The Prayer of Faith

James 5:13-18

13 Is any one of you suffering? He should pray. Is anyone cheerful? 

He should sing praises. 

14 Is any one of you sick? He should call the elders of the church to pray over him 

and anoint him with oil in the name of the Lord. 

15 And the prayer offered in faith will restore the one who is sick. 

The Lord will raise him up. If he has sinned, he will be forgiven.

16 Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other 

so that you may be healed. 

The prayer of a righteous man has great power to prevail. 

17 Elijah was a man just like us. 

He prayed earnestly that it would not rain, 

and it did not rain on the land for three and a half years. 

18 Again he prayed, and the heavens gave rain, and the earth yielded its crops.

They say video killed the radio star. What killed our prayer life?

So much media consumption. 

We must consume more faith, the proof of invisible things, 

instead of the visible things that are not real. 

We watch so much stuff on screen. Is any of them real? No. 

But when we pray, we see in our heart the vision that God gives. 

Is that vision real? Yes. When we say Amen to the vision that God shows, 

that vision becomes a reality in our life. 

What killed our prayer life?

Sins. James says that the prayer of a righteous person is powerful. 

If you keep sinning and try to pray, your prayer has no power. 

You have to prove that your prayer is truthful by a righteous life. 

Before you complain that God does not answer to your prayer,

look back on your life. Can you say that you have been living a

righteous life? Then you may complain. 

Then what do we have to do as we start the new year?

We must repent and restore our righteousness. 

We do not have any righteousness of our own as we know. 

When we repent we are clothed with Jesus's righteousness. 

Repentance means you rely on God's righteousness to become justified before God. 

Repentance means that you continue your prayer life. 

A continued prayer life IS a righteous life. 

And a righteous person's prayer is powerful and will be answered quickly. 

Pray to pray. Keep on praying. Fill your life with prayer. 

Amen.