Don’t Underestimate Others’ Prayers for You
Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working. Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed fervently that it might not rain, and for three years and six months it did not rain on the earth. Then he prayed again, and heaven gave rain, and the earth bore its fruit.
My brothers, if anyone among you wanders from the truth and someone brings him back, let him know that whoever brings back a sinner from his wandering will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins. James 5:16–20
How many times have you tried to pray, just to give up halfway, or never start in the first place? There is an apathy that haunts us and whisper the age-old falsehood that God doesn’t really care about our prayers, or we’re not even worthy enough to approach him in prayer.
How many more times have you rolled the eyes of your heart when someone tells you that they are “praying for you?” You fake a smile. You assume a tone of touched gentleness. You insidiously think, “Yeah, right.”
The half brother of Our Lord, James, has something to say to our apathy. Namely, we need the prayers of other saints.
He writes envisioning the church community coming together in suffering, that when one member suffers the entire body suffers. He writes calling for corporate endurance (James 1:4). And after writing addressing various issues concerning suffering, faith, and relationships within the church, he concludes his letter with an encouragement towards unity in prayer.
Is anyone suffering, cheerful, or sick, indicating the entire range of the Christian experience, let him pray. Let him involve other people to pray. Because James knows that God hears His righteous ones. That was true in the Old Testament and it remains true today. The KJV puts it so well, “The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.”
Now when the entire church community comes together to pray, James envisions a multitude of righteous, redeemed-by-Christ voices ascending to heaven as one powerful united aroma. How much more so would God be inclined to hear the cries of His people? This isn’t a method to strong-arm God as no one can override the counsel of His will, but as C.S Lewis quotes Pascal, “God instituted prayer in order to lend to His creatures the dignity of causality.” We partake and participate in God’s sovereign will when we pray because God has already heard and foreknown those prayers and decreed accordingly. Like a father who deeply cares for his children, God has planned and preordained our prayers to be used as the catalysts for deliverance and redemption in our brother or sister’s suffering.
As an example, the prophet Elijah was a man like us with the same faults as us. He also possessed the same kind of faith as us. Therefore, when he prayed in faith, according to the will of God, God responded and used His prayers for His purposes. The same thing happens when the man or woman prays. Therefore, do not underestimate these prayers. The prayers of a righteous man/woman affect much.
James concludes his letter, not with a greeting, but with a promise. It is a promise for all who go to the throne of grace on behalf of another. In the same vein as Jesus approached the throne of grace to intercede for His own, it is a promise offered to Christians who intercede on behalf of their own brothers and sisters. It is a seal, a guarantee of the true abiding presence of the Great Interceder, who is the salvation of souls. Christian, you are no more like Christ when you are on your knees interceding on the behalf of another in prayer, because that is what Jesus is doing this very moment.
So, don’t despise others’ prayers. Treasure them. Love them, because they are so much like Christ when they offer their prayers for you. And of course, be more than ready to offer up the same petitions and pleas for others in turn.
