James Expounds on Faith Volume 60

 Praying in Faith Part 5

James 5:17-18 Elias/Elijah was a man subject to like passions as we are, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain: and it rained not on the earth by the space of three years and six months. And he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain, and the earth brought forth her fruit. KJV Note: NKJV=New King James Version

We just heard from the Apostle James how the effectual fervant prayer of a righteous man 👨 bears much fruit, well the Apostle now reminded those scattered Jewish brothers and sisters in Christ Jesus our Lord as he so reminds we brothers and sisters 'in Christ' today and of every era and generation of the efforts, exploits, and endeavors of the Prophet of God Elijah who was a weak sinful man just like we are today and in every era and generation of those who truly belong to Adonai/Elohim, as it is 📝 written, "Elias/Elijah was a man subject to like passions as we are, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain: and it rained not on the earth by the space of three years and six months. And he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain, and the earth brought forth her fruit." (James 5:17-18) (KJV). Somehow, those of us alive today who have come to our Lord Jesus Christ in repentance and faith falsely believe that those saints of God who lived hundreds of years and even thousands of years before we came upon the earth 🌎 were somehow different than we are, i.e. 'supersaints'. Reality is that they were vile sinners just like us, but the same God/Jesus whom we belong to did miraculous deeds through them. Why? Was it because they were special? Of course not, they were simply obedient and faithful. Is this word from the Word of God true or not? "Jesus Christ the same yesterday and today and forever." (Hebrews 13:8) (KJV). Well, if it is true and it is, then this same Jesus/God can do whatever He wills to do today as He did yesterday and as He will do forever, through the obedient faith and prayers of any righteous son or daughter of His. Is God/Jesus dead or is He alive for evermore? Let us not think that Elijah was not a wretched sinner, because he was, as well as King David, the Apostle Paul, Peter, John, James and all who came to belong to Christ Jesus our Lord just like we do. Let us stop this foolishness of arguing over whether God still answers the seemingly impossible prayers of His sons and daughters with miracles that cannot be explained by the finite minds that belong to all human beings. Brothers and Sisters 'in Christ' over the centuries have prayed for some of the most hopeless cases of people still dead in their tresspasses and sins to be born again and those sinners salvation by grace through faith happened. I just read 📖 that the women who was the star in the popular reality TV show Ink (Kate Von D) has made a profession of faith in our Lord Jesus Christ and she ended up going to a small Baptist Church not far from her home in Indiana. When she went the saints there told her they had been praying for her ever since she moved into her new home (how long they prayed I do not know). This may seem like nothing to many cynical minded folk, but God is God over everything happening within His Universe 🌌, so He does not miss the prayers of a one or a few, just like He does not miss the prayers of many. You know the people who are quick to discount miracles always do so until their little girl 👧 or little boy 👦 is sick unto death, then you better believe they are praying for a miracle from God to save the life of their child 🧒 just as they should be doing. God makes miracles happen every day in the life of His adopted sons and daughters, except many of us fail to see them (there are some we cannot see) because our faith is at such a weak and low state or condition. The Apostle James was originally writing to the new converts to Christ from the 12 Tribes of Judah who were being viciously persecuted which is what caused them to flee to various other parts of the world 🗺 during that time. The Apostle wanted them to know that Elijah was just like them and God received his prayers and answered in a Mighty way that could only be attributed, acknowledged, or accounted that God had shut up the rain for three (3) years and that at the faithful praying of Elijah, He (God) had brought forth the rain once again to the land. In other words, Brother James wanted them to know that they are not less of saints than Elijah, nor was Elijah a greater saint than they or us today, but they too can pray for big things they needed and for the protection they needed from the violent assaults coming from the devil through his two-legged devils and God would hear them and hear us.

Here is what the Expositors' Bible Commentary had to say of James 5:17-18, "The example by which St. James proves the efficacy of a righteous man’s prayer is interesting and important in two respects:- (1.) It is the only evidence that we have that the great drought in the time of Ahab was prayed for by Elijah, and it is the only direct evidence that he prayed for the rain which put an end to it. We are told that Elijah prophesied the drought (1 Kings 17:1) and the rain; (1 Kiings 18:41) and that before the rain he put himself in an attitude of prayer, with his face between his knees (1 Kings 18:42); but that he prayed, and for the rain which he had foretold, is not stated. Whether the statement made by St. James is an inference from these statements, or based on independent tradition, must remain uncertain. We read in Ecclesiasticus of Elijah that by 'the Word of the Lord he shut up (held back), the heaven' (48:3); but that seems to refer to prophecy rather than to prayer. The difference, if there be any, between the duration of the drought as stated here and by St. Luke, (Luke 4:25) and as stated in the Book of the Kings, will not be a stumbling-block to any who recognize that inspiration does not necessarily make a man infallible in chronology. Three and a half years (=42 months= 1,260 days) was the traditional duration of times of great calamity. (Daniel 7:25; Daniel 12:7; Revelation 11:2-3; Revelation 12:6; Revelation 12:14; Revelation 13:5) (2.) This passage supplies us with Biblical authority for prayers for changes of weather, and the like; for the conduct of Elijah is evidently put before us for our imitation. St. James carefully guards against the objection that Elijah was a man gifted with miraculous powers, and therefore no guide for ordinary people, by asserting that he was a man of like nature with ourselves. And let us concede, for the sake of argument, that St. James may have been mistaken in believing that Elijah prayed for the drought and for the rain; yet still the fact remains that an inspired New Testament writer puts before us, for our encouragement in prayer, a case in which prayers for changes of weather were made and answered. And he certainly exhorts us to pray for the recovery of the sick, which is an analogous case. This kind of prayer seems to require special consideration. 'Is it, then, according to the Divine will that when we are individually suffering from the regularity of the course of nature-suffering, for instance, from the want of rain, or the superabundance of it-we should ask God to interfere with that regularity? That in such circumstances we should pray for submission to the Divine will, and for such wisdom as shall lead to compliance with it in the future, is a matter of course, and results inevitably from the relation between the spiritual Father and the spiritual child. But ought we to go farther than this? Ought we to pray, expecting that our prayer will be effectual, that God may interfere with the fixed sequences of nature? Let us try to realize what Would follow if we offered such prayer and prevailed. In a world-wide Church each believer would constitute himself a judge of what was best for himself and his neighbor, and thus the order of the world would be at the mercy everywhere of individual caprice (a sudden desire) and ignorance. Irregularity would accordingly take the place of invariableness. No man could possibly foretell what would be on the morrow. The scientist would find all his researches for rule and law baffled; the agriculturist would find all his calculations upset; nature, again, as in the days of ignorance, would become the master of man; like an eagle transfixed by an arrow winged by one of its own feathers, man would have shackled himself with the chains of his ancient servitude by the licentious employment of his own freedom, and would have reduced the cosmos of which God made him the master to a chaos which overwhelmed him by its unexpected blows.' The picture which is here drawn sketches for us the consequences of allowing each individual to have control over the forces of nature. It is incredible that God could be induced to allow such control to individuals; but does it follow from this that He never listens to prayers respecting His direction of the forces of nature, and that consequently all such prayers are presumptuous? The conclusion does not seem to follow from the premises, The valid conclusion would rather be this: No one ought to pray to God to give him absolute control of the forces of nature. The prayer, 'Lord, in Thy control of the forces of nature have mercy upon me and my fellow-men,' is a prayer of a very different character. The objection to prayers for rain or for the cessation of rain, and the like, is based on the supposition that we thereby 'ask God to interfere with the regularity of the course of nature.' Yet it is admitted that to 'pray for submission to the Divine will, and for such wisdom as will lead to compliance with it in the future, is a matter of course and results inevitably from the relation between the spiritual Father and the spiritual child.' But is there no regularity about the things thus admitted to befit objects of prayer? Are human character and human intellect not subject to law? When we pray for a submissive spirit and for wisdom, are we not asking God to 'interfere with that regularity' which governs the development of character and of intelligence? Either the prayer is to obtain more submission or more wisdom than we should otherwise get, or it is not. If it is to obtain it, then the regularity which would otherwise have prevailed is interrupted. If our prayer is not to obtain for us more submission and more wisdom than we should have obtained if we had not prayed, then the prayer is futile. It will perhaps be urged that the two cases are not strictly parallel. They are not; but for the purposes of this argument they are sufficiently parallel. It is maintained that we have no right to pray for rain, because we thereby propose to interfere with the regularity of natural processes; yet it is allowed that we may pray for wisdom. To get wisdom by prayer is quite as much an interference with the regularity of natural processes as to get rain by prayer. Therefore, either we ought to pray for neither, or we have the right to pray for both. And so far as the two cases are not parallel, it seems to be more reasonable to pray for rain than to pray for submissiveness and wisdom. God has given our wills the awful power of being able to resist His will. Are we to suppose that He exercises less control over matter, which cannot resist Him, than over human wills, which He allows to do so; or that He will help us or not help us to become better and wiser, according as we ask Him or do not ask Him for such help, and yet will never make any change as to giving or withholding material blessings, however much, or however little, we may ask Him to do this? The objection is sometimes stated in a slightly different form. God has arranged the material universe according to His infinite wisdom; it is presumptuous to pray that He will make any change in it. The answer to which is that, if that argument is valid against praying for rain, it is valid against all prayer whatever. If I impugn infinite wisdom when I pray for a change in the weather, do I not equally impugn it, when I pray for a change in the life or character of myself or of my friends? God knows without our asking what weather is best for us; and He knows equally without our asking what spiritual graces are best for us. Does not the parallel difficulty point to a parallel solution? What right have we to assume that in either case effectual prayer interferes with the regularity which seems to characterize Divine action? May it not be God’s will that the prayer of faith should be a force that can influence other forces, whether material or spiritual, and that its influence should be according to law (whether natural or supernatural) quite as much as the influence of other forces? A man who puts up a lightning-conductor brings down the electric current when it might otherwise have remained above, and brings it down in one place rather than another; yet no one would say that he interferes With the regularity of the course of nature. Is there anything in religion or science to forbid us from thinking of prayer as working in an analogous manner-according to a law too subtle for us to comprehend and analyze, but according to a law none the less? In the vast network of forces in which an all-wise God has constructed the universe a Christian will believe that one force which 'availeth much,' both in the material and in the spiritual world, 'is the earnest prayer of the righteous'. It is better for us that we should be able to influence by our prayers God’s direction of events than that we should be unable to do so; therefore a merciful Father has placed this power within our reach."

If you do not know the Lord Jesus Christ and His amazing healing power, pray this from your heart to the Lord Jesus Christ (you speaking directly to Him), Dear Lord Jesus, I confess to You that I am a sinner and I need Your forgiveness. I believe You shed Your Blood and died for my sins. I believe that You rose from the dead proving that You alone are God. I repent of my sins. I want to turn from my sins. I ask You Dear Lord Jesus to come into my heart and take control of my life. I want You to be my Lord, Savior, and my God. Amen...


Sincerely in Christ,


Clifford D. Tate, Sr.


Author of “Silent Assassins of the Soul - Are you Broken by Pornography and Masturbation? You can be Restored by the Lord Jesus Christ and brought into Deliverance, Freedom, and Victory! A Guide for Men and Women in the Enemy’s Crosshairs” e-book available now @ Amazon Kindle, @ Apple I Bookstore for IPod, Barnes and Noble for Nook, Reader Store for Sony Reade, Kobo, Copia, Gardners, Baker and Taylor, and eBookPie…