Is any sick among you? let him call to [him] the elders of the assembly, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of [the] Lord;
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
and the prayer of faith shall heal the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up; and if he be one who has committed sins, it shall be forgiven him.
The sick believer has called for the elders, and they have prayed over him and anointed him with oil. Two questions now press on every reader: whose faith heals him, and which forgiveness does James promise a sick man?
A reader might credit the elders' office, or the oil. The verse puts the power somewhere else.
It is remarkable. The inspired writer encourages honour to the elders, yet he attaches healing power not to their official place or special skill, but to prayer — prayer made effective through faith. He says, "And the prayer of faith will save (or heal) the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up." What a contrast with the gloomy superstition that sends "a priest" to absolve him and give him the last rites, because it treats his death as certain! For if he recovers, he will need the same hateful parody all over again.
What does it mean to be "saved" here?
It is the prayer of faith, not the anointing, that saves the sick. This salvation, of course, is the delivering of a person from his sickness.
The sick man is the one prayed for, not the one required to produce faith.
Notice that the faith belongs to those who pray — that is, to the elders. The verse says nothing about the faith of the sick man. Still, we may infer that he has some faith in the matter, at least enough to send for the elders, as this Scripture directs. We may also infer, from the words that follow in verse 16, that he would confess his sins, if indeed he has committed any.
Those who pray must also judge whether they can pray in faith at all:
No doubt in every case some spiritual discernment would be needed, to judge whether we could pray in faith. This would involve not only the sin committed, but the circumstances and the motives behind it.
James does not say the sick man has sinned. He says if he has.
The "if" shows that the sickness might not have been sent because of any particular sin.
That single word marks off the one case where the promise rests on solid ground:
Healing is sure in one case only: when the sickness does not come from bodily weakness, as with Timothy, or from the hardship of devoted Christian service, as with Epaphroditus, or from any other natural cause. It comes instead as a chastening from the Lord for some specific sins committed. Once he confesses those sins and puts them away, the chastening stops.
The cross settled a believer's standing before God long before this sickness came.
There are two kinds of forgiveness in the ways of God. Eternal justification, taught in Romans 4 and Hebrews 10, is the blessed portion of those who believe in the power of the blood of Christ. Their sins are no longer counted against them. God took up the question of their sins at the cross. He has finished with them forever, and He will never remember them again. But there is also the government of God. It is the government of a Father — a holy Father, who loves His children too well to let them walk badly.
So when the illness lifts, the discipline itself has ended:
This discipline had shown itself in the chastening — that is, in the sickness. Once the sickness goes, the discipline is over and the sins are forgiven.
One point here turns on grammar.
The true rendering of the clause holds a fine and notable point. The sins stand in the plural; the forgiveness stands in the singular. It is right that each and every sin should be judged in turn; but grace gives the forgiveness in full.
The promise has a setting: the sick "among you", inside the company of God's people.
So this Scripture gives no warrant for a popular system of half-miraculous cures handed out to all and sundry. Sickness among God's people stands on special ground.
Writers note one reason the practice is rare today: the elders of the church are hard to identify. God's power, though, has not changed:
The outward order of the assembly is lost, but the power, love, and faithfulness of the Lord are unchanged... it is not godliness to doubt the power of Christ, if God gives faith to use it.
- Prayer heals. Not the oil, not the office, not the ritual — believing prayer heals the sick.
- Their faith, his healing. The faith in view belongs to those praying. The sick man's part is to call for them and own his sins.
- "If" guards it. Sickness may or may not come from a specific sin. Illness is never proof of guilt.
- Forgiveness restored, not first granted. James promises the lifting of a Father's discipline. The cross already settled the eternal pardon.
- Among God's own. The promise belongs inside the company of God's people, at the sick one's call — never a platform for public cures.