The Medical Missionary, vol. 14
October 1905
“‘Is Any Afflicted? Let Him Pray’” The Medical Missionary 14, 10.
E. J. Waggoner
“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 tile Lord shall raise him up; and if he have committed sins, they shall be forgiven him.” James 5:13-15. MEDM October 1905, page 306.1
The second part of this portion of Scripture has been often quoted and acted upon by believers in prayer for the sick; and it is not proposed at present to dwell upon it any more than is necessary in order to bring the first part sharply into prominence: for it seems as if the attention of believers has been directed to the latter part almost to the overlooking of the first. MEDM October 1905, page 306.2
It is evident at a glance that two different conditions are here presented, and these conditions are respectively indicated by the words rendered “afflicted” and “sick.” It is also evident that the condition indicated by the word “sick” is more serious than that indicated by “afflicted.” In the first instance, the individual’s own prayer is sufficient: but in the second the case is so grave that the combined prayers of the elders of the church are needed, and anointing with oil is added. MEDM October 1905, page 306.3
Notice further that the promise in the case of prayer by the elders of the church with anointing is explicit and unequivocal. There is nothing conditional. That is, when the given conditions-prayer by the elders and anointing-are met, there is no doubt as to the result. “The prayer of faith shall heal the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up.” There is no intimation in this case that the elders are to pray that the sick one may he raised up, if it be the Lord’s will, and are then to wait and see what he will do; the instruction and promise are positive: pray, and the Lord shall raise him up. MEDM October 1905, page 306.4
How is this? Are we to understand that there is ever a time when we are warranted in praying, regardless of the will of God? that we can ever, under any conditions, make a request in the shape of a demand to God, and expect that he will unconditionally yield to our ultimatum? Not by any means. There is no ground for expecting an answer to any prayer that does not contain through it all, “Thy will he done.” God works all things after the counsel of his own will, and his will must be done, and will be done, in spite of all opposition. Our only ground of positive confidence in any prayer at any time is this. “That, if we ask anything according to his will, he heareth us; and if we know that he hears us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we desired of him.” 1 John 5:14, 15. MEDM October 1905, page 306.5
What, then, is the conclusion as to the case before us?-Simply this, that when the elders are called for, and anointing takes place with the prayer, positive evidence has been received beforehand that it is the Lord’s will that the person prayed for should be raised up at that particular time. Those praying having received the assurance that it is the Lord’s will to raise up this particular person at this particular time,-the individual himself having received the same personal assurance before sending for them,-all that they have to do is to make their request in harmony with the Lord’s plainly expressed will. Having the positive assurance that it is the Lord’s will to do a certain thing, it would be a manifestation of unbelief if they should say, “Lord, if it be thy will, let this be done.” MEDM October 1905, page 306.6
This is more apparent when we take into consideration the promise that is coupled with the promise of healing: Let us read them both together. “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.” Suppose anybody, acknowledging that he has sinned, should pray. “Lord, if it be thy will, forgive my sins.” Would it not be evident that he did not know the promise of God, or else did not fully believe it? The publican did not pray, “Lord, if it be thy will, be merciful to me, a sinner.” If he had so prayed, he would not have gone down to his house justified. God is good, and ready to forgive, and plenteous in mercy to all that call upon him. There are to be no conditions in our prayer for the pardon of our sins; our sincere prayer itself is the only condition, because we have beforehand, each one individually, the positive assurance that it is God’s will that we should be saved from sin. Even so it is in the case referred to in James 5:14, 15. Just how any sick person may know positively what is the Lord’s will in his case, is not a matter for discussion. No one could tell another how he may know, and nobody who knows could tell anybody else how he knows. It is a personal matter between the individual himself and the Lord. MEDM October 1905, page 306.7
But “men ought always to pray;” therefore, “Is any among you afflicted? let him pray.” For what shall he pray?-For relief, of course, and he should expect to get it, too; for surely we would not be told to pray, if nothing were to come of it. “I said not to the seed of Jacob, Seek ye me in vain.” Isaiah 45:19. It will be noticed that there has been no attempt in this article to distinguish between and to define the two different states indicated in James 5:13-15 by the terms “afflicted” and “sick.” All that is desired is that it shall be recognized that there are two different conditions, and that in any case prayer is to be made to God. MEDM October 1905, page 307.1
The relation of prayer to the healing of disease has been much misunderstood, even by many believers in the efficacy of prayer. Too often it is regarded as a last resort. How often words like these are heard: “We have done everything, and tried every remedy that we know, and now there is nothing left to do but to pray.” The idea seems to obtain that prayer is another remedy, to be used when all others fail; that the Lord is merely a consulting physician, to be called in only in an extremity, when the regular physician’s skill is exhausted. This is a great mistake. God is the physician, and there is none besides him that can heal. But God accepts whosoever will, as “workers together with him,” and he imparts to the sons of men wisdom, and knowledge of his ways, according to their willingness and ability to receive. Whenever any person is healed of any disease, it is because the Lord healed him; and whenever any nurse or physician, or any minister of any kind, is instrumental in the recovery of the sick, it is only because such ones have applied the Lord’s remedies, or have co-operated with God in the application of them. MEDM October 1905, page 307.2
When this is fully recognized, there will be no question as to the use of “means” for the restoration of the sick. Prayer for the sick does not necessitate the abandoning of personal effort for them, any more than prayer that God will “give us this day our daily bread;” means that we are to fold our hands and expect God to drop the food into our mouths. It is God’s will that men in this world shall eat bread in the sweat of their face; but however hard they work, and however much they sweat, it is God alone who gives them their food, and to him and him alone are thanks due. When God rained down bread from heaven for the Israelites, they had to gather it. He can feed us without any effort on our part, as in the case of Elijah in the wilderness; but his usual way is through the sowing of the seed and the cultivation and harvesting of it by man. Our work, however, does not shut out prayer. Both are in harmony, and both, with the well-instructed person, indicate submission to the will of God. Even so should it be in the case of sickness. MEDM October 1905, page 307.3
This subject has recently come into especial prominence in medical circles. There have always been Christian physicians, who believed in prayer, and who, however blindly they have worked, have regarded themselves as only working under a Chief Physician, who alone had the power to heal: but probably never before the present year has prayer been mentioned in a medical society as a therapeutic agent. That, however, has been done, and in no obscure corner. At the recent annual meeting of the British Medical Association, Dr. Theodore B. Hyslop, superintendent of Bethlehem Royal Hospital, who has a high reputation as a specialist in neurology, and in the treatment of mental disease, gave the following testimony to the therapeutic value of prayer:- MEDM October 1905, page 307.4
“As an alienist, and one whose whole life has been concerned with the sufferings of the mind, I would state that of all hygienic measures to counteract disturbed sleep, depressed spirits, and all the miserable sequels of a disturbed mind, I would undoubtedly give the first place to the simple habit of prayer. MEDM October 1905, page 308.1
“Let there be but a habit of nightly connection, not as a mendicant or repeater of words more adapted to the tongue of a sage, but as a humble individual who submerges or asserts his individuality as an integral part of a greater whole. Such a habit does more to clean the spirit and strengthen the soul to overcome mere incidental emotionalism than any other therapeutic agent known to me.” MEDM October 1905, page 308.2
No doubt the doctor’s language, and probably his ideas, may be open to criticism; nevertheless, we have here a recognition by a scientist, in an assemblage of scientific men, of the fact that the principles of the gospel are in the highest sense scientific. There is much “science falsely so-called;” but there is real science, nevertheless, and that science consists primarily in recognizing that “there is one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in all,” and that “of him, and through him, and to him, are all things.” MEDM October 1905, page 308.3
Dr. Hyslop speaks only of prayer in nervous and mental diseases, because that is his specialty; but what he says may be applied to all cases. The effect is not imaginary: it is real. We all know the comfort and help there is in mere human sympathy. The mother’s loving embrace and kiss have soothed the real pain of many a child. Think, then, of what must be the effect upon one who is racked by physical pain, when his mind grasps the truth that “underneath are the everlasting arms” to soothe him, “as one whom his mother cornforteth:” when he knows of a surety that this One sympathizes with him to the full, because He actually suffers with him. And when the sufferer can realize that God does not merely share his suffering, but that God bears it all, and that he himself only shares a portion of God’s sufferings, this knowledge can cause him so to sink out of himself and be swallowed up in God, that he will lose all consciousness of his own pain in the contemplation of the sufferings of his Saviour; and this relief may be not merely temporary, but permanent. MEDM October 1905, page 308.4
This has been the personal experience of many; and it is a cause for rejoicing that there is one medical college in the world, having a reputation in the world as a scientific institution, where God is recognized as the one healer; and where, both in the simple case for which the divinely ordained remedy is plainly apparent, and also in the complicated case which leaves human skill utterly at fault, prayer to God is recognized and taught as the first scientific requisite. MEDM October 1905, page 308.5
E. J. W.