The man bowed down before him and said, “Lord, you can heal me if you will.”ģ Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man and said, “I will. 2 Then a man with a skin disease came to Jesus. He blogs at Experimental Theology, where this post originally appeared.8 When Jesus came down from the hill, great crowds followed him. Richard’s area of interest - be it research, writing or blogging - is on the interface of Christian theology and psychology, with a particular focus on how existential issues affect Christian belief and practice. ![]() He is the author of Unclean: Meditations on Purity, Hospitality and Mortality. Richard Beck is professor and department chair of psychology at Abilene Christian University. But it seems clear to me that the focus of the text is less about praying for miraculous healing than upon confession and the healing/resurrecting of sinners. None of this is to deny that there is a medical or physical aspect to the text. if one of you should wander from the truth and someone should bring that person back, remember this: Whoever turns a sinner from the error of their way will save them from death and cover over a multitude of sins. Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. and if he have committed sins, it shall be forgiven him. The prayer of faith shall save him that is sick, and the Lord shall raise him up. Let me edit the passage to make it more compact: Overall, then, the focus on healing from 5:14 to 5:20 seems to be more spiritual than physical, more focused on the restoration that comes from confession. In short, it seems that “powerful and effective” prayer has less to do with stopping rain than with the restoration of sinners, saving them from death and covering over a multitude of sins. My brothers and sisters, if one of you should wander from the truth and someone should bring that person back, remember this: Whoever turns a sinner from the error of their way will save them from death and cover over a multitude of sins. But once again the text shifts away from the “miraculous” and back toward the moral and confessional: Like with the prayer for the sick, taken out of context this text is often cited as an example of the powerful and miraculous effects of prayer. Again he prayed, and the heavens gave rain, and the earth produced its crops. He prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the land for three and a half years. Powerful and effective in what way? Well, the text goes on to talk about Elijah:Įlijah was a human being, even as we are. The “powerful and effective prayer” of the righteous is, thus, connected to the “confession of sins.” To be sure, the healing here may be physical, but the ailment is connected to a moral infirmity: the remedy is clearly the confession of sins. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.Ĭonfess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. Because if the sick person has committed sins these will be forgiven.Įven the phrase “the Lord shall rise him up” can be taken in a spiritual light as this is the same term used to describe resurrection.Īnd the spiritual focus on confession and the restoration of sinners continues in the very next verse: ![]() The prayer of faith with “save” the sick. Looking at the whole context you could plausibly make the case that the prayers of the elders described here are focused upon spiritual healing. ![]() Is any among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord: and the prayer of faith shall save him that is sick, and the Lord shall raise him up and if he have committed sins, it shall be forgiven him. So here is a more literal reading of the same passage from the ASV including the entirety of 5:15: The literal word is “save,” the word that is typically used to describe God saving us from sin. That confessional context pushes back on how the NIV translates the word “well” in 5:15. In light of those issues, what recently struck me about this text is the moral and confessional context of the entire passage. The prayer wasn’t answered because we didn’t have enough faith. Adding to the problem, in the face of those unanswered prayers, we wonder if the prayer wasn’t offered “in faith.” Maybe, then, it was our fault. The promise of healing described here - “the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well” - collides with the reality we face in praying for sick people who regularly aren’t healed. And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well the Lord will raise them up. Is anyone among you sick? Let them call the elders of the church to pray over them and anoint them with oil in the name of the Lord. James 5:14-15 has always been a difficult text for me:
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