He Answers Prayers

Is any among you afflicted? let him pray. Is any merry? let him sing psalms.

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:

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.

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.

Elias 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.

Brethren, if any of you do err from the truth, and one convert him;

Let him know, that he which converteth the sinner from the error of his way shall save a soul from death, and shall hide a multitude of sins. 

                                                                              (James 5:13-20 KJV)

Pray and praise the Lord for in His he hears or prayers and answers.

What ails you? Pray to the Lord for healing and wholeness. Then thank him with songs of praise for answering your prayers.

It is difficult for one who refuses to acknowledge their own sins; yet, complains about the sins of others to have a deep faith. How can we say that we have faith in God when our faith lies in our own actions or inactions? How can we say that we have faith in God when we insist that we are not guilty of any wrong-doing?

If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us." (1 John 1:8)

If we have no part in the injustice and ills of the world; if we are not guilty of committing sins against God and our neighbors then why did Christ die for us?

"I do not frustrate the grace of God: for if righteousness come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain." (Gal 2:21)

Let us not frustrate the grace of God! Christ did not die in vain. He died so that we might be forgiven our sins and reconciled to God our Father in heaven. Confess your sins; pray for healing and God in Christ Jesus will make you whole.

God's Peace - Pr. J.

Calm The Sea

The sea was getting rougher and rougher. So they asked him, “What should we do to you to make the sea calm down for us?” Jonah 1:11

I listened to the book of Jonah dramatized on You-Tube after my evening prayers last night. It is a fascinating story. What, indeed, shall we do when we feel as though the storm we are going through is about to take us down? Shall we attempt to make a bargain with God to save us? Shall we attempt to find the guilty party; the person or persons, that may have offended God and make a scapegoat of them? Shall we offer up a sacrifice to God? That is exactly what the men on the ship with Jonah did. They threw him overboard to drown in the depths of the sea. Only, he did not drown. He got another chance. He lived to continue on the mission that God had sent him on in the first place.

When the sea gets stormy and when times get rough, we don't get to make scapegoats of others. Because the truth is that we are all guilty. We all make mistakes. We all sin. We all, at times, by our actions or our inactions, put others in harm's way.

Justifying our own sins by blaming others will not erase our sins. We cannot and will not be able to appease or bargain with God by making someone else the scapegoat. The Good News is that the only sacrifice for our sins that is required has already been made by Jesus on the cross. With him and in him, we have died; and, have been born again. We have been given another chance and even another to live as a child of God; to go forth and continue in the mission God has called us to.

Let us go forth and proclaim the Good News that our sins have been washed away by the blood of Jesus the Christ. Let us proclaim that, through him, we are reconciled to God our Father for time eternal.

God's Peace - Pr. J