Introduction:
How to See Prayer Answered (James 5:13-18):
- Make prayer the Norm . (Jas 5:13)
1 Thessalonians 5:17 - pray without ceasing…
- Call for Help . (Jas 5:14-15)
- Deal with Sin openly. (Jas 5:16)
- Believe that prayer Works . (Jas 5:17-18)
Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
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00:39-01:23
James chapter 5. Are you there? Let's bow our heads. I'm going to ask that you would please pray for me to be faithful to communicate God's Word and I will pray for you to have a heart open ready to receive it. All right, let's just take a moment and pray. Father in heaven, we come to your Word. I pray that you would Give us the faith that we need to actually believe what you said to the point that it makes a difference in the way that we live.
01:30-01:41
Your Holy Spirit has a way of taking your Word and making perfect application, bringing conviction and bringing the change that we need.
01:42-01:53
And Father, I pray that that's exactly what happens to those in this room, those who will be joining us later, those who will be watching this stream or listening to the podcast later.
01:53-01:59
I just ask, Father, that you are exalted and glorified over all.
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We pray in Jesus' name, Amen.
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James chapter 5, are you there?
02:10-02:15
Imagine that I move away and I send a letter to the church.
02:17-02:20
And Pastor Taylor gets up and he says, "Hey, we got a letter from Jeff.
02:20-02:23
I'm going to tell you what he has to say." and he opens up the letter.
02:25-02:39
Instead of like reading the whole letter, he just flips it over and says, Jeff says, "He is such a big baby." And then Taylor's like, "What do you think he meant by that?
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"He is such a big baby." And somebody would say, "Oh, he has a, him and Aaron have these friends.
02:46-02:49
"They just had a 10 and a half pound infant.
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"That's what he's talking about.
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he's such a big baby." Somebody else was like, "No, no, no, no, no, no, no.
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No, he's not talking about that.
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He's talking about he has, they have boxers And somebody else would say, "No, no, no, no, no, no.
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That's not what he's talking about at all." Jeff worked with this guy.
03:15-03:18
They woulda tease him and stuff and he'd always boo-hoo and cry.
03:18-03:26
And he's like, "Oh, he's such a big baby." And could it mean any of those?
03:27-03:29
Sure, it could.
03:30-03:32
Could it mean all three of those things at the same time?
03:34-03:41
No, because we're talking about an infant, we're talking about a dog, and we're talking about a man.
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So how do you know?
03:45-03:46
How do you know what the big baby is?
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Well, you take the letter and you read that statement and it's context, right?
03:53-03:55
It says here, "Our dogs are doing great.
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"Lou is 80 pounds, but still loves to climb on my lap.
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"He is such a big baby." Oh, okay, now we know what the big baby is.
04:07-04:13
And you're like, "Yes, we do, "but I don't know why you're telling us this." Because that's how some people read the Bible.
04:15-05:15
They just kind of pull a verse out make it mean what I think it means, but you can't do that. You have to understand the meaning of the passage in its context to understand what is actually being said. That's why at Harvest Bible Chapel we preach through books of the Bible so that we get the context. But there's another reason that I'm telling you this. We're getting to a passage today that's about prayer and healing and this passage is so often taken out of context and it leaves people feeling disappointed by God. Some people look at this passage and say, "Look, this passage guarantees healing from diseases.
05:18-05:19
And it really doesn't.
05:22-05:35
Because the context of the passage, and if you've been with us as we've been going through, James, he's been talking about spiritual suffering is what he's been talking about throughout chapter five over and over and over.
05:35-05:37
He's like, be patient, be patient, be patient.
05:37-05:40
He's talking about people that are spiritually suffering.
05:40-05:44
He says, look at Job's example in suffering and in patience.
05:44-05:50
And this passage that we're looking at today, please hear me because this is so important.
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This passage isn't about physical suffering.
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As much as it's about spiritual suffering.
05:59-06:03
Talking about weakness, talking about depression.
06:06-06:16
And that's actually much more relevant for us, Because I can tell you as a pastor, there are more people in the church that are afflicted by spiritual suffering than physical.
06:20-06:31
Because church, despite us knowing our Bibles, despite us having good theology, sometimes we get overwhelmed with trials in life.
06:33-06:35
Maybe it's a relationship problem.
06:36-06:39
Or maybe you're just going through a season of discouragement.
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Maybe you're just flat out dealing with depression.
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Look, maybe it's because of something you've done.
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Maybe it's because of something somebody else did to you.
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But that's the topic on the table here.
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Is what do you do when trials have you beat down?
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Right, that's the context of the passage, what do you do when trials have you beat down, the answer is prayer.
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And there's a guarantee.
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To have your prayers answered.
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When you're spiritually weak.
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So on your outline, how does he prayer answered?
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How does he prayer answered?
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Number one, make prayer the norm.
07:36-07:37
Look at verse 13.
07:38-07:45
He says, "Is anyone among you suffering?" Let him pray.
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"Is anyone cheerful?" Let him sing praise.
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Now that word for suffering here in verse 13, It's the same word he uses in verse 10.
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He's talking about the spiritual suffering that the prophets had to endure.
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And he says, when you're suffering, when you're spiritually beat down, he says, pray.
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Now, the problem with us, especially those of us that have been around the church for any length of time, sometimes that just seems trite.
08:25-08:27
"Oh, you're just going to tell me to pray." Yes.
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And it's not trite.
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Because here's the thing, if you're having a problem with your back, go see the chiropractor, right?
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If you're having a problem with your tooth, go see the dentist, right?
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If you're having a problem with your soul, there's only one person who can fix that.
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And that's God Himself.
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Then He says also here, He goes, "Are you cheerful?" That word literally means, "Are you well feeling?" He says, "If you're feeling good," he goes, "then praise." And that's really a form of prayer, isn't it?
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It's all communication with God.
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If you're in a good season in life, let God know that you love Him.
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Let God know that you trust Him.
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Tell God how thankful you are for everything.
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All right, so really in verse 13, he's just, he says all the bases are covered.
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Is your soul suffering?
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He says, pray.
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Are you in a good place?
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Then praise.
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In church, prayer is so much more than giving God the wishlist.
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That's how some people view prayer.
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And that's why some people are disappointed by prayer, is they view God as Santa Claus.
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I just, I have my list and I just show up and I tell God, this is, okay, here's the stuff that I want.
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He's not Santa Claus.
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Some people view God as a vending machine.
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It's just a purely transactional thing.
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I just tell God what I want.
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I push a couple of buttons and he gives me what I want.
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Look, God's not a vending machine.
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You study your Bibles, people, the Bible says he's a person, he's a father, he's a king, he's a shepherd, he's a counselor.
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You see, prayer is so much more than just giving God the to-do list.
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Prayer first and foremost is about the relationship with God that he's provided through Jesus Christ.
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It's about the relationship.
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I think sometimes we miss that because we have such a small view of prayer.
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God's after the relationship.
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You know, think like, in terms of marriage.
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Imagine if the only time I talked to my wife was when I wanted something.
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Imagine that.
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I come home and I'm like, "Hungry, I want food." And then after I eat, I'm like, "Thirsty, want drink." She gets me a drink.
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I sit on the couch.
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I'm like, "Change channel, don't want to watch Family Feud." But I have much of a relationship with my wife if that was the interaction that I had with her.
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And I know some of you are like, "You wouldn't have much of a relationship with her and Pastor Jeff I know your wife, you also wouldn't have very many teeth if you talk to your wife that way." And that's true.
11:56-11:59
But for some people that's how they view prayer.
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I said, "Okay, God, this is the time that I get down "and tell you all the stuff that I want." When was the last time that you prayed just to give thanks to God?
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When was the last time that you just prayed prayers of worship, praise, for who God is?
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When was the last time you prayed, God, I just wanna be close to you.
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That's all I'm asking for, is let me know your abiding presence by your Holy Spirit.
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God, I know you're with me.
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God, please let me experience that and live that and believe that.
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When was the last time you prayed something like that?
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Now, listen, I don't want anybody to misunderstand me.
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Yes, absolutely, we should make our requests known to God.
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Absolutely.
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But if that's how you view prayer, I want to encourage you this morning to get a bigger view.
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And if you commit yourself to making prayer more than the occasional check-in or your grocery list of once, you're gonna have eyes to see God at work all over the place because you're constantly aware of His abiding presence.
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That's why Paul says in 1 Thessalonians 5, 17, pray without ceasing.
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You need to see prayer as constant communication with your heavenly Father, not this occasional event that I try to squeeze into my day.
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Make prayer the norm, and you're gonna see God's hand at work everywhere in your life.
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How does he pray?
13:55-14:35
make prayer the norm and you're like okay Pastor Jeff that's all well and good but you know what we're talking about suffering here and quite honestly I just I'm having a really hard time praying right now. Okay well if that's you then let's let's move on to number two. How does he prayer answered? Call for help. Call for help. Look at verse 14 he says 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." Oh, this is a part that gets misunderstood a lot.
14:36-14:46
Some people read this and say, "Okay, so this is saying if you have a disease, "you call the elders and then they heal you." And that's really not what this verse is talking about.
14:47-15:01
Again, I don't wanna be misunderstood 'cause somebody right now is like, "Pastor Jeff doesn't believe that God heals diseases." I actually in my notes had a list of like people and incidences from our church where we saw God heal.
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And I had to cut that out because it was gonna take way too much time.
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I have seen God directly heal people in my family, in the church so many times over the past 20 some years, so many times.
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Buy me Chick-fil-A sometime and we'll sit down and I'll tell you about them.
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I just don't have time today.
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But I do believe that.
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But that's not the subject of this passage.
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See, the word sick here, is anyone among you sick?
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The word sick literally in the Greek means opposite of powerful.
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It's talking about somebody who's weak or feeble.
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In fact, they found this word in secular Greek, And it was used to describe a soldier who was worn out from being in too many battles.
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So the word sick doesn't really mean you have cancer or COVID.
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It means that you're just spiritually worn out.
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You're at the end of your rope.
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So much so, that you, you're like, I just, I can't, I can't pray right now.
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And if we're gonna be totally honest, I really don't wanna pray right now.
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I just don't, I'm not there.
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I just don't want to.
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So what he's saying here is, listen, if you feel like you're at the place in your life where you're so weak that you can't pray like you know you should, what should you do?
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He says, call the elders.
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That's what you do, call the elders.
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By the way, that's our primary job.
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more than counseling, more than meetings, more than updating the website.
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Our primary job as church leaders is to pray.
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So James would say, look, if you're weak, you need somebody to pray over you, so get a guy who gets prayer.
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That's what he's saying.
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Get the guy who gets prayer and get him to pray over you.
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When my son was younger, let's just say I got a lot of experience in my life on clogging toilets because my son flushed everything.
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And I just didn't have the coin to call the plumber every time.
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I learned.
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And you buy the plumbing stuff at the hardware store.
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You know, you buy the snake and all these little contraptions and pumps and ropes and pulleys and all these things.
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But I've unplugged a lot of toilets in my time.
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And I kind of get, you know, like, if you're little and you don't really understand how it works and what it's for, it does kind of look like a porcelain wishing well.
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But I've unplugged so many things.
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Do you know the hardest thing I've ever gotten out of our pipes?
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Slinky.
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That took like literally days of just going back to it, working on it a half hour, going back to it.
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Yeah.
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I've spent more time in our pipes than like Super Mario.
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I mean, but there have been times that My little Home Depot tools couldn't do the job.
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And there was a season in our life where I had our plumber on speed dial.
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His name's Ray.
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And he would come.
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The one time in particular, I tried and tried and tried.
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I can't figure out what's going on.
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And he comes with his van, and he pulls out this giant-- it's like a plumbing snake, but it's hooked up to some giant machine.
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So it's just like, brrrrr.
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Ray hooked this thing up.
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And you know those candy, the Gushers, those little gummy candies where you bite into them and you get the squirt of the fruity toothpaste or whatever?
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Well, Owen ate a whole box of those and flushed all the wrappers at the same time.
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And you're like, why are you telling us this?
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And I can't remember why I was supposed to tell you this.
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Oh yeah, I remember.
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The point is this.
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I got to a place so often in plumbing where it was just-- I was swinging above my weight class, and I needed to call in the pros to do what I wasn't able to do.
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And really, that's what James is saying here.
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When you're at the place in your life that you're like, I can't-- I just can't pray.
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I'm so weak right now, I can't do it.
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It's the same principle.
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He says, call in the big guns.
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Call in the big guns.
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But going on, he says, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord.
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Let's talk about anointing with oil.
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Like, what does that mean?
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Well, I've spent a lot of time studying this, a lot.
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Not just this past week, the elders actually did a deep dive on this many years ago.
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What does this mean, anoint with oil?
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Well, you take a trip through the Bible and you see all kinds of things with the oil, right?
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Like you can go to the Old Testament and see King Saul, he was anointed king.
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Then you go to Matthew chapter 26, Jesus was anointed.
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And sometimes it looks like anointing with oil is symbolic.
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And I've heard people say, well, anointing with oil, that's just a symbol of the Holy Spirit.
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That's all it is, it's purely symbolic, like communion, like baptism.
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It's the same kind of thing, it's purely symbolic.
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Well, keep studying in your Bible.
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You also see the guests would often be anointed, right?
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Like Psalm 23, you anoint my head with oil, right?
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And it was a matter of comfort, right?
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And some people say, well, that's what James is saying here is the elders should seek to refresh somebody.
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Like somebody who's like beat down and weak.
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It's the elder's job to sort of, you know, pep them up, right?
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Some people say, "No, no, this is topical relief, right?
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"This is like medicinal." Because sometimes oil was used that way.
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You know the story that Jesus told about the good Samaritan?
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That's what he did.
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When he found the man beat up, he anointed him with oil.
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It was medicinal.
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And some people say that's what he's talking about here.
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It's purely, you know, he's saying elders, Pray over them, yes, but also use medicine.
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But then we go to Mark 6 in verse 13, we see that the apostles anointed with oil as they healed people.
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And you're like, all right, so that's what the Bible says about anointing, but what is it here?
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I think you can make a case for any of them.
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Like, well, Jeff, when somebody comes to you and asks for anointing with oil, do you do it or do you not do it?
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And here's the answer, I always have.
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And I always will, if somebody comes to request that.
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Because I see it as an act of faith.
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The person that comes and they're at the point, they're like, hey, can you anoint me with oil and pray for me?
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They're crying out in faith.
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So I do it.
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But there's a promise attached to it.
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Look at verse 15.
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He says, "And the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up." There's the refreshing.
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When you pray over someone who's weak, the Lord will refresh them.
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He'll awaken them, and I've seen that countless times.
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That's the promise to answer.
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Because you see, the power is not in the oil, and the power is not in the elder.
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The power of prayer is from God himself.
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He goes on, he says, "And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven." If, by the way, for people that think any time you're suffering it's because you're sinning and God's, you know, hitting you with the whammy, that's not the case at all.
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He says, "If." Sometimes your problem is your own sin, but sometimes, as we said earlier, your problem is other people's sin.
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But he says, "If, if he has committed sins," and here he's talking about people who are spiritually weak.
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You know, when you're in that state, you're susceptible to doing things that you know that you shouldn't do.
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You are prone to sin when you're weak.
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Complaining, doubting, fighting, being lazy, maybe going back to some addiction.
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He says, you know, somebody in that state needs reminded of what Jesus Christ has done.
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They need reminded of our identity in Christ.
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And God is going to cleanse whatever in your heart needs cleansed.
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So we've all been to the place in our walks.
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where we just can't pray.
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James says, "Get help from people who can." Right?
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How does he pray?
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Answered, make it the norm, call for help.
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Number three, oh, speaking of sin, deal with sin openly.
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Look at verse 16.
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He says, "Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another that you may be healed.
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You want to see prayer answered, you want to be recharged in your walk with God, well, then you've got to deal with sin.
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Because when it comes to prayer, so often what's what's most on our hearts and what's most on God's heart.
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Not always the same thing.
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Here's what I mean.
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For some people, they're like, God, I really want this job.
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And that's what I'm praying for, God.
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I want this job, I want this job.
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Meanwhile, God's saying, I want you free from that addiction.
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That's the thing that's dominating your life right now.
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Or we're like, God, I just, God, I just wanna get married.
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God, put the right person in my life because I just wanna get married.
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And meanwhile, God says, "No, I want you free from idolatry because that's where you are right now." We're so often like, "God, this is what I'm praying for.
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This is the thing." And God's like, "No, wait, wait, wait.
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You have a sin that's a much bigger issue.
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Are we just gonna ignore that?" You see the point?
27:10-27:16
Sometimes I think God wants to deal with something that we're not wanting to deal with.
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We've got to deal with sin.
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We've got to deal with sin.
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He says we need to confess to one another.
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Confess to one another.
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Like, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh.
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That's uncomfortable.
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Why can't I just confess to God?
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Well, lots of reasons.
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How about accountability?
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How about sin wants to hide, right?
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That's just the way sin is.
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Remember, Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve sinned.
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What was the first thing they did?
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After covering themselves, they went and they hid from God.
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That's how sin is.
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And if you want to defeat sin, that means you've got to grab it by the seat of the pants and the scruff of its miserable neck and drag it out into the open.
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Hey, we're dealing with this.
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But you've got to drag it out.
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That's why we confess to one another, get the whole church involved.
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Get the elders, yes, get your ministry team leader, get your small group leader.
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Let this be a community where we deal with sin and not just pretend that it's not happening.
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The worst thing you can do if you're struggling with sin, the worst thing you can do is the natural tendency of most people, and that's to isolate, run and hide.
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Oh, you know what?
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I'm just gonna stream from home, not because of health reasons, but because there's a sin thing that I know God wants to deal with, and just quite frankly, I just don't wanna deal with it.
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And you're like, man, that's easier said than done, Jeff.
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I really don't want people, I don't want people to know how I'm struggling.
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And I'd like to take this opportunity to remind you that I'm the worst sinner that I know.
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In fact, my sin was so bad.
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You know how bad my sin was?
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My sin was so bad that it took the death of the sinless son of God to pay the penalty for my sin.
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That's how horrible my sin is.
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And if you think you're the only one struggling with whatever sin it is that you're struggling with.
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You're deceiving yourself.
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It takes incredible humility to open up about sin.
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But as we've already learned from James, we're called to humble ourselves.
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Look at verse 15 again, I'm sorry, 16.
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He says, "The prayer of a righteous person "has great power as it is working." So if you're weak, if you're struggling, he says, hey, there's real power on display when a righteous person prays.
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Do you believe that?
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Do you believe that?
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I hope so because number four is believe that prayer works.
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Believe that prayer works.
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He says, Elijah was a man with a nature like ours and he prayed fervently that it might not rain.
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And for three years and six months, it did not rain on the earth.
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Then he prayed again, and heaven gave rain, and the earth bore its fruit.
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You see, previous passage, he says the prayer of a righteous person has power.
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And I think we look at that, and we get all humble, and we say, well, the prayer of a righteous person.
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Yeah, I don't know if I'd put myself in this category.
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I don't really think, I don't really think, Jeff, that I'm anything special.
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And I would say, good.
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I'm glad you think that because you're not.
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But that's not a requirement for prayer to work.
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That's one of the reasons he mentioned Elijah.
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Elijah was a normal guy, right?
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Read his story.
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He suffered.
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He was fearful.
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He battled depression.
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He got completely worn out, but he prayed.
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You know, we tend, just like the Jews that would have received this correspondence from James, we tend to sort of romanticize and idealize these Old Testament people.
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We're like, "Man, you know, people like Elijah, he was awesome!" And no, no he wasn't.
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His God was.
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His God is awesome.
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And that's the point here.
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Elijah's God is the one with the power.
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And you can pray to the same God.
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This is another reason I believe this passage isn't primarily speaking about physical healing.
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Because if that was what James was talking about, was healing from diseases, he could have used a lot of examples from Elijah.
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He could have used examples from other people in the Old Testament to illustrate that.
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But instead, look at the analogy he gives.
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A dry, parched land, receiving rain, resulting in fruitfulness.
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That's James' analogy here.
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When you're spiritually weak, when you're spiritually dry, you aren't fruitful.
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But prayer brings refreshment from God, bringing you back to life and once again, fruitful for ministry.
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He said, "Do I believe that prayer works?
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I absolutely do.
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Not because I'm anything special, but because God is powerful.
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And He has promised to refresh those who are weak and who will cry out to Him.
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Our worship team would make their way back to the platform.
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I just want to ask you, would you just bow your heads?
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Let's just take a moment here.
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Let me ask you, are you in a place right now where you're worn out?
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Are you in a place in your life right now where you feel beat down?
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God wants to restore your joy.
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But are you willing to pray?
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I don't just mean say your prayers or go through a list, and the list is important, but to go beyond that, to say, "God, I'm not just going to read you a list of sick people, but I want to tell you what's on my heart.
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Are you willing to do that?" If you're like, "You know what, Jeff, I don't think I can right now.
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I'm just not there." Well, then are you willing to call for help?
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And if there is sin in your life, if the circumstances of life have just gotten you to the point that you're just like, "I don't care!" Are you willing to deal with the sin?
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Are you willing to believe that there's power in prayer because you're praying to a powerful God?
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And if you're like, yeah, you know what, Jeff?
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Yeah, I am there.
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I am there and I am willing, then I would say, well, according to the promise of God's word, you're going to see prayer answered.
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So let's get to it.
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Father in heaven, we've all been there.
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In fact, some of our Christian brothers and sisters are there right now.
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Just weak, just worn out.
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been fighting too hard and too long. Don't see end in sight. Just despondent and discouraged and depressed. Father, we've all been there. And Father, we confess to you that our tendency is to run from you. To run from the church, to run from our brothers and sisters. And that's the worst thing we can do, Father.
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I pray that You would draw us to You. You would draw us to Your people. And that we would experience the kind of refreshment that You promised here in this passage.
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Like a land that hasn't received rain in three and a half years, suddenly drinking in the rain. Father, I pray that you would give us the faith. I pray, Father, that you would give us the humility, that we're willing to do business with you the way that you've called us to. Pray in Jesus' name, Amen.
Small Group Discussion
Read James 5:13-18
What was your big take-away from this passage / message?
Why do you think most of our prayer requests are about physical needs, and relatively few are about spiritual needs?
Why does James instruct us to call on church leaders for prayer (Jas 5:14)? What do you think is the purpose of the oil?
How would you respond to someone who says “I tried praying - and it didn’t work.”?
What was the point of the Elijah illustration (Jas 5:17-18)? What does this teach us about answered prayer in our lives?
Breakout
Pray for one another.