in First Corinthians but he says if one member suffers they all suffer if one member rejoices they all Rejoice right so again Paul and James are are not in Conflict at all
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here but he's talking about the community the community and that's what he's been talking about all along certainly the community is made up of individuals but what he says you know what he's
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saying here saying here when he says is anyone among you he's basically saying that um well I like the way
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um Alec moisture put it he says neither suffering nor ease should find us without a suitable Christian response in prayer and song
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no matter what comes our way and that's what James is saying no matter what comes your way you have the same recourse and that is to God now he's been talking about submit
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yourself under the hand of God he's talking about Divine Providence he's talking about divine grace how we've been we've been basically born again we've been um brought into being by the word so we're
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we are his we are gods and therefore if we're suffering we're suffering then our prayer should go to God if we are rejoicing then our songs of praise should go to God
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now I'm not going to spend a great deal of time on that but I do want to point out something that that has come up in recent discussions in our own body and that is the nature of Prayer
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but um I have found in in all discussions on prayer in the church for the most part in the modern Evangelical Church
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the realm of singing is not does not enter into the conversation thing only they come from a different
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motive a different attitude singing if you and if you read the Psalms which of course were songs you see that many of them are in fact prayers and petitions to God
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so he's he's not saying these are two different responses different responses they're the same response from two different circumstances if you're suffering if you're
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experiencing trouble then yeah okay you're not really in a singing mood but you better be in a Praying mood if you're not suffering if things are going well there's nothing to pray for
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you better be singing then because there's not much difference between if any at all prayer and song Douglas moo see if I can
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find that um I got it on page 243 here his little quote
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um starts out by saying that prayer talking about verses 13 through 18 He says prayer is clearly the topic of this paragraph being mentioned in every verse
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so he talks about prayer and then he comments this singing In Praise was closely related to prayer indeed it can be regarded as a form of Prayer and I
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don't know if we think of that when we think of our singing in the church and we don't talk much about it which may be a good thing because oftentimes when churches talk about singing It's
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controversial and conflict and all of that and we don't have that and that's good but when we when we select the hymns that we select the Psalms the songs and when we sing
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them to whom are we singing and to what purpose are we selecting the music in the in the modern Evangelical especially what they call the Seeker
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sensitive churches sensitive churches your singing or actually you're being sung to but that's been around a long time you know the choir lofts they came about about the early 19th century the
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idea of having I guess they took it from what are they the sons of asaph or whoever they were in the Old Testament you know the Levites who were basically singers
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um but I don't think they sang for the whole nation of Israel okay I still think that the Israelites sang the songs of a sense when they went up to Jerusalem um so and we know that Jesus and the
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disciples sang Psalms that last supper so they didn't take the place of the singing of the people of God but largely I think in many churches the choirs have
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taken the place of the singing and as we're going to talk about in Sunday school about the church architecture architecture from about the 1830s on
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took on an Amphitheater with entertainment being the primary emphasis of the
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arrangement and acoustics being the primary um design Point making sure that that everybody wherever they sit can hear
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what's going on in the stage not the idea of participation but of observation so what do you think of when you're when you're singing
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you're singing a Psalm or a hymn or a song especially in the worship of God gathered together are you thinking how good it sounds
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set up of these churches in development and architecture and architecture did that come out of the idea of preaching being heard everywhere or do they come out of this it came out it came it came out of Finney Charles Finney yeah and that whole
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revivalism which yes there was preaching but there were also testimonies and entertained music and there were other methods of bringing people to that point
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of decision and so it wasn't it wasn't exactly uh as it is today and that is to bring in more and more people it still had an Evangelistic motive well grant that no matter what we think about the
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methods there was still that at least outward motive of bringing people to Christ so that that's kind of the era as the Second Great Awakening and phineism
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kind of led to that many churches took over theaters and then when the architecture started to catch up the emphasis was on the amphitheater type
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and you see that now in the mega churches that's not new because with Luther he redid the songs there are these Lutheran Corrals but then
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two or three hundred years later Bob Telemann handle war of writing cantadas is that is that has one Corral but otherwise it was just
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like a sort of a mask they were using more tests more tests for example right right
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yes you're right it's it and there is nothing new Under the Sun it's a little bit new in terms of the architecture and now it's it's it's a bit new in that but that's again we're getting into Sunday school that the the the point
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tonight though is that you know when we're singing we're praying we're lifting up our voices to God the fact that we're doing it with a lilt
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and a Harmony or even the fact that we're doing it to words already written doesn't take away the the fact that we are to be doing it to God and if we
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can't sing those particular words to God we should not have that in our liturgy that particular hymn should should go away okay and that's
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how I think James would have us think song it's certainly not entertainment and it's not for those who are around
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you even though as with corporate prayer song singing does provide Mutual edification you know there's there's no doubt that
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there's a corporate participation of it but the audience is not the people the people that's not the purpose of it it and um and you know frankly I
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it may be that you know we always I do I know I do sing during the singing time in church on Sunday mornings
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Sunday mornings but as James is saying you know if if you're struggling if you're suffering maybe during that time you should be
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praying you know I mean he's he's not actually saying as many do say in our culture in our Christian literature you know what do you do when you're feeling bad well sing a song well uh maybe not not James
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is saying is saying and he's saying is pray okay no I'm not you know of course if Josh starts singing and everybody's quiet well no it's a rough day
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rough day in the congregation uh we just should stop and start praying
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of doing saying something to one another yes yes yes yes yeah speaking to one another in Psalms and hymns and spirituals are teaching one another in Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs I I accept that that's what I mean by the mutual edification I
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think the same thing is true with prayer you know vocal prayer is edified it should be edifying if the prayer is not edifying it should not be prayed but who do we pray to
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God who do we sing to to God so not to deny the corporate aspect at all just to minimize or or maybe step back from the modern entertainment venue
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where your your music is actually now tailored toward the audience okay and so you have churches even even uh older churches that now have
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different Services based on the music style you know contemporary traditional country um rap I don't know what they do but it's like there's something something really wrong there you know you can
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imagine James saying any among you not like contemporary Christian music Christian music let him go to the 9 A.M service no I don't think that's quite what James is
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saying okay so you can see that that uh the purpose of singing is not to entertain and it's not to um you know some some choirs are are
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very very competitive and and the music that and the choir leaders you know they feel like they have to justify their existence by doing choral numbers and Christmas
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presentations and all of that like no that's not what it's about and uh and so I just yeah again just briefly that you know here he's talking
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about with these any among yous he's really applying everything he's written so far in the whole book back to the community as I said he's
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done chastising he's done highlighting the problems within the congregation and he's really ending somewhat on a high note and the ultimate one and we've talked about how
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um ancient wisdom literature followed the two paths motif and and the scripture definitely does I I set before you this day life and death choose life you know
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the path the narrow way versus the broad way so you you have the the two paths wisdom Motif and and that's really shows up in verses 19 and 20.
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what is the ultimate wrong path or what is the ultimate ailment that needs remediation well my brethren
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if any among you Strays from the truth the language is wanders from the path of Truth okay
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there's that two paths and we we are to be watching out for one another and if we see a brother wandering off the path of Truth
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then James says let him know that he who turns a sinner from the error of his way that's the word path we'll save his soul
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from death and we'll cover a multitude of sins well this is essentially the same as what Paul says in Galatians chapter 6
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he says Brethren even if a man is caught in any trespass you who are spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness each one looking to yourself lest you be tempted bear one another's
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burdens and thus fulfill the law of Christ I think if the two got together in the same room James and Paul would agree that the law of Christ is the Royal law
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you shall love your neighbor as yourself okay so okay so he finishes up with kind of a reiteration and a
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recapitulation of the patience and prayer Motif that shows up all the way through from the beginning of the letter to the end and as I as I uh I want to emphasize
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though that though that it's it's really about everyone it's about the whole Community the whole
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body and it's about the the um the mutual responsibility now that's no different than Paul in Ephesians 4 where he says the whole body being built up by
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what every joint and ligament provides building in itself up in love so again no conflict between the two but I want to point out I want to spend
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most of the time talking about verses 14 and 15. and 15. and we're very familiar with this again it's another one of those is any
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among you among you is any among you sick let him call for the Elders of the church and let them pray over them anointing him with all with oil in the name of the Lord
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and the prayer offered in faith will restore the one who is sick and the Lord will raise him up and as if he has committed sins they will be forgiven him but I want to before we get into those
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two verses because those two verses perverted and neglected
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and neglected in the history of the church but verse 16
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Protestants therefore confess your sins to one and pray for one another so that you may be healed the effective
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prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much well again the emphasis here is prayer but that's not where people go they go to the word confess
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uh-huh yeah you yeah that's the Evangelical way of doing it the sacrament of accountability and uh there are actually congregations you have time of confession I I call it a confession session
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confession session where you you confess your sins um and uh that contradicts what John says
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about to whom we confess our sins and that is God so verse 16 it can't mean that we're to have a
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confessional first for example I don't think it means that we are to have a time in our service where we stand up and confess our secret sins in front of the whole congregation
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yeah there's yeah there's they actually they're they're our churches that do that Evangelical churches that do that
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[Laughter] oh my yeah this is 21st century therefore text your sins to one another and gotta update the word you know be
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culturally relevant culturally relevant we don't actually talk to each other anymore probably and I'm not going to be dogmatic about this because the passage is I don't think the passage is intended
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to tell us something to do a ritual or part of our liturgy I think he's he's just talked about the elders but he wants to guard against
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clericalism he does he doesn't you know he just mentioned what the Elder call for the elders and the elders are going to do this but don't count on the elders to do everything pray for one another okay you still have the one and others
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you can't say okay you know you're sick go to the elders they'll take care of you you can't do that okay as to confessing sins to one
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another the most biblical uh way to interpret that through the lens of Jesus and of Paul for example would be Those whom you offended
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you know it's it's that keeping short accounts uh if you if you have your gift on the Altar and your brother has ought against you leave your gift on the Altar and go
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and be reconciled with your brother right so that's kind of the paradigm by which we should interpret what James is saying we shouldn't come up with a new liturgy or ritual just because of
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verse 16 of James chapter 5. that's that's not good hermeneutics we cannot come up with a Sacrament for everything we read in the Bible we have
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to let scripture interpret scripture and confessing our sins to one another is not for absolution it's for reconciliation
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confessing your sins to a priest is blasphemy is blasphemy or it leads to blasphemy as soon as that priest says te absolvo
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I absolve you no you don't okay so we have to stand on the whole Council of scripture even in the Old
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Testament under the levitical system they did not confess their sins to the priest they brought their sacrifice to Yahweh they laid their hands on the sacrifice
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and the priest killed it or actually in some of their sacrifices the offerer killed it okay the priest was simply there to mediate the whole
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thing but he did not um he did not absolve the people it was the shedding of the blood that brought atonement not the priest
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Okay so Okay so let's not trip over that verse 16 let's see it within its context of If anyone among you any among you any among you
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one another one another again I've mentioned this so many times I hope you don't get tired of hearing it but most of the Bible is the answer God's answer to Cain's question am I My
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Brother's Keeper and God's answer is yes you are you are yes we are and the two paths is not about just you
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walking it making it through the narrow gate and walking that narrow path and condemning all those fools over on the broad path no it's making sure your brother and your
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sister stay on the path too and when you see them they are off the path try to bring them back but as Paul says be careful lest you to be tempted
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I'm not sure if you're familiar with 19th century British prime minister politician William Gladstone interesting interesting man
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brilliant man
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well I I don't think I mean a kind of a personal that's what he called it yeah okay but that's not being careful is it
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you know we have that prayer lead us not into temptation because we're doing well enough on our own leading ourselves into temptation you know that's not what you know we we
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have to be careful as we look out for one another because the tentacles of sin are are very strong very strong and can wrap themselves around you as
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you seek to rescue a brother or sister but that doesn't mean you don't seek to rescue them rescue them so the two paths kind of is the
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governing Paradigm here but I want to talk more about this this concept go ahead
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actually no we won't talk about that because but let's let's start with that you know there there is that Jesus's disciples when they encounter the blind man they asked who sinned
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this man or his parents and Jesus response was neither notice what James says if he has committed sin
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which means that we do not deny that there is a connection between sin and sickness okay we don't deny that there's a connection we just deny that it is a direct connection all the time
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like job's friends thought it was okay listen to what Paul says in First Corinthians 11. Corinthians 11. now the Corinthians weren't doing well
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to say you know say the least um verse 28 but let a man examine himself and so let him eat of the bread and drink of the cup for he who eats and
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drinks eats and drinks judgment to himself if he does not judge the body rightly for this reason many among you are weak and sick and a
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dead for this reason there is sickness and death in your community because you are not judging the body correctly
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you are rushing to get fed and drink all the wine before your poor Brethren get there and have nothing you know all the things that they're doing wrong are sins against the body
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and because of that there was illness when when Israel sinned one of the means of God's judgment was
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plague right sickness right sickness so is there a connection between sin and sickness well would there be sickness if there were no sin in the world
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I think we have to say no right we'd have to say that in the new Heaven and the new Earth there will be no sickness there will be no sin but in this world sin is what introduced sickness into the
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world so in a general sense all illness is due to sin to sin but in a specific sense what we cannot do is make a direct causal link between
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a person's illness and sin which is why James says if he has committed any sins we don't necessarily know
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there's nothing in the in the ritual of of these two verses whereby the sick person is to confess their sins to the elders
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that's not in there okay I know that isn't that has entered into the the ritual itself and in some churches that do practice
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this elder anointing in prayer they will have a time of confession
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what we tend to do is to say have you confessed all your sins to God okay I don't need to hear them and I can't do anything about them anyhow I was here to pray
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Mark's got the oil I'm just praying I mean you know okay you follow what I'm saying I it's not in there and I'm going to talk about the history of these verses you can see you're going
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to see how it was perverted and really and really mutilated by the early church
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[Music] yes it does
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yeah well yeah that that misstep the the misstep that that gave us priests was very early on we say the Catholic church but it was
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all the Catholic church then of course um and and it was very early on where the ministers the pastors became a
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priests and that's part of the perversion of of this whole of this these two verses
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but they won't use the word freezing to use the other words yes they they won't use the word priest but again the word pastor is not from that family of words it's from poyman or Shepherd and so presbyter
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uh and Priests yeah they are related words but what's really bad is that the the one became a mediatorial
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office that required ordination it was it became a sacrament and worse than that it became what they call an indelible sacrament
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now I've mentioned this before but not all of you have been in each of the classes uh if you followed the trials and tribulations of the Roman
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Catholic Church Catholic Church with regard to uh sexual sins perversions and and you've seen how the church has
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dealt with it by moving an offending priest to a different diocese you've probably wondered
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what's wrong with them why are they doing that the world wonders well that's because the world doesn't understand that holy orders like baptism
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holy orders is an indelible sacrament meaning once it's been given it cannot be taken away
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once a priest in Narnia always a priest in order okay um they've painted themselves into a corner
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okay and then maybe that'll help you understand not not approve of not excused by any means but at least help you understand how the intricacies of their system
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their system demands certain responses that the rest of the world considered abhorrent these these men should be defrocked right they should be put away but no
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they're they're put in a different they're told not to do that they're told to stop doing that but we're going to put you into this other place and you're going to stop doing it there you're not going to stop doing it but
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see he's still a priest okay so um it's not just changing you know I I appreciate what you're what you're saying yeah the word was there
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but it wasn't just a change of words it was a complete change in the office itself and that's not just um not just semantics you know if we want to call
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Elders pastors or pastors elders that's okay that's okay because those words are used in the same context if you want to call your elders
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presbyters that's fine too that's what the word is if you want to call them Bishops because they are episcopoi they are overseers that's right there in all of
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the different passages Acts 20 first Timothy Titus okay talking about what they do they are overseers that's actually their title their title is not Elder their title is
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Bishop okay but don't start that okay I don't think either mark Or I want to be called Bishop because of what has happened with that word but the point being is if all
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we were dealing with was semantics we could we could use a wide variety of about four words we could use that are all really biblically in a sense
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synonymous one of them being a title another being a nature of the person the other being the function of the person okay so episcopos persputeroy POI men pastors Bishops
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Elders presbyters fine you know no big deal if you want to call the group of Elders a Presbytery that's okay that's just usually the Greek that's all
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okay um now I understand the associations may want you not to use those terms because then you sound like a church that you're not a denomination but that's not what happened that's mild that's benign compared to
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what actually happened where these offices became mediatorial and sacramental that's what went wrong even if we did start calling them all priests
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that's not a good word to use because of its connotation it's what a priest means that's the error and the and the blasphemy of the Roman Catholic mutation
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um so I appreciate you bringing that up in terms of the words because they are definitely related definitely related so let's talk about this um this ritual is any among you
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um sick um sick now that word literally means without it doesn't necessarily mean sick as in an illness it just means without
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strength now strength now reasonably it means that this person is is without strength due to illness and to the extent
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that they are no longer ambulatory they must call for the elders okay so the idea is they're not able to go to the elders they might not even be
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able to attend the assembly because of their weakness because of their illness whatever it is so they call for the elders now this is the only place
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that we find this ritual this ritual in the whole Bible okay and really even in the culture
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of first century Judaism and the synagogue we don't find a single I don't know of a single example I don't know one so I'll
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limit it that way I don't know of a single example where the Elders of the synagogue had a Healing Ministry within the community
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does anybody know of any have you all read up on your mishnah yeah you're pretty good on the talmud yeah okay all right so what we are talking about here and this this is this is why this is so important this is
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how often do we think about the church today as a place of healing and by that I don't mean spiritual healing see whatever this is this weakness
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there's no justification from the words themselves and the use of the word astanos or weakness to interpret this in any other way but
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physical at the end of verse 15 James does introduce the possibility of a spiritual component if any if if perhaps he has sinned but
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it isn't if right so we're dealing with a physical illness
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why don't you call the doctor why don't you call the physician you know why don't you call the doctor why do you call an elder and you don't call an elder you call the Elders okay it's really again it is uh in a sense
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the word hypoxagamina means a word that's only used once in the whole new testament this is not a word but it's the same concept this this thing
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is only here in the whole Bible and even within the biblical culture elders did not have this role
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they did yeah but they were not Elders they were no no they weren't no I mean he was the great Shepherd yes
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but when that analogy is used for example by Peter the word that he uses Shepherd the flock among you or Paul in Acts 20 Shepherd
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the flock among which God has made you overseers he's talking to elders okay the difference that we've talked about this some when we talked about the the Epistles of Paul
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you have in Ephesians 4 you have the gifts that Christ gave to the church Gifts of men Apostles prophets evangelists Pastor teachers three of those are what we might call at
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large ministers large ministers they ministered they ministered to the broad Church
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wherever they may be the fourth one is a local Ministry and Paul and Barnabas appointed Elders in the churches that they had established okay he called for the Elders of Ephesus when
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he landed at miletus okay so you have a two-fold distinction in the gifts of men one of which being Broad and to the
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whole church one of which being specific to the local church okay and that's the one that James says
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has The Healing Ministry
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yeah he sought help from Physicians and he did not seek help from Yahweh that's that's a good point but but also he did not call for the Elders of the gate he did not call for the elders because that wasn't something that
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um anybody did now you may have called for a prophet but you should have called on zelway and that's that that example
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should help us understand the true nature of physical illness and I'm kind of giving away the punch line but even though not every illness can be associated with a particular sin
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that does not mean that we cease to be Spiritual Beings Spiritual Beings and in our modern world we treat
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physical illness and physical maladies in a purely physical manner and that has caused a divorce between
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the church's Healing Ministry and the medical community medical community but even the medical community has come around to understand that there's a
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spiritual component spiritual component in healing and so they let you have your pet with you in the room every church has a chaplain you know they they have spiritual assistance because they
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understand even though they don't have any way of documenting it or measuring it they understand that a person's attitude is critical to the success of
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their healing their healing okay however they say it so the church has abandoned what the world has picked back up but the world has not picked it up in
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the truth as it is in Jesus Christ the world is simply recognized that there's more to a human being in the sense of healing there's more to a human being than just the neurochemicals and the
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physical molecules and the cancer the the material aspect of our illness you can put it just into a word of Hope it's very hard to heal a person who has
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no hope no hope people can actually um I mean I went up to Pennsylvania to help my mother find an assisted living
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care for my father who had had a stroke seven years earlier he could no longer be at home she could no longer take care of him we found a very nice place I came
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back to Greenville because he was still in the hospital they brought him to the place got him situated in the room stayed a couple days my siblings
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as they were boarding the plane to go home my father died I have no doubt that he was done okay I mean I just think he was done I
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think we have you know there's something about us obviously we don't know the day of our death the days of our life we don't know that but I do think there's something about the human
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being that is as much spiritual as it is physical and when one of them is separated from the other in terms of our healing that's malpractice but very few evangelicals will consider
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a Healing Ministry in the church
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okay it has yeah I I can't think of anybody who died
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very good yeah they're bringing in other spiritual things to help their mental well-being or even their physical well-being um they're they're becoming vegans or you know they're doing different things because we just don't even have a
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concept anymore of a Healing Ministry within the church but that actually that's a scary thing so is the holy spirit yes yes I mean
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faith whose faith is James relying on here
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yeah right that's exactly right yeah that that is scary I mean because he says the effective prayer of a righteous man accomplished monthly he died okay what does that say about my
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righteousness what does that say about my faith my faith I prayed over him I anointed him and he didn't get better so yeah it's so so what do I do do I just stop doing it because you know see
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that's the thing it is scary and it's it's uh I mean James says in chapter three let not many of you become teachers that's bad enough now I gotta heal y'all okay
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congregation arguably is much much stronger it's much scarier because that's the that's the Watchman on the wall
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you know honestly I do not think what James is saying is that Elders are Faith Healers this is not the charismata of healing that Paul speaks of in First Corinthians
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12. this is a part of the ministry of the pastors of the flock just as a Shepherd would bind up the wounds of the Sheep but not every sheep Will Survive
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okay but he will still do it because he wants the Sheep to survive and it is the will of the owner of the Sheep that he does everything in his power to to make the Sheep whole and well and
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restored so the imagery of pastoring is still intimately related here it's not and I I have to emphasize that what James is talking about is not the same
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as the gift of healing that Paul talks about in First Corinthians because that gift is given by the Holy Spirit severally as he Wills
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there's no indication that that gift is given to elders right not in First Corinthians but in James we see that part of the
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ministry of Elders is healing
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go ahead oh yeah this is you know don't worry you could go ahead
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God may have a whole different will here for this person yes he may and we have to remember that this is wisdom literature wisdom literature it is of the same genre as the proverb
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raise up a child train up a child in the way he shall go and when he is old he will not depart from it from it well what happens if he does well obviously you didn't train him
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upright see see I mean it's the same thing isn't it what if he dies well obviously you didn't have enough Faith he didn't pray right it's your fault no the wisdom that we're given is given in
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absolute terms but it can't be interpreted that way it's given because this is God's normal Providence this is what God desires but his will for each individual is beyond
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our knowledge our knowledge and what does he will that we should will we should will that that person be healed our love for them and their body
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that will mourn over the loss of that person causes us to pray for them to be healed now frankly if they are old and die suffering and in the Lord
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then our desire for them and their desire may be to go to be with the Lord and we don't anoint them with oil we pray that the passage would be peaceful okay and painless you know that's what
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we pray okay I've told people over the years you gotta be careful when you ask me to pray for people because I'm part Cecilia and you don't know how I'm going to pray
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I might pray for their healing and you know I pray for depending on who they are what they're doing they may be enemies of God David did not pray for his enemies that
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way he said your enemies are my enemies so how we pray is always is always the whole nature of prayer is are we changing God's mind
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are we interfering with God's will no we're not we're not we're actually seeking to know God's will when we pray if we're listening okay and we can't say that when somebody dies well that was God's will yes it was
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it happened therefore it was God's will all right that that's you know that's we can't let ourselves off the hook that way but and we should be as especially as
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elders examining this passage and trying to understand because James is very clear it's not the faith of the sick person sick person that heals him it's the faith of the
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elders in their prayer and that is very scary but let's talk about what's happened to this early on in in the history of the church
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really by the late second century and into the third century this um this um this ritual this ritual began to mutate
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into a sacrament that Sacrament is now one of the seven sacraments of the Roman Catholic Church and it is called Extreme unction
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so this is and you'll find it in the Catholic catechism this is the proof text for the sacrament of extreme unction now extreme unction is to be
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administered only by a priest and it is to be administered to someone who is at the point of death last rites is what it's called it's
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called Extreme unction or final unction it is to prepare them for purgatory I don't know what preparation you need for pro I think you spent your whole life preparing yourself for Purgatory
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good luck yeah better you than me uh not my time yet
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there's no way you can get either a priest or a death bed anointing out of this verse out of this passage it just isn't there these these people are not on their deathbed they are
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simply sick simply sick obviously the sickness is is severe enough that they want to call for the elders and they can't apparently go to the
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but by calling the elders as local ministers as local pastors James is James is is saying this this is part of the any among you or the one and others
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this is not a sasser-dotal ritual that needs to be performed only by ordained priests ordained priests by the way
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is subject to a lot of debate as far as its biblical application we ordain our deacons we ordain our elders but we are not making them by doing that we are not making them mediatorial or in
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any way Sasser dotal we do not mediate grace through offices God doesn't do that he mediates grace through his holy spirit
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so this is the progression or the digression of what happened I'm gonna I'm gonna read a summary there's actually a passage um in your notes
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from the Catholic catechism regarding the definition and application of extreme unction extreme unction but I want to read a passage from Alec
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Mosher in his commentary he says by the third Century A.D it had become the custom for oil used in anointing to sick the sick to be consecrated by the
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bishop of the area in which it was to be used so you would get at a church you would get a vial of blessed oil and that's what you would use as a priest to anoint the sick okay so that's
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kind of the first thing is we got to bless the oil by the 10th Century it was increasingly the practice to insist that the anointing be carried out by a priest
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by the 12th century the terms extreme unction and sacrament of the dying are found and the anointing is restricted to those whose imminent death seems certain
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in the 13th century the ceremony of anointing was declared to be one of the seven sacraments of the church instituted by Christ himself so that the Council of Trent 1545 can
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pronounce an anathema on anyone who denies that extreme unction is properly a Sacrament instituted by Christ promulgated by the Blessed Apostle James
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that he'd even get the right James but by the 16th century it is now you are accursed are accursed if you disagree
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that number one a priest must do it and number two it's at the point of death in other words we're going to take this passage rip it apart rework it and then tell you that you are
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accursed if you simply read the text and come away thinking that any Elders can gather and pray over the sick so the ministry of healing first thing that happened to the ministry of healing
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is that it was clericalized sacramentalized it became part of the Priestly Ministry and then it was
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marginalized to the point of death now since Vatican II they have backed off of that extreme unction is still one of the
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seven sacraments seven sacraments it's also indelible by the way because you're dead afterwards so it can't go away um that was a joke
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I thought it was funny but second Vatican did try to expand it to include sick people who are not on the verge of death
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practically speaking though it is still extreme unction and that's what they do so when a person a Catholic is near death or believe themselves to be you know they're in the hospital and the
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doctors have called for the family where they call for the priest too because he's got to have that final oil or he's not ready not ready to cross the river sticks and you know go into the Afterlife
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um so boy how'd this happen how did um how did how did the Catholic Church
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um mess up mess up this simple passage so powerfully but what about the evangelicals what have we done
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uh section commentary that kind of indicates I I like it because it indicates that we really had to work hard to miss
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to miss the meaning of this passage we really had to work hard to first of all screw it up the way the Catholics have done
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but what have we done as evangelicals well we've abandoned it and those who over periods of time chronically have picked it back up again
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we've looked at as weirdos because many of them were okay in fact one one commentator mentions some of them you've heard some of these names
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Amy simple McPherson Mary Baker Eddie Little David but this particular scholar says he comments on this phenomenon quote how