The effectual prayer of the righteous man can accomplish much. But Dr. Tony Evans says tapping the power of prayer requires a clean heart. If you're not willing to deal with sin, then you will not have access to Jesus Christ. This is the alternative broadcast, featuring the timeless biblical teachings from the archives of Dr.
Tony Evans. We've all heard the expression, when all else fails, pray. But Dr. Evans says our best efforts begin with prayer. And today he explains how to make it your top priority.
Let's turn to James chapter 5 as we join him. First of all, let's look at the priority of prayer. Verse 13. Is anyone among you suffering? Let him pray.
That is, instead of complaining in verse 9, and instead of swearing, cussing, fussing, and making false oaths in verse 12, open your mouth. But not for those purposes. If you are going through affliction, that's what the Greek word for suffering means, and it can be used of any kind of affliction. It can be physical affliction, it can be emotional affliction, it can be circumstantial affliction, it can be financial affliction, it can be familial affliction. No matter what the classification of affliction is, if you are going through it, let him pray.
Now, what's very important is that what God wants as he communicates through the Apostle James is that prayer should be the priority. That is the thing you should do, it should be first. What is prayer? Maybe we ought to start there. If we're going to prioritize it, what is it that we're prioritizing?
Prayer. It's simply Intimate. Communication. with God. That's it.
You don't need a $10 definition. Prayer is simply Intimate. Communication. with God. Far too many of us want to throw in the towel before we've thrown up the prayers.
Oh. When you pray. What you are doing is gaining Access to grace. Pray That you might get the grace of God in order to deal with the problem that you have encountered.
Now, I don't know what your trial is and what you're facing today, but grace is available, but only at the throne, and you can only approach the throne through prayer. He raises another question. In verse 13, he says. Is anyone cheerful? Let him sing praises.
If things are going well and there is no trauma, And things are smooth right now. Praise him. Because if he sends affliction to develop you, that's God. And if he sends deliverance to deliver you, that's God. Yeah.
So, whether you're afflicted or whether you're cheerful is all God. And since it's all God, you ought to be praying. or praising. Secondly. The people of prayer, verse 14.
Here is one of our tough verses. Is anyone among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of God. of the Lord. First of all, we've got to deal with this word sick.
The Greek word here for the word sick is the word weak. Means weak. It can refer to any kind of weakness. In fact, it is used in the scripture of different kinds of weaknesses. Certainly, when you're physically incapacitated.
The traditional use of the word sick, you're weak, you're weak physically. But I'm sure many of you have said this phrase: I'm sick of being broke. Anybody sick that way today? Uh-huh. And you really sick too.
That's real sickness.
Okay. It can be physical, but it is not limited to physical. It means you are encountering what verse 13 says, an affliction. The difference in verse 14 is what that affliction is doing to you. It's beating you down.
It's beating you down. It's weakening you. You are beginning to buckle at your knees because of what it is doing to you.
Some of us wouldn't call it sick if it was just here today and gone tomorrow. You know, if you sneeze one time, you wouldn't call that, you wouldn't call that being weak. That's an inconvenience. But he's talking about your knees are buckling. The circumstance has weakened you.
He says, if the suffering of verse 13. Mm. Is beginning to weaken you in verse 14, then you're going to need support. Help! Because your knees are beginning to buckle.
Now if you walk and your knees begin to buckle That means you need help to stand back up because you're weak. If you are weak, and it can be any kind of weakness that you're suffering. Then you are, he says, to call the church. In fact, he says, you are called the elders of the church. That is the spiritual leadership who sits as representatives over the rest of the congregation.
So it is a representative group. That represents the bigger group because they belong to the church, and your purpose for calling them is because you are weak. You don't believe you're getting through to God. In fact, You may be too weak to even talk to God. And all of us have been in that situation where things are so bad, we just don't feel like praying.
Or we try to pray and we can't even keep our minds on what we're trying to say. We've just been weakened by our circumstances. He says, if you have been weakened by your circumstances, get spiritual help. Protect. says when you have been weakened In any kind of category.
You ought to call the spiritual leadership of the church. And they are to come and buoy you up. Through prayer. They are to pray. over him.
And that is because The praying you could do in verse 13, you can't do in verse 14. Then it comes to verse 15, 0.3. The promise of prayer. And the prayer offered in faith will restore the one who is. Weary.
That's what the word means, sick in verse 15. It means weary. Yeah.
Okay, we started off where he's suffering, but he's praying himself. In verse 14, he becomes weak.
So he needs some help. By the time you get to him, he's weary. And there's not a person in here who hasn't been there. Just tired, just wondering, is it worth it? Shouldn't I just go out and do it my way?
Because God's way has taken too long. You're just tired of it. But yet, you still got that faith. You still believe. You're just so tired.
He gives you a promise, and this is one of the great promises of the New Testament. The prayer offered in faith. Will. Will, will, will, will, will restore the one who is sick.
Now, folks, this is why this verse cannot just be referring to physical sickness. One, because if it was referring to only physical sickness, you'd never die. All you had to do is pray the prayer of faith, and every time you got sick, you'd get well.
Okay. Number two, we know through scripture that it's God's will sometimes. For sickness to occur in the life of the believer for his own purposes, like Job.
So let anybody tell you.
Well, if you're sick, you are automatically out of the will of God. No, you may be right smack dab in the middle of it. God took the young lady, Joni Erickson. And she's been in a wheelchair and she's been paralyzed from the neck down. Would she love to walk again?
Yes. But God decided, I have a ministry that I want to give you that's going to be unique. I'm going to let this happen. And now, worldwide, people who have her dilemma are being encouraged by her like never before. It's not a spiritual problem.
It's a sovereign plan.
Now, don't ask me why, because I don't know why God does this with that person and that with the other person. I don't know. That's his plan. All I know is we better be able to reach him when it happens. He says the prayer I'm talking about when offered in faith.
We'll pick up the one who is weary. That's the promise. God promises you, not necessarily, he may bring the solution to the problem. But what he's promising you is divine encouragement in the midst of the problem. That's the problem.
And you know, many of us could go a long way if we just get get encouragement. Many of us couldn't do a whole lot if we'd just be encouraged. And that's what the church is to provide: a place of encouragement. The church can't solve all your problems. Church can't fix everything.
People get mad at the church. Uh-uh, you better talk to God. But the church can help you reach God. It can encourage you, and the Lord will restore the weary one. And raise him up.
Raise him up from what? Raise him up from whatever it is, whatever has caused the weariness. What do you say? But he says it must be the prayer of faith. The prayer of faith.
What is the prayer of faith?
Well, according to 1 John chapter 5, verse 14 and 15, the prayer of faith is the prayer that is entrusting itself to the will of God. That's a prayer of faith. The prayer of faith is confident of what the will of God is. And the will of God is not for me to be miserable in my trials. The will of God is for me to count it all joy when I face all kinds of trials.
I know that's the will of God because James has already told me that in chapter one.
So I can say, Lord. I don't know whether it's your will for me to stay in this situation. I don't know how long, but I know James told me you want me to be joyful in it. And I am not joyful right now. I'm mad, but I know that this anger is not the will of God.
You're giving me joy is the will of God.
So I'm going to trust you to get it.
Now, here's the problem: suppose. Your faith is too weak. You're supposed to pray the prayer of faith and that will restore you, but maybe you don't have the faith to pray the prayer of faith. That's why you call on other people who are not going through the trial that you're going through right now so you can piggyback on their faith. Dr.
Evans will come right back with a powerful biblical story that shows how leaning on the faith of our friends can change everything. First, though, I wanted you to know that today's lesson is part of Tony's seven-part series on the power of prayer. It's a practical look at how to move your prayers beyond the ordinary and start experiencing real results, including spiritual breakthroughs, wisdom for life's decisions, and the peace that comes from knowing that God hears you. We'll send the full audio series as our thank you gift when you make a contribution to help us keep Tony's teaching on this station. Plus, we're including Tony's new book, Anchored by Prayer, a devotional guide designed to help you pray boldly, consistently, and in alignment with God's will.
It's a perfect resource to help if you've ever felt stuck, distracted, or discouraged in prayer. This special double offer will only be available for a short time, so visit TonyEvans.org right away to get the details. You'll find a prominent link right on the homepage. Or if it's easier, you can call us day or night at at 1-800-800-3222 and let one of our team members help you. I'll repeat that contact information for you later on.
Right now, let's rejoin Dr. Evans for more of today's message. Mark chapter 2 tells a wonderful story. It talks about the sick man. He was physically weary.
He was laid out on a pallet and Jesus was teaching. Jesus is teaching, he's laid out on a pallet. And they said, we got to get you to Jesus.
Now, he was too weak to get to Jesus by himself. He was too invalid to get to Jesus by himself. And so, what happened was. The men came and lifted him. and took him to the house where Jesus was teaching.
Guess what they did? The house was too crowded. Too many people were there to hear Jesus preach, and they couldn't get to Jesus.
So, what they did was put a rope around the man's pallet, got up on the roof, pulled the man up to the roof. Cut a hole in the roof. Let the man down through the roof. In front of Jesus. And guess what Jesus said?
The Bible says, and when Jesus saw, here's the key word. their faith. Hold on now. He didn't see the sick man's faith. He didn't see the weak, the weary man's faith.
He saw collective faith. He said it's all their faith. In other words, the sick man said, I can't get to Jesus. I'm too weak. My bones are too brittle.
I'm too crippled. I can't get to Jesus. Will you guys come over here and help me get to the Jesus that I can't get to by myself? I need get to Jesus' help. It says he took care of the weary man.
Now, listen to me: the other men didn't have a problem. At least not right then. They helped the other man get to it, but they were one of the reasons for the solution. Let me tell you why. If you're a person who trusts God and you're not going through bad times, you ought to help because one day you're going to be the one on the ballot.
One day you're going to be the one too weary to trust God. And the idea of having this small group nucleus of saints is so that you have a group who can take you to Jesus when you can't get there yourself. And so He goes on to say, I will raise him up. And if he has committed any sins, They will be forgiven. That's a very important phrase.
If you have committed sins, And you call the elders, which he's previously said, admitting that what I'm going through could be because of my lifestyle right now. Then, if you're willing to deal with the lifestyle, God will remove the weariness that is the result of the lifestyle. If you're not willing to deal with sin, then you will not have access to Jesus Christ. The Bible says in 1 Corinthians 11, verse 30: because of sinful lifestyles of some of the saints, some are weak, some are sick, and some die young. You can expect to be weary.
If you're not committed to dealing with sin. What this means, brothers and sisters, is that God will meet you in your struggle, and while He may or may not Bring that struggle to an end, depending upon his purposes, he will change you in the midst of it. Finally, the promise. productivity of prayer. Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another.
He's now gone beyond the elders to the fellowship of the saints, one another. You ought to have fellowship, small groups, if you will. Why should we pray for one another? Because prayer works. The effectual prayer.
of the righteous man can accomplish much. And then he closes with this illustration. He says, look at a man named Elijah. A man named Elijah. He said Elijah was a man.
of nature like ours. He was not from krypton. He was an ordinary Joe. You say, but he was a prophet. Yeah, but he was the ordinary prophet.
We know how ordinary he was because when he got out there and started doing stuff in Israel, Jezebel heard about it and ran him out of town, scared to death of the woman. What? Elijah was an ordinary man. James said he didn't have anything on any Christian under the sound of my book. Who's listening to the word?
If you are a Christian in love with Jesus Christ today, Elijah had nothing on you. Ordinary man. But he became superordinary in prayer. Look at this now. Follow me closely as we conclude.
And He Prayed. Earnestly, that's the energized prayer. Elijah got on his knees and says, your people are not following you, God. Let your people see your power close up heaven.
Now, you got to know what you're doing if you're going to shut down the sky. And guess what? An ordinary man shut down the sky. Not a superordinary man. An ordinary Joe shut down the sky.
Sky.
Now, where did he get that from? I'll tell you where he got it from. He got it from Deuteronomy 11. Because Deuteronomy 11 says, When you fail to obey me, I'm going to close up the sky. There will be no rain on your crops.
But if you return to me, I'll open up the sky. I will rain on your crops, and your crops will begin to grow again. You know where he got that? He prayed biblically. he knew the word you know the reason why we're not getting answers to prayer because we don't know what we're praying about Not only did he pray biblically, He prayed specifically.
He didn't do what we do. Let me tell you our prayers, which is a non-prayer prayer. Lord bless me today. Hello, I'm a Watch over me today. That's a vague prayer.
You don't even know if God answered it or not. You know why a lot of us don't see God? Because we don't have anything specific we want. You ought to pray specifically. Tell God what you want.
I had a sister one time, she went to, she went, she said, I need a new car. I went to God and asked. My two favorite colors are green and blue. She said, I don't know of a green and blue car, but Lord, I want you to give me a green and blue car, because those are my two favorite colors. She went car hunt, found the car she wanted.
Perfect green, but no blue. She said, well, I'm not sure this is the will of God because I want a green and blue car. There's no blue here. She said, I don't know if I'm taking it, but it is the car I want. Salesman explained it to her.
He said, Well, let me show you the hood. Lifted up the hood, and the motor had been painted blue. She said, Glory!
Some of us will never know whether we've heard from God because we pray vaguely. He prayed specifically in 1 Kings 18, verse 36. He said, I did. You are going to obey the specific things you're going to do, Lord, the specific things that I've requested of you today. Not only that.
But he prayed humbly. In chapter 18 of 1 Kings, verse 42, which tells this story, it says, he got on his knees and put his head between his legs. That was a position of humility. He not only got his knees, he bowed his head and put it between his knees. He not only did that, but he prayed persistently.
In chapter 18, verse 43 of 1 Kings, it says. That he prayed seven times. But not only did he pray specifically, Verse 41, 43, and 44 teaches us he prayed expectantly. Let me tell you what he did. It was time for the drought to end.
The people had repented. It was time for God to keep his promise and bring rain.
So watch this now.
So he's praying. As he bows and praise, Lord, bring the rain. He sent his servants and said, Is it raining yet? They say no. Let's pray.
Lord, you promised to bring the rain. Bring the rain. Send them back. Is it raining yet? No.
Is it raining yet? No. Is it raining yet? No. He got to the seventh time.
God still hadn't said a word. It says, at the seventh time, he said the servants out, is it raining yet? The servants came back and said, No, it's not raining now. But way out there in the distance, there's this tiny little cloud that's no bigger than a man's hand. He says, Way out there, way farther, I see this little crowd, but it's not raining, the sky's blue.
Elijah said, okay, grab your stuff, the skies, get ready, bust out here. Yeah, but we only see a tie cut.
Now, listen, the sky's getting red bust. He told them the sky's gonna bust the barbers, and in a few minutes, it poured. Because he prayed expecting to see something. And even when the something he saw didn't look like anything, he knew that God was good all the time. He knew that God was gonna come through.
So he prayed.
So if you want to get a hole of God, we have to stop being double-minded. We have to stop living two ways at one time. We're going to have to stop believing man and believe in God. And if you are too weak to believe God, call some spiritual people so they can believe God with you. And what?
Don't let him go till he answers you. God has three answers: yes, no, and slow. Yeah.
Okay? Yes, no, and slow. Yes, I'll give it to you. No, I won't give it to you. Or I will give it to you at some point, but you're going to have to wait on it.
Whether it's yes, pray till you hear yes. Or no, pray till you hear no, like Paul did. Or slow, keep praying till you hear something. Either way, God will do it. If you've never reached out to Jesus and asked him to lift you out of your sin and give you eternal life, well, stay with us.
Dr. Evans will return to explain how you can do that in just a moment. First, though, if you'd like to review today's message on your own or share it with somebody else, you can get the full-length version by checking with us about the title The Power of Prayer. Better yet, this lesson comes as a part of Dr. Evans' current teaching series by the same name, The Power of Prayer.
This is a compilation of sermons we're making available on digital download as well as on either CD or USB flash drive. And for a limited time, we're also including a copy of Tony's brand new book, Anchored by Prayer. Both the audio series and devotional book are yours as our way of saying thanks for your support of the alternative. Just visit tonyevans.org or call 1-800-800-3222 to make your request. That's tonyevans.org or call 1-800-800-3222.
And now, one final reminder: the latest episode of Stories from the Storyteller is now available. In The Great Catch, Kelsey's social media struggles turn into a lesson about using our gifts to point others to Jesus, just like Peter and his miraculous catch of fish. It's the perfect time to introduce the kids in your life to this inspiring animated series. Watch it now at tonyevanstv.com. That's tonyevanstv.com.
Sometimes it seems like our prayers just bounce off the ceiling. Before they ever get to God's ears. Tomorrow, Dr. Evans will explain how we can make our prayers more productive. Right now, though, he's back to talk about the most productive prayer you could ever pray.
You're not a Christian because you're religious. or because you go to church, or even because you believe in God. You're a Christian because you've accepted Jesus Christ as your personal sin bearer. Being religious, doing good works. That's nice, but it's not sufficient when God demands perfection.
2 Corinthians 5.21 says, He who knew no sin became sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in him.
So what God has said is He placed your sin on the cross on the Christ and then judged Christ for your sin. If you will go to Christ, he will take Christ's righteousness, which is perfect, and he will credit it to your account.
So you will stand before God as though you've never sinned. Not because you're sinless, but because you've got a sinless credit on your account. If you will receive Jesus Christ right now, if you will invite him into your life, believing that he died for you and rose for you personally, He will. Credit your account with perfection because he's already credited your sin on the Jesus Christ.
So go to Christ right now and get this free gift of salvation that he's offering to all who come to him for it.
