Henry Krabbendam - James - World Evangelical Alliance

family and church members. But we should also pray for neighbors and
strangers. 378
By way of final comment, one commentator brings up the vast difference
between the procedures James lays out in his day and for all Christians
at all times and today’s rather anemic habits.
Then: “Are you sick? Call for the church leaders. They will pray and
anoint you with oil. You will be saved, raised and forgiven. So confess your
sins and pray, and you will be healed.”
Comment: “What we find is an almost complete, and seemingly indiscriminate,
mixing of sin, sickness, confession, healing, and forgiveness, with
a little salvation and resurrection thrown in for good measure.”
Now: “If we are sick, we go to a doctor (we can summon all we want, it
won’t help). If we have sinned, we confess our sins and are forgiven. The
physical and the spiritual are two entirely different things, and we intend to
keep them that way, unless, of course, the medicine is not working or the diagnosis
is dire. Then, the spiritual, driven by a confrontation with our own
mortality, is suddenly welcome, and we pray like crazy.”
Comment: “So who is crazy? We who wait until the doctor says, ‘There
is nothing more we can do. All we can do is pray’ before attempting to deal
with our own mortality, or James, who ... begins to pray at the first sign of
illness ... and (in the process) addresses sickness, sin, health and forgiveness
together?” (For all this, see Brosend, 160-161.) Clearly, to ask the question is
to answer it.
(2) Man of Prayer (5:17)
At this point James refers to Elijah as a true model of a man of prayer. He
“infers a general rule out of a single instance from a man whose life was full
of prodigy and wonder, because the precept of praying and the promise of
being heard are universal” (Manton, 465). The purpose of bringing him into
the picture is twofold. First, his example will add to the confidence of the
readers in their prayers for the sick. Second, it will stir them up to turn to God
with confidence in any and all of their prayers, whatever the content or purpose,
as long as they are based on Scripture and glorifying to God!
The text says that Elijah, as “assumed from 1 Kings 17:1 and 18:42”
(Burdick, 204), "prayed and prayed" (Laws, 235), "prayed intensely" (Martin,
378
For the requirements of effective prayer, see once again Topical Focus # 6, which is inserted
in my exposition of James 1:5-8.
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