If you have read the post about Calvin Hunt, I’m sure you can sense some of my longings about the state of the true church. There have been times I have shed tears over the state of the pathetic condition of the church. And invaribly someone is going to cough up that catch-all copout phrase, “Well, you know you’re not going to find a perfect church”. To that, I reply that you have the wrong “p” word. I’m not longing for perfection in this life, BUT I AM LONGING FOR A CHURCH WITH ANOTHER WORD THAT STARTS WITH “P” —POWER!

Allow me to illustrate:

The other day I stopped by the local Home Depot, and as I was making my way to the registers to check out, I heard, “Hey Larry” I turned around and looked and there sat my friend Tom. He had taken a seat in a display chair, the kind of chair that people buy for their decks. But something didn’t look right this time. My friend was quite gaunt and had a cane in his hand. As I approached Tom, he began to say he just come from his final treatment for cancer. He told me that he had just completed 11 treatments of radiation and after having gone through all of that, his doctor told him, “you’re on your own now”. Tom looked at me as intently as he ever has, and said, “Larry, I want to be healed. Would you pray for me for a complete healing from the Lord?” He said, “I don’t want just remission, I want a complete healing! I was talking to my mother who is now in her 80s and she said she believes the Lord would like to see me healed completely.”

I agreed  with Tom that I would surely pray for his complete healing. After all, I have seen God grant that request to people firsthand more than once. But then I began a conversation with Tom about the procedure for requesting healing from the Lord. I discussed that classic passage of scripture in the book of James chapter 5 and verse 14 that says “is any sick among you? let him call for the elders of the church…” Of course, Tom knew exactly what I was talking about, having been a Christian for most of his life, and being a graduate of a christian university, (Bob Jones University). I asked Tom if he believed in that, and he said, “Of course I do.” (After all, where else can you turn but to the Lord when your back’s up against the wall?)

Well, I shared with Tom my experience of anointing my own father with oil in the name of the Lord along with the elders of the church that I was pastor of at the time. I shared with him how precious it was when the men gathered around him to anoint him and pray over him. I expressed to the elders at that time that they needed to be sure that they were in right fellowship with God, making sure all of their sins were confessed to the Lord in order that God would hear their prayer for him. (This is in reference to the scripture that says, “If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me” Psalm 66:8). Prayer is serious business, and the one being prayed for can’t afford these prayers to bounce off of a brass ceiling because of unconfessed sin in an elder’s life. This is a biblical principle and is one way to keep the church leadership in tune with God.

Among those elders, there was a man who was ready to meet the Lord due to the fact that he himself had cancer throughout his entire body, and knew that it was his time to go. Yet there he was, anointing my own father with oil and requesting of the Lord to save my father from that dreaded disease, the one that would soon take him.

I went on to share with him how my father lived many years after that, to a full ripe age of 88. Then I asked him, “Tom, does your church do that?” His reply is something that I think I shall never forget. He said simply, “I don’t know.” Think about it! If you walked into a bank and asked a receptionist or a teller the question, “Do you make loans?”, and she would say,”I don’t know.” How absurd it would be to even ask the question in the first place! It would be common knowledge that they would make loans! And using the same reasoning, it should be common knowledge in any true church that James 5:15 is in full effect at any time.

Tom had been had been attending his church for quite a long time. If Tom’s church followed James 5:15, then it was never during the time he attended, and it certainly was not common knowledge. Some churches, and this is probably the case with his, don’t even have elders, just deacons and trustees. I personally, think that is powerless and unforgivable of that church to have never made it a priority to pray over those who are sick in the biblical way. Pastors surely will stand in judgment for that. We are taught in scripture that there will be a greater judgment on them (James 3:1). But neglecting James 5:15 seems to be “par for the course” in today’s powerless churches. No wonder our churches are emptying. Would your reply be the same about your church? Along that same line, may I ask the reader this question: Does your New Testament Bible have healing prayer in it? Case closed.

-Larry