Blessings on Your Phone
November 17, 2020
Daily Bible reading: Ezekiel 40-41 and James 5
“The Prayer of Faith”
(James 5:13-16) “Is any among you afflicted? let him pray. Is any merry? let him sing psalms. (14) Is any sick among you? 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: (15) And the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up; and if he have committed sins, they shall be forgiven him. (16) Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.”
What to do when we are sick? The book of James tells us to call for help. We are to call for the elders, leaders of the church for prayer. The Word tells us to go, anoint with oil, and pray in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus said, “If ye shall ask any thing in my name, I will do it” (John 14:14). We pray with the oil, which is a symbol of the anointing of the Lord. As we pray with faith in the Lord, then He is present to heal; (Hebrews 11:6, GW) “No one can please God without faith. Whoever goes to God must believe that God exists and that he rewards those who seek him.”
I have personally witnessed many miracles as we believe and pray in the name of Jesus. In Romania in 1990, in one service we witnessed a blind woman and a deaf man healed. To name only a few miracles, we have witnessed people being healed of cancer, severe pain, paralysis, injuries from accidents, and many other things. The power is found in the Lord our healer. Jesus said, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised” (Luke 4:18).
But if the elders of the church are not available, what then? That is when we ask a friend to pray with us. (Mark 16:17-20) “And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; (18) They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover. (19) So then after the Lord had spoken unto them, he was received up into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God. (20) And they went forth, and preached every where, the Lord working with them, and confirming the word with signs following. Amen.”
Do not be afraid of praying in faith in the name of Jesus. The power belongs to the Lord. We are praying in faith for the Lord to be present to perform the miracle. Verse to meditate on is (James 5:15) “And the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up; and if he have committed sins, they shall be forgiven him.”