Chapter 5
God’s grace must have a place to go
in the devil’s world, and the only place that God’s grace can go in an
unrestrained manner where His capacity for love is manifest is to the
supergrace believer. Therefore supergrace is a series of capacities so that the
believer can respond to what God provides. Every believer from the point of the
cross on can choose for supergrace or not. The whole point of the book of James
is, Which road are you on? Are you on the road to supergrace or the road to
reversionism. You never stand still in the Christian life. The road to
reversionism is the road where you
try to make you happy.
Verse 1 — “Go to now.” What is
really says is, “Come on now” — present active imperative of a)gw plus the temporal adverb noun. It is an idiom. When you translate it literally it
is “Go now,” but when you bring it into an equivalent English idiom it is “Come
on now.”
“you rich ones.” There is nothing
wrong with being rich, and there is nothing wrong with being poor under certain
circumstances, but people always associate money with happiness. What they have
forgotten is that you can have lots of money or now money but what really gives
you capacity for what you do have or do not have is in your soul. You can be
wealthy and miserable because you have no capacity, but you can also be wealthy
and happy. What makes the difference between having happiness and having
everything in life God’s way, of trying to get happiness your way. It is the
difference between supergrace and reversionism.
When the believers tries to find
happiness apart from Bible doctrine this is where he always ends up — “weep and
howl.” “Weep” is an aorist active imperative of klaiw,
and it is an ingressive aorist, it means break out into crying. Why? Because he
is under discipline. This is a rich man in reversionism. The imperative mood is
a command. Then we have the word “howl” — o)loluzw which means to scream. This is a present tense. When you start crying
you go right into something else, you start screaming. He began to cry but when
he hit the tantrum it indicated total frustration. The change from the aorist
tense — “begin to cry,” and then “keep on screaming,” the constant screaming is
a tantrum to express the total frustration of a person who has everything and
has nothing. In other words, a wealthy believer in reversionism. His wealth in neutralised
by his lack of capacity. The supergrace life is the capacity to enjoy what God
provides.
What do they scream over? Next we
have the preposition e)pi — “over,” plus talaipwria — “miseries.” Literally, “over your miseries”
.There is only one way for any believer to ever enjoy anything and that is with
capacity that comes from the supergrace life, and no other way.
“that shall come upon you” — present
middle participle of e)iserxomai. This is a futuristic
present to denote an event which has not occurred but which will occur. If you
choose reversionism your life will be miseries “that shall come upon you.” If
you go for happiness by getting certain things in life what you wind up getting
is frustration and misery, even if you get the things you go for. “To “come
upon you” means to enter you. Again, the futuristic present indicates that
while it hasn’t occurred this is what will occur — divine discipline for the
reversionistic believer.
Translation: “Come on now you rich
ones, burst into weeping, continue screaming over your miseries coming upon
you.”
Verse 2 — “Your riches,” o( ploutoj u(mwn. This means “the riches of yours.” U(mwn is the genitive plural of possession of the pronoun su, indicating the wealth of the reversionist. Here is
a reversionist who through his own ability acquired wealth. There is nothing
wrong with acquiring wealth. The problem is not the wealth, it is the spiritual
status of reversionism. The problem is not having money, the problem lies in
having capacity, in spiritual status. In this passage it is not the wealth that
is being criticised it is the reversionist, the reversionist with wealth.
Remember that the reversionist has
no capacity. “Your riches are corrupted” .This wealth belongs to a believer. He
made a decision to neglect Bible doctrine and he went very positive toward the
idea of accumulating wealth. Here is corrupted wealth.. The word “corrupted”
here does not mean corrupted. It is the perfect active indicative of shpw which means to rot. It should be translated. “Your
wealth has rotted.” If a person gets a million dollars in reversionism it is
rotten, but if he gets it in supergrace it is capacity. In reversionism is
divine discipline and eventually the sin unto death. The point is that the soul
is corrupted. Reversionism rots the soul. This is a perfect tense, and it means
that whenever a person enters into reversionism his soul is not only in
emotional revolt but his soul has rotted and everything he possesses is rotten.
This is a tense of completed action and it is called a consummated perfect in
which a consummated process is presented. The money didn’t get corrupted, it is
the person on his way to reversionism. It isn’t the money that is rotten, it is
the soul. The wealth or the possessions of a person are not greater than the
soul of that person, the soul capacity of that person. When money becomes the
object of pseudo fanaticism then the soul rots. When a house, or things or clothes
become the object of pseudo love fanaticism the soul suffers. A rotten soul
corrupts everything it touches, everything in its periphery. There is no excuse
for the believer to have a rotten soul. When money or things or people or power
is preferred over doctrine they become inconsequential. In other words. before
you get what you want you destroy it by putting it before doctrine. So in
effect you destroy anything that you put before doctrine. And you haven’t
destroyed it for anyone else, you have destroyed it for yourself.
The word “rot” is better than
“corrupted” here because rot indicates that it is malodorous. Anything that
rots is malodorous, and you have a malodorous soul in reversionism. When
something is malodorous and gets in the vicinity of others it corrupts them and
they become malodorous. That is rottenness of soul. You neutralise and destroy
everything in life that would make you happy without capacity.
Capital for redeeming time is Bible
doctrine. Remember that James is teaching how to purchase time as a believer.
If money was the way time was purchased and God gave everyone money, they would
blow it, so He has given them something that they could all have in grace —
Bible doctrine, the capital for purchasing time. If the believer pursues
doctrine then he has divine capital. Once he has divine capital then God will
hook up with it whatever is prosperity for that person and he will enjoy it to
the utmost. Pursue doctrine and money will catch up with you. In other words,
while you are pursuing doctrine the things that you associate with prosperity
will be coming to you, and when they come to you, then the capacity for
prosperity is there. Prosperity = capacity + an object. The object can be
money, a woman, a man, success, power, etc. But prosperity equals capacity plus
an object. God in His grace knew this, so what does He want you to have first?
Capacity, and that is doctrine. Then you will never destroy any object in your
periphery whether it is a person or a thing. Without capacity you will.
“your garments.” Why use garments here? Because garments are
associated with wealth and success and influence. Ta himatia u(mwn — “your clothes,” generally outer clothing, that which is observable
and therefore makes you attractive in the eyes of others and brings some kind
of a compliment, and so on.
“are” — perfect active indicative of
ginomai, literally, “have become.”
This is a consummative perfect in which the process is emphasised — the process
of the garments becoming moth-eaten. If you have rottenness of soul you could
have the most beautiful clothes in the world and they are moth-eaten while you
wear them.
“moth-eaten” — shtobrwtoj [shto = moth; brwtoj = to eat]. “Rotten” and “moth-eaten” both refer to
reversionism which lacks capacity.
Verse 3 — “Your gold and silver” not
only refers to intrinsic wealth but it refers to things. In the ancient world
many things were made out of gold and silver and some of the most fantastic
treasures on the earth are some of the gold and silver things that were made in
the past. People may comment on what beautiful silver you have, and if you have
a rotten soul it will be destructive. The silver is tarnished even though it
may be very beautiful. If you possess them with a moth-eaten soul, a rotten
soul, there will be no blessing for you and none for anyone else.
“cankered” — the perfect passive
indicative of katiow. Katiow
really
means to be corroded or tarnished. Again, it is a perfect tense. And it is a
consummated perfect which indicates that it is not the process in the object,
it is the process in the soul which has done this. The process in the soul is
negative volition toward doctrine. Then what is in the soul reaches out to
everything that you possess, and it tarnishes, it rots, it corrodes, it corrupts,
it is moth-eaten because of no capacity in the soul. The possession of wealth
is not the issue, it is the capacity in the soul to possess wealth. It is not
what you have that counts, it is what your soul contains by way of doctrine.
Gold provides wealth but doctrine provides capacity for wealth. Wealth is not
happiness, the possession of things is not happiness; it is merely a means by
which one expresses his capacity. The true issue is doctrine in the soul.
“rust” — this is incorrect because
gold and silver do not rust. They tarnish but do not rust. The word is o( i)oj — “and their poison” .This
is the venom of reversionism. The venom is in the soul, not on, the gold or the
silver. The venom is reversionism; “shall be,” future active indicative of e)imi. The future tense is a gnomic future for a statement
of fact which could be expected under conditions of reversionism. The active
voice: the venom of reverse process reversionism produces the action of the
verb. The indicative mood is the reality of reverse process reversionism now
compared to venom.
“a witness” — preposition e)ij plus the accusative of marturion, which means evidence. The evidence against you is the fact that in
your soul is the venom of reversionism. In reversionism the believer accumulates
his own evidence which leads to his prosecution and punishment. Venom in the
soul today means divine discipline in your life tomorrow.
How do you get this venom in your
soul? First of all you neglect Bible doctrine, you go negative. Then you build
up scar tissue on the left bank of the soul, a frantic search for happiness on
the right bank, and whatever you use for your frantic search for happiness this
becomes the means for putting venom in the soul. venom in the soul, then, is
the evidence of reversionism and the evidence is used to convict you and lead
to divine discipline, which will be first of all illness in this passage, and
secondly, the sin unto death.
“and shall eat your flesh” —
literally, “it shall eat your pieces of flesh.” “Pieces of flesh” refers to the
objects of prosperity. It means anything — money, right man/right woman, power,
success, etc. Whatever it is the venom eats up or destroys the pieces of flesh.
The nest phrase, “as it were fire,”
goes with the next sentence. “Like fire you have heaped treasure together [or,
accumulated treasure]” — the aorist active indicative of qhsaurizw means to accumulate treasure. In other words, when
you try on your own prosperity. Capacity comes from doctrine and you are
negative toward doctrine. Whatever objects you acquire they produce a reaction
in the soul which has no doctrine. Instead of capacity you have rot, you have
tarnish, you have moth-eaten, you have venom, and all of these things are a
fire in the soul that burns you up. You self-destruct while still alive. The
accumulation of treasure is trying to gain these things on your own apart from
Bible doctrine. The aorist tense is culminative, which means that as you
accumulate these things and you accumulate fire the fire eventually destroys
everything. The fire, then, refers to the sin unto death bracket. All
reversionists get burned.
You have to have capacity + the
object = prosperity. The reversionist uses this object to try to solve his
problems. And that is his problem. He is using the object — money, a woman,
success, etc. — to solve his problem, and the only solution to problems is
doctrine in the soul which gives the capacity.
“for the last days” — e)n plus the dative plural of e)sxatoj. But e)sxatoj here doesn’t mean the last
days, it means the catastrophe. The end of reversionism is total catastrophe or
the sin unto death. So it is “the end catastrophe,” or “the crisis [or
catastrophic] days.”
In verses 4-6 we have three areas of
monetary reverse process reversionism. The first is in business life, the
second is in social life, and the third is in the function of the laws of
establishment in the field of law and judicial activity.
Verse 4 — we begin with the particle i)dou which means “Behold.” It is actually a particle
taken from the aorist middle imperative of the verb o(raw
which means to see. to look, or to behold. This is called demonstrative
particle and it is designed to focus attention. The real rich man in phase two
is the supergrace believer. Here is a reversionistic rich man whose wealth is
measured in terms of a large accumulation of money. He has no doctrine,
although a believer, and he does have a great deal of money. The supergrace
believer uses doctrine under the concept of patience but the believer in this
passage is very rich, very reversionistic, and he practices reverse process
reversionism in his business life.
“the hire of the labourers” — the
word for “hire” is misqoj which means wages. This man
cheated people of their wages in making a good deal of money. When God provides
money for a believer there is no cheating involved. This man has cheated and
made money by depriving those who worked for it of legitimate wages.
“who have reaped down” is an aorist
active participle from a)maw which means to harvest. He
hired these people for a harvest and then refused to pay them and therefore
made more money out of the harvest.
“your fields” — referring, of
course, to industry as it existed in the ancient world which had an
agricultural economy.
Why did these people go to this man
to work? because he said he would pay them at the end of the harvest, but he
lied. They assumed that because he was a believer he would keep his word. They
may have had some experience with an honourable man but this dishonourable
believer is the believer on the road to reversionism and he is making money out
of using Christianity as a front.
“which is of you kept back” — this
is a perfect passive participle of a)fusterew which means to defraud. It
is in the perfect tense, which means he habitually defrauded people of their
wages. He deprives them of their living so that he can accumulate more and more
wealth. The phrase “of you” is the ablative of source: “from the source of
you,” a)po plus the ablative of su.
It is not the money that is crying,
it is the one who has been cheated. Here is a victim of cheating in business.
In this case it is a worker, lots of workers. It is the victim who is screaming
because his living is gone.
“crieth” — the present active
indicative of krazw which means to scream. It is
the cry of desperation, it is a truly desperate situation. This is actually a
reference to Deuteronomy 24:14,15 which as a part of the laws of divine
establishment deals with economy. The principle is that people have a right to
wages and under the principle of establishment the more money a man makes in
business under free enterprise and under the grace of God the greater becomes
his responsibility to the system under which he becomes wealthy. The present
active indicative of krazw means to keep screaming. Why
do they keep screaming? Because they have been deprived of a living when in
reality they should be sharing in the prosperity. The man who made all of this
money has responsibility to his workers, for their prosperity, to allow the
prosperity to overflow to others. In this way he is blessed and others are
blessed. This is the way the laws of divine establishment work. Not only that,
but if any of his workers for some reason become disabled they do not have to
go to a government for help, they go to him for help. From his business and
from his profits he provides for them. So it is not the business of government
it is the business of those who have succeeded under free enterprise to carry
along those who have been disabled in helping them, and to carry along those
who have been faithful in helping him so that the profit is shared.
“and the cries” — literally, the
screams, boai (pl); “of the ones having
harvested” (literally), the aorist active participle. In other words, they did
their job and they were not paid for the legitimate work which they did. The
rich man broke his contract to make more money.
“have entered” — perfect active
indicative of e(iserxomai, and it means to enter into;
“have entered into,” perfect tense, they have entered in the past with the
result that God is going to do something about it.
“into the ears” — this is an
anthropomorphism, God doesn’t have ears but the screams of people suffering,
starving, of being deprived of their homes or their families because their
wages were not forthcoming.
“of the Lord” — but He is not called
“the Lord” here, and there is a reason for it. He is called “Lord” but there is
something else — kurioj sabawq. This is taken from the
Hebrew, Adonai Sabaoth. “Sabaoth” means armies. “So, “the screams have entered
into the ears of the Lord of the armies” which implies that when those who are
capitalists under free enterprise under the laws of divine establishment become
reversionistic and begin to cheat, they themselves will suffer from violence.
The violence will either be regular military warfare or revolution. That is
what happened in Russia in 1917. The discipline of the reversionistic believers
through national military defeat or revolution will deprive them of their
wealth and their freedom. In reversionism, in a frantic search for happiness,
they went all out to make money and in doing so they cheated those who worked
for them. As a result the screams of those who have suffered from the tyranny
of this wealthy reversionist have gone to the Lord of the armies and there will
be national catastrophe, and this man will lose everything — his wealth and,
more important, his freedom by which he made his wealth.
Verse 5 — a change of scene. We have
social life. This could be the same man or some other man, the principle
remains the same. “You have lived in pleasure.” There is nothing wrong with
that, but what does this verb say? It is the aorist active indicative of trufaw. The aorist active indicative means to live a life of
luxury or self-indulgence. It doesn’t mean to have luxury, it means to push
luxury to the point of self-indulgence. It means also to carouse, the revel. It
is actually a case of self-indulgence as a substitute for capacity for life. A
wealthy person in supergrace would have capacity for life but a wealthy person
in reversionism goes in for self-indulgence. The aorist tense is a constantive
aorist. This man is totally self-indulgent. The active voice: the rich
reversionist produces the action of the verb and in so doing this is a social
reverse process reversionism. The indicative mood is the reality of a life of
self-indulgence, of carousal, on the part of a sensual person. His capacity for
life comes from supergrace but he is in reversionism, therefore he has no
capacity for living luxuriously. “You have lived in luxury and self-indulgence
on the earth.”
“and have been wanton” — aorist
active indicative from spatalaw which means to be a sensual
voluptuary. Like all reversionists this man has said no to Bible doctrine and
said yes to pleasure. There is nothing wrong with pleasure as such unless you
happen to be in reversionism, and then there is everything wrong with it.
“you have nourished your hearts as
in a day of slaughter.” The aorist active indicative of trepw means to fatten. Trepw means
to feed but it means to fatten an animal for the slaughter house. They have
fattened their right lobes which instead of being filled with doctrine are
fattened with pleasure. In other words, they are getting ready for the
slaughter house. The right lobe is empty of doctrine but it is full of sensual
types of stimuli. As a result this person is being fattened for the slaughter.
“as in the day of slaughter” — the
day of sfagh. Sfagh means slaughtering fatted
animals. The day of slaughter is the national disaster, whether it is
revolution or military defeat, or both, always results in enslavement for the
destruction of the reversionist. Social life, like business life, contributes
to the destruction of the national entity.
Translation: “You have lived in
luxury and self-indulgence in the land, you have been a sensual voluptuary; you
have fattened your right lobes for a day of slaughter.”
Now, what else can they attack in
reversionism? The very basis for the function of all kinds of establishment. A
nation must have its military to protect its freedoms. it must have free
enterprise and men of business genius for its prosperity. But a nation cannot
have either freedom or prosperity without a system of law. Law suppresses the
evil of the old sin nature and makes it possible for three things: the freedom
of the individual, the privacy and the property of the individual citizen.
These are the three basic fundamentals which are involved in any system or free
nation. Legislation must always be designed to protect the individuals freedom,
privacy and property unless he is a criminal, in which case it must either
execute him or isolate him from society so that he cannot violate these
principles.
“You have condemned and killed the
just.” This is the aorist active indicative from the compound verb katedikaw, which means that he has used his wealth, his
influence and his power to run an innocent person under condemnation; “You have
condemned the innocent.” The very one that the law should protect is the
innocent.
“and he does not oppose you” — a)ntitassw means not to resist but to oppose. This innocent
person doesn’t oppose you, is not against you and your money; but you have used
your money against him, you have taken something provided by the grace of God.
When a rich man attacks and destroys establishment in law he destroys the only
place where his money and his power have approval. He therefore pulls the rug
out from under himself and from his wealth. Therefore this verse ends just a
little differently: “he does not oppose you.” You oppose yourself is the
implication.
In verses 7 & 8 we have the
solution to monetary reversionism.
Verse 7 — we have the first of two
identical commands. In both verses (seven and eight) the Rapture of the Church
is mentioned, and in both verses we have a command which in the English says
“Be patient.”
“Be patient” is an aorist active
imperative of the Greek verb makroqumew. The word means to have
patience in the aorist tense but this is one of those words which is technical
and needs to be expanded into the concept which it represents in this passage.
This is a compound verb formed from two words: makroj
and qumoj. Makroj is a word connoting duration or long duration; qumoj is one of those synonyms for the soul with emphasis
on the mind. So it means to have a long soul or a long mind. But the meaning of
a word is determined by its usage in the original language and eventually this
came to mean to be long-suffering, to be patient, to be long-enduring of soul.
The principle in using this
particular passage has to do with the fact that in the soul is the solution to
every problem, very facet of reversionism. Not only that, but the soul was
saved at the point of salvation. When we believed on the Lord Jesus Christ it
was our soul that was saved, not the body. The soul is the great issue and the
soul is the battleground for the Christian way of life in phase two of the plan
of God, the believer in time. Therefore, whatever solution exists in life, whatever
blessing comes to you, it must be related to the soul.
Makroqumew is referring to the steps by which the believer enters into supergrace.
So he leaves reversionism and goes all of the way to supergrace. Under this
principle makroqumew, which is translated “be
patient,” means instead of pushing for money you should push for doctrine. That
is the principle of this aorist active imperative of makroqumew. Instead of money have patience. Patience is the
capital of phase two. The whole objective for the Christian in phase two is to
get doctrine into the soul.
The word “brethren” has to do with
members of the family of God — a)delfoj, which means “brother,” a
member of the family of God. You have to be born into God’s family and the only
way to be born into God’s family is through personal faith in the Lord Jesus
Christ.
The word “therefore” is an
inferential particle o)un indicating that we are on
the version of a conclusion at this point. The conclusion is that you do not
have to die in reversionism, you do not have to be disciplined in reversionism,
as long as you are alive you can get out of reversionism.
We cannot actually go along with the
translation “Be patient” because that is a present tense. Since this is an
aorist tense it should be translated “Have patience.” But remember that “Have
patience” is technical, it means to have doctrine in the right lobe, on the
launching pad, to be in the supergrace bracket, to have capacity for life.
The aorist tense is a constative
aorist and it gathers into one ball of wax all of the accumulated doctrine of
the supergrace life at the point at which that doctrine is being spent or
applied. The constative aorist refers to the supergrace believer spending or utilising
his capital. The active voice: the supergrace believer produces the action of
the verb. The imperative mood: this is a command. It is a command to use
doctrine as capital.
So we have: “Have patience therefore
members of the family of God.” This is addressed to believers in reversionism,
they are not impressed yet because the disciplinary points have not been
covered. There will be two disciplinary points later on in the passage: one in
verses 14 & 15 where a believer is dying the sin unto death in
reversionism, and one in verse 16 where the believer is very ill but not in the
terminal bracket as yet. In both cases believers hear the principle given now
and they will be impressed when they are hurting enough to be impressed.
Principle: Money cannot purchase
time in the Christian life. Only the supergrace believer can use doctrine as
capital to purchase time. Problems are solved by doctrine in the soul, not by
money.
Next we have “unto the coming of the
Lord.” The word “unto” is really “until” — e(wj.
This is a reference to the Rapture/resurrection of the Church. As long as the
Church Age is operational it is imperative that all believers becomes
capitalists. The way you become capitalists in the priesthood of the believer —
remember that the Church Age is the age of the universal priesthood of the
believer; every believer is a priest; every believer is indwelt by Jesus
Christ; every believer is indwelt by the Holy Spirit; every believer possesses
union with Christ; every believer has the canon of Scripture in writing,
protected and permanent — is to have Bible doctrine in the soul.
After this we have an illustration,
and the pattern of verse 7, the illustration, leads to a repetition of the
command. We have a demonstrative particle here: idou,
and it is based upon the aorist middle imperative of o(raw,
one of the verbs “to see.” It means to get a panoramic view. O(raw in the aorist middle imperative is translated
correctly, “behold” or “take a look.” This particular demonstrative particle is
designed to enliven the narrative by arousing the attention of the hearers or
readers by way of introducing an illustration. This word gives us the purpose
for illustration — to get you to regroup, to reconcentrate, to illustrate from
something in life, something that is easily understood. In those days it was
very understandable what was meant by a “husbandman.” In the Greek it is o( gewrgoj, a farmer or someone who owned a lot of land. Today
it would be a capitalist, a successful businessman, a man of wealth who
invested his money and expected a return on it.
The word “waiteth” is the present
middle indicative of e)kdexomai which means to receive from
another, to expect to receive something. It has the connotation of expectation,
to look for something with expectation. it means to invest money in something
and anticipate a profit. It is strictly a concept of capitalism. All
illustrations in the Bible which deal with economy always are related to
capitalism under free enterprise since capitalism under free enterprise is a
part of the laws of divine establishment. The anticipation is described here by
the present middle indicative of e)kdexomai: “Behold the farmer waits
with expectation.” The present tense here is known as an iterative present, it
describes that which recurs at successive intervals in an agricultural economy.
In other words, there is the sowing, then the harvest, and then the profit. The
iterative present indicates that he has done this before and he will do it
again. He is an excellent businessman. This is also the middle voice in the
Greek, and in the middle voice here the subject participates in the action of
the verb. The indirect middle is used here in which the agent producing the
action is emphasised. he is benefited by the action of the verb; he is going to
make a great profit. By way of illustration the middle voice here indicates
that only the supergrace believer with a saturation of Bible doctrine in his
soul actually has the capacity to enjoy life. This is also a permissive middle
voice in which the agent yields himself to the results of the action in his own
interest. The indicative mood is the reality of the supergrace believer
utilising Bible doctrine in the soul and therefore the reality of spending
doctrine to the Lord’s profit.
“the precious fruit of the earth” — ton timion means “that of highest value” .The word “fruit” is
also in the accusative singular karpon, and it means in this case
“production” — the production from whatever he sowed. Then, “of the earth” is
the genitive thj ghj and it means “of the land”
.So it should be translated, “the valuable production of the land.” This is
analogous to the supergrace believer redeeming time while waiting for the
Rapture of the Church and/or phase three. So the precious or most valuable
production refers to capital gains from doctrine spent in the supergrace life.
The supergrace believer redeems time by the use of Bible doctrine in his soul,
in his spirit, in the ECS, in the supergrace bracket.
Next we have “and hath long
patience.” Again, we have the same verb repeated. The verb that was used in the
aorist active imperative in the command that began this sentence is now found
in the form of a participle in the illustration — the present active participle
makroqumew. It means, again, to have
doctrine in the soul — Bible doctrine in the soul spent, utilised by the
supergrace believer. The present active participle indicates this man is a
capitalist, this man is confident, this man knows that investments sooner or
later will make money, just as the believer with Bible doctrine in the soul knows
that sooner or later he will spend, he will utilise that doctrine to the glory
of God in phase two.
Then we have the word “and” in the KJV. There is no “and.” It should be “constantly being patient for it” —
the preposition e)pi plus the locative of a)utoj, the intensive pronoun, and it should be translated
“over it.” It is in the feminine gender to go with the word “land” .It is a
feminine noun and therefore the intensive pronoun modifies it and it should be
translated “over it [the land]” .He is constantly applying to the land.
Next we have “until” — e(wj, the conjunction of time. This sets up the analogy
again to the Rapture or entry into phase three by death; “until he has
received,” the aorist active subjunctive of lambanw. The aorist tense this time is a culminative aorist, he has now
received a profit. The active voice: the subject produces the action of the
verb, he has made the basis by which the profit will occur. The subjunctive
mood indicates the potentiality of the factors that go into success in business
in agriculture.
The word “early” is proimon referring the rains which occur from October to
December. Rain portrays God’s grace. We don’t earn it or deserve it or work for
it. The early rain is analogous to that part of the believer’s life when he is
progressing; when he has left reversionism or he is by-passing reversionism. In
other words, the early rain is analogous to doctrine in the left lobe as gnwsij. Gnwsij is transferred by pistij, positive volition, the human spirit as e)pignwsij cycled into the right lobe into the frame of
reference. There it becomes vocabulary, categories, norms and standards. The ECS is erected and there is progress to the verge of supergrace. That is
the early rain. That is the continuation, the persistence in the intake of
Bible doctrine so that doctrine becomes a permanent part of the soul. There are
many blessings and even prosperity in daily spiritual growth. You haven’t
arrived yet but you are on the way. While the believer is moving toward
supergrace his capacity is developing and he has many wonderful blessings along
the way, but that is not arrival. Arrival comes after the “latter rain” — kai o)yimon, and it refers to the rains which come in March and
April and are analogous to the supergrace life. This is the rain that
guarantees the harvest. This is supergrace prosperity, supergrace production.
The same concept is found in Hebrews 6:7-10. So the latter rain refers to
capacity for life, capacity for freedom, capacity for love, capacity for
happiness, capacity for prosperity, capacity for grace in the supergrace life.
Translation: “Have patience
therefore, members of the family of God, until the coming of the Lord [phase
three, the Rapture]. Behold, the capitalist farmer waits with expectation for
the precious [or very valuable] production of the land, constantly being
patient over it [the land], until he has received the early and the latter
rain.”
Summary
1. The command is given to the
supergrace believer to redeem the time by utilising grace provision through
Bible doctrine. Remember that Bible doctrine is capital. Capital for phase one:
the blood of Christ; capital for phase two: Bible doctrine in the soul.
2. The command in the constative
aorist active imperative of makroqumew
is continue
as long as you live on this earth, until either death or the Rapture removes
you into the presence of the Lord.
3. The illustration is used from
capitalism of an agricultural economy. The farmer illustrates the supergrace
believer redeeming the time through doctrine.
4. The early rain refers to the
approach to supergrace — growing up, developing the ECS through the daily function of GAP.
5. The early rain is comparable to
the early stages of the Christian life when a believer goes from spiritual
infancy to supergrace. This is the stage of the planting of the seed, the
germination of the seed.
6. The latter rain is the period of
the maturing of the grain prior to harvest. This is the entrance into the
supergrace life, the point at which the believer shares God’s happiness.
7. The supergrace function demands
total capacity from maximum doctrine in the soul. This is capacity for freedom,
life, love, God’s happiness, grace, prosperity.
8. A reminder. No believer ever goes
from spiritual infancy to supergrace without a) his right pastor communicating;
b) a local church in which there is strict academic discipline; c) the filling
of the Spirit and the daily function of GAP; d) persistence in the
intake of Bible doctrine.
Verse 8 — “Be ye also patient” —
aorist active imperative of makroqumew
again. Same
verb, same morphology as in verse 7. Again, it means the daily intake of Bible
doctrine accumulating in the soul capital to be spent in the supergrace life.
By the way, Bible doctrine in the nouj [the mind], which is called gnwsij, cannot be applied. It is not capital there. That
is why James says at the beginning of this book, Don’t be just a hearer, be a
doer of the Word. To be a doer of the Word is to have doctrine in your right
lobe. Capital can only be spent in the heart or the right lobe, never in the nouj or the mind. Doing the Word is spending capital as a
believer. We have a constative aorist here which refers to every time you as a
supergrace believers utilises Bible doctrine. The active voice: the believer in
supergrace spends capital, invests capital, and always gets more and more
return; there is no end to it. This is capacity for supergrace living. Again,
it is the imperative mood which is a command for all believers to take in
doctrine and to utilise doctrine for phase two.
Verse 9 — “Grudge not” is a present
active imperative of stenazw plus the negative mh. Stenazw means to vent verbally, to complain, to murmur, to criticise.
to malign, to slander; in other words, to be guilty of the sins of the tongue.
With the negative mh it should be translated
“Stop criticising.” The present tense is a customary present which means
something that occurs habitually at certain times. The active voice: the action
is produced by a reversionistic believer whose frantic search for happiness
involves putting down others by means of the sins of the tongue, and
specifically putting down the pastor. The imperative mood plus the negative
means to stop doing something that is being done.
“one against another” — we have the
preposition kata plus a reciprocal pronoun
taken from a)lloj, which means another of the
same kind. Kata with stenazw means “against.” “Stop criticising against another
of the same kind.”
“brethren” — a)delfoj means members of the family of God.
The doctrine of the sins of the tongue
1. The old sin nature sponsors three
categories of personal sins. a) Mental attitude sins; b) Sins of the tongue; c)
Overt sins. Sins of the tongue emanate from the old sin nature — Psalm 34:13;
James 3:6.
2. Out of the list of the seven
worst sins in Proverbs 6:16-19 three are sins of the tongue — nearly half.
Verbal sins are always indicative of a mind in neutral and an old sin nature in
gear.
3. Sins of the tongue are sponsored
or motivated by mental attitude sins. Mental attitude sins which generally
motivate sins of the tongue are pride, jealousy, which are usually two sides of
the same coin. If you are proud you resent someone who appears to challenge
your pride, and therefore you are jealous of that person. Psalm 5:9.
4. Perpetuation of the sins of the
tongue or habitual function of the sins of the tongue indicate verbal
reversionism — James 5:9, 12. Verbal reversionism results in the sin unto death
— Psalm 12:3.
5. Sins of the tongue also produce
triple compound divine discipline — Psalm 64:8; Matthew 7:1,2 (in the Greek).
Triple compound discipline is developed from three sources: a) the mental
attitude sin which sponsors the sin of the tongue; b) the sin of gossip,
slander, criticism, produces divine discipline; c) when it is gossip or slander
you assign sins to the individual.
6. Furthermore, God protects the
believer who is victimised by the sins of the tongue — Job 5:19-21. God blesses
the believer who is victimised by the sins of the tongue by making him a blessing
to his detractor — James 5:16. This is grace turning cursing
into blessing. (The curse is stated in James 3:9)
7. Control of the tongue or the
absence of verbal sins is a sign of a mature believer possessing an ECS — James 3:2; and functioning in the supergrace life — James 4:11,12.
8. The sin of the tongue habitually
used are a sign of reversionism — James 4:11; 5:9, 12.
9. Verbal reversionism produces
enough gossip, slander, maligning, criticism, judging, to destroy an entire
congregation — James 3:5,6.
10. Since the sins of the tongue can
destroy an entire congregation it is the duty of the pastor-teacher to warn his
sheep against them — 2 Timothy 2:14-17.
11. Furtherance on this:
troublemakers are characterised by the sins of the tongue — Psalm 52:2.
Believers are commanded to
separate from verbal troublemakers — Romans 16:17,18.
12. By avoiding the sins of the
tongue the believer can both lengthen his life and find great happiness — Psalm 34:12,13.
“lest” — the conjunction i(na plus the negative mh,
“that you not be.” Then we have the word “condemned,” the aorist passive
subjunctive of krinw which means to be judged or
disciplined. The constative aorist gathers up into one ball of wax every time
you will be judged for sins of the tongue. The passive voice: the
reversionistic believer receives discipline from God. And the subjunctive mood
goes with the purpose clause.
There are three types of discipline
which will be found in this context, both from monetary reversionism and verbal
reversionism.
a) The sin unto death, verses 14,
15, 20; b) Illness for reversionism, verse 16; c) National catastrophe, the
fifth cycle of discipline, from reversionism, verses 17, 18.
In this verse we have the sin, the
discipline, and the principle. In the recovery from the sin unto death we will
have the same concept — verse 16.
The principle: “behold” — used in
this passage to introduce illustrations; now it is used to introduce a
principle: i)dou, a demonstrative particle
derived from the aorist middle imperative of o(raw,
used to emphasised the importance of this principle of doctrine in phase two.
“the judge” — krithj. The judge is God Himself. You are critical of
others; now face the critic [krithj]. The critic refers to God
in the role of a judge against the reversionistic believer. This is not God
judging carnality. We should learn to distinguish between carnality and
reversionism. Carnality is a believer getting out of fellowship, and under the
carnal state the solution is rebound. But when a believer is in reversionism he
sits an area of persistent carnality which results in, first sickness [God
knocking at the door], and then dying [the sin unto death; God knocking harder
at the door].
“standeth” — this is a perfect
tense; the perfect active indicative of i(sthmi. It means He stands in the past, from the time you go into
reversionism.
“before the door” — pro plus the ablative of qura,
a big door. Both here and in Revelation 3:20 the knocking on the door is a
disciplinary warning of reversionism. After all, if you won’t pay attention any
other way you will pay attention when you hurt bad enough.
Translation: “Stop criticising,
brethren, against others of the same kind that you not be judged: behold the
judge stands in the past with the result that he keeps standing before the
door.”
Summary
1. Constant criticism, slander,
maligning, judging — habitual, unrestrained verbal sins — is a sign of
reversionism.
2. The believer in reversionism
cannot redeem time.
3. For the critical, reversionistic
believer God has a system of disciplinary warnings. God stands at the door of
the soul and the knocking at the door is the actual discipline.
4. Not only is the believer under
divine discipline miserable — not redeeming time, not fulfilling the purpose
for which he remains in this life — but this is the manner in which God seeks
to get his attention. In other words, you have a choice of two kinds of
authority in this world. You can come to Bible class and get it from your pastor and be under his authority,
or you can go negative toward doctrine and come directly under God’s authority.
The only way God can get your attention in phase two when you are out from
under your right pastor is to clobber you.
This sentence in verse 9 is not
completed, it is postponed by a parenthesis. The sentence is continued in verse
12. So the verbal reversionism is interrupted and in the parenthesis we see
that not all suffering is for discipline; not all suffering is punitive. In
this particular passage now we have a short dissertation on the fact, Look, if
you are suffering it doesn’t mean wake up and go positive for doctrine. It may
be that you are growing up and you need some suffering for blessing, for
growth. So we have in verses 10-11 a parenthesis to set up a contrast between
suffering for discipline on the one hand and the reversionist suffering on the
other.
Verse 10 — “Take” is literally
“receive,” aorist active imperative of lambanw which means to receive something. Who receives? A believer who is
positive toward doctrine. It means here to receive an example. Actually this
sentence begins with the word u(podeigmai which means an example.
“Receive an example of suffering affliction, members of the family of God.” Now
we have believers growing; suffering for blessing. We have the noun kakopaqeia here. Paqeia comes from suffering; kako means evil, but it doesn’t mean to suffer evil here,
it means to endure affliction. It should be translated this way: “Members of
the family of God, receive [or take an example of] endurance in suffering.”
“and of patience” — makroqumia, which means spending doctrine. Doctrine in the
soul is your capital. There are two things here: a) There is a situation of
suffering; b) There is doctrine so that you can cope with it. So take an
example of a combination where it isn’t suffering for discipline. We have just
had in verse 9 suffering from divine discipline; that is a reversionist. But
now we go to a person who has doctrine. What does he do when he suffers? He
spends doctrine, he is not broke. When a person has money in the bank he can
meet the situation. When a person has doctrine in the soul he can meet the
situation in suffering, and he can spend it and have a ball in suffering as
well as in anything else. “Members of the family of God, take an example of
endurance in suffering, and spending doctrine.”
Then he mentions the prophets. Profhthj is used here for the Old Testament gifts of
pastor-teacher, the gift of communication comparable to the gift of
pastor-teacher in the Church Age.
“the prophets who” — nominative
masculine plural from the relative pronoun o(j,
indicating once again that God provides the gift of communication to males;
“have spoken” — aorist active indicative of lalew which
means to communicate, to teach; “in the name of the Lord.” Notice the change in
the word order: “Members of the family of God, take an example of endurance and
suffering, and patience, the prophets who have communicated doctrine in the
name of the Lord.”
Why did he mention the prophets? Because
these prophets had doctrine. They were plus doctrine because if they didn’t
have doctrine they couldn’t communicate. So they spent doctrine. That is why
they makes such a good illustration. They were plus doctrine and often they
faced great adversity. This adversity was not discipline, it was to give them a
chance to spend some of that doctrine they were communicating. So the would
spend it in the adversity, and when you spend doctrine in adversity you are
counted +H — “Behold we count them happy,” in verse 11.
The prophets
1. They used doctrine which is the
coin of the realm for phase two. They used it first of all for communication, this was their message.
2. They used it for capacity in
supergrace. Supergrace capacity means capacity for freedom, for life, for love,
for +H, for grace, for prosperity. They also used it in time of suffering,
adversity and tragedy.
Verse 11 — “Behold” — again the
demonstrative particle used to place emphasis on the greatness of any believer
who will have doctrine stored in the soul for all kinds of situations. You
spend money in happy times and you spend money in adverse times. That is the
point. You also spend money to make money. There is your production of divine
good.
“we count them happy” — present
active indicative of makarizw.
Makarizw
means to congratulate. You congratulate people generally who are happy. When
you say “Congratulations” to someone it is because they have achieved, they
have acquired, they have done something that is associated with happiness or
success. Congratulations means “I recognise your happiness” .In other words,
this verb means to recognise someone else’s happiness, and we recognise the
happiness of those believers who are saturated with Bible doctrine. We
recognise their happiness in prosperity, in adversity and at all times.
Congratulations prophets!
“who endure” — u(pomenw, aorist active participle plus the definite
article: “We congratulate the ones having endured.” “Behold, we congratulate
the ones having endured” .U(pomenw means to endure in the
sense of being under — u(po: under; menw: to abide. What does that mean? Doctrine in the
soul plus suffering. And they continued to abide under the suffering because
they had doctrine in the soul. Out of this comes +H.
Now he gives the illustration: “Ye have heard” — they had been taught,
they are Jews, they understand the Old Testament scriptures. James is one of
the early books in the New Testament. The New Testament had not come along yet
so he has to go to the Old Testament. This is the aorist active indicative of a)kouw. In the past you have learned some doctrine, you
have studied the book of Job. “You have heard [through Bible teaching] of the
patience of Job” — thn u(pomonhn
I)wb. Job
stayed under doctrine — when the bad news came in. “The Lord giveth, the Lord taketh
away” .That is spending doctrine in catastrophe.
“and have seen” — aorist active
indicative of o(raw. This skips over his
reversionism because that would anticipate what is coming up. He went into
reversionism. He recovered. His friends went into reversionism. He prayed for
their recovery and they did recover. This is o(raw
the panoramic view. Aorist tense: they studied Job from some teacher. The
active voice: they sat and listened to the teaching of Job and understood it.
The indicative mood is the reality of the fact that when they did understand
the teaching of Job they were growing up and moving toward supergrace.
“the end from the Lord” — teloj for the end of the story of
Job under suffering. “From the Lord” is the ablative of kurioj — this is ablative, not genitive. What was the end?
Job prayed for his reversionistic friends, just as the pastor is going to pray
for a reversionistic flock in verses 15 and 16, just as Elijah will pray for a
reversionistic nation in verses 17 and 18. Job prayed for his friends and the
Lord restored them. That was the end wrought by the Lord.
When Job went into the great
adversity he had just doctrine and three friends. He applied doctrine, and as
long as he did in suffering everything was great — he was happy, he had +H; but
his three friends began to work on him and he phased out doctrine and listened
to them, and finally came up with -H and started into reversionism from which
he recovered, while his friends were still giving him the shaft. Then when he
got straightened out along the way. God finally told his three friends in
reversionism they had better listen to Job and get him to pray for you. Job
prayed for them and they were restored. Then God poured out prosperity and plus
H on Job that was fantastic.
“that” is literally “because” — “the
Lord keeps on being,” present active indicative of e)imi (not
“very pitiful” but “very compassionate”) “and merciful.”
Translation: “Behold, we consider
happy the ones having endured [Doctrine plus suffering]. You have heard of the
endurance of Job [Doctrine spent in adversity], and have seen the end from the
Lord; because the Lord keeps on being very compassionate, and merciful.”
Grace always finds a way. Even with
supergrace heroes the emphasis is always on the character of the Lord. This is
grace. Everything depends on who and what the Lord is, never who and what man
is. So in the parenthesis the Lord restores from reversionism directly, as in
the case of Job, and then Job as the supergrace hero restores his friends
through prayer. Chapter 5:12-13
In verses 1-6 we had a study of
monetary reversionism; verses 7-8, the solution to it. Verses 9-12, verbal
reversionism; beginning in verse 13 we see the solution.
Verse 12 — the word which begins the
verse is a particle to resume a discourse. This particle actually closes the
parenthesis. In verse 9 we began verbal reversionism with the principle of criticising.
In verses 10 and 11 we have the completion of a dissertation on adversity for
blessing, and then in verse 12 we resume with verbal reversionism. Verse 9
emphasises the slander, criticism, maligning and judging of others, especially
the pastor-teacher. Verse 12 indicates operation strap-on.
The particle de is used to resume the discourse and in effect closes
the parenthesis. It indicates that verses 10 and 11 was a slight interruption,
the purpose of which was to take a discourse on the fact that there is
suffering for blessing. That doesn’t happen to be the type of suffering in this
passage but there is suffering for blessing. The translation should be, “Before
all things.” The discourse started out indicating the fact that in verse 9
verbal reversionism results in suffering for discipline. However, just because
a person may be a verbal reversionist and suffer from it there is another type
of suffering which is designed for blessing.
Verse 9 said literally, “Judge not,
stop maligning, stop slandering, stop judging.” Now in verse 12 we resume the
discourse with another negative. We have the present active imperative. This
time we have the word “swear not,” o)mnuw which means to make a
promise with an oath, to cover a lie by making an oath in the name of something
that will act as a front for operation strap-on. Always o)mnuw indicates that the content of what is said is a lie
but in order to make it appear as the truth to make some kind of a solemn oath
with it. In that solemn oath, like “As God is my witness, thus and thus is
true,” when in reality it is not true at all. That is using God to front for a
lie, and that is called operation strap-on.
“Before all things my brethren” —
“brethren” refers to members of the family of God. Man enters the family of God
by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ; “stop making promises with an oath,” i.e.
stop lying and using something else to cover for your lie. The negative mh with the imperative indicates that the believers to
whom this was originally addressed were doing it, in fact they were actually
believers involved in the verbal reversionism concept. The present tense is a
present tense of duration which is called retroactive linear aktionsart and it
indicates that these believers had been doing it ever since they got into
verbal reversionism. The active voice: the reversionistic believer uses a front
for his lies to try to make them appear as the truth.
So the passage begins: “Before all
things, members of the family of God, stop lying and fronting it with an oath.”
In the function of operation strap-on we have here the reversionist who is
doing it and his victim. Just as in verse 9 “grudge not” means stop judging,
stop criticising, stop maligning. The victim of verse 9, according to what is
coming up, is the pastor-teacher. The victim in verse 12 is the pastor-teacher
again. The victim can be anyone in vernal reversionism but in this context it
is the pastor-teacher. The authority of the pastor-teacher has been rejected
and since his authority has been rejected he has become the target for
criticism in verse 9 and in verse 9 he has become the object of a series of strap-ons.
“Stop making promises with an oath.” This is using something usually associated
with the truth to cover up for a lie. This indicates both instability and
dishonesty in verbal reversionism.
What is used as a front? Our first
phrase says “neither by heaven.” This refers to using God as a front — “As God
is my witness,” people often say to cover up a lie. God is used as a front. God
is associated with truth and therefore if you want to make a lie more
impressive then mention the fact that God is the witness that you are telling
the truth. Or another offshoot of this is to stand up in a congregational
meeting and say, “It’s God’s will that we do it this way.” That is merely an
opinion and when an opinion is expressed as an absolute it becomes a lie, and
to use God as the front for the lie is, again, operation strap-on: using
something associated with truth in order to front for either an opinion set up
as an absolute or a lie set up as the truth. Under operation strap-on you take
something verbally, like a lie, and say it is truth. Or you take an opinion and
make it an absolute. Doctrine is absolute. In either case you must have a front
for acceptability, and “neither by heaven” refers to God, setting up God as the
front.
There are other ways also of
covering a lie by setting up something that appears true — “neither by the
earth.” This refers to a person using another person to cover for his lie,
someone who is usually recognised as being truthful. This is also used in some
cases to set up some kind of an institution which is recognised as being
truthful, therefor the next phrase, “neither by any other oath,” the oath
being, for example, “I swear on my mother’s grave,” or “I swear on a stack of
Bibles.” All of these are fabrications designed to cover.
What this verse does not mean and
what it appears to mean because of the poor translation has to d with
profanity. This verse does not refer to profanity, to taking the Lord’s name in
vain, except as it applies to using the Lord as a front for a lie. This verse
has nothing to do with using expletives or using profanity, rather it does
refer to honesty of soul expressed in human language. When a believer enters
into reversionism one of the signs of this reversionism is dishonesty:
fabricating lies and using something for a front. Reversionism is a life of
sham, of pretense, of fabrication, of mendacity, and of dissimulation. Since
the whole concept of reversionism is a fraud this obviously will express itself
in a verbal way. This deception of life is wrapped up in pious oaths in the
name of God. It is often used in the way of honest or respectable people to
front for a lie, or even to refer to institutions which stand for the truth .
Perjury is swearing by another oath. So “neither by heaven; neither by earth;
neither by any other oath” is a reference to the fact that believers under
reversionism entering into reversionism always function under operation
strap-on and they always have a front for that strap-on.
By way of summary: The believer
building an ECS and entering into
supergrace is honest in his soul. Supergrace is characterised by a number of
things. Doctrine goes into the left lobe, into the human spirit. It is cycled
into the right lobe or the heart — into the frame of reference, memory centre,
vocabulary, categories, norms and standards, launching pad. Doctrine forms the
structure of the ECS and then there is entrance
into the supergrace life. In the supergrace life the believer has capacity for
freedom, capacity for life, capacity for love, capacity for happiness, capacity
for prosperity, capacity for grace, and so on. In addition to that the
supergrace believer has nobility. Supergrace is characterised by nobility and
true human nobility is found in the supergrace hero. If the supergrace hero is
a noble person nobility must always be related to the truth, and nobility
cannot be related to lies. Man can under grace be a noble creature. He can be
honest and forthright. He can have nobility of soul, but the nobility of soul
is in the supergrace area and verbal reversionism with operation strap-on is a
part of that lack of nobility that comes to the believer in reversionism. The
believer, then, building an ECS or a supergrace believer,
or a supergrace believer, has nobility of soul and therefore honesty. He is
honest therefore in the content of his speech, he is candid, he is frank, he is
open, without fraud, without deceit, and this reveals his nobility of soul.
Now we have a second de in this verse and this is the adversative use. The
adversative use is set up as a contrast. This time it is to contrast between
reversionism and supergrace. “But let be” is a present active imperative of e)imi — “keep on being” .It is an absolute status quo
verb; the present tense and the imperative mood means it is a command to
perpetuate something. It should always be that way and there should be no
exception to it ever: “Let you yes be yes; your no, no.” This is an idiom. it
is an idiom which demands honesty and straightforwardness of soul. It demands
nobility and integrity of soul. It demands an expression of the soul’s content
in speech: honest, noble, related to doctrine, related to establishment. People
often obscure the truth or change the meaning of someone’s actions by leaving
out something.
There is one final way in which
verbal reversionism expresses itself. There are certain things that cannot be
justified in your own soul that you do and rather than simply confessing them
as a sin and growing out of these things through the intake of doctrine you
decide and you select for yourself an opportunity such as comes along quite
frequently, the opportunity to use someone as a patsy — blame the course of
action in your life on someone else. This takes the heat off of you and
guarantees that sooner or later you will be in reversionism and you will be
found in the latter part of this passage dying the sin unto death or miserably
sick and getting close to it.
So “let you yea be yea and you nay,
nay” demands honesty for the individual, for groups of individuals, for
governments, for in effect everything that is related to a divine institution.
Honesty must apply to every divine institution. It must apply in every field of
function of life, not just in one or two. Let you yes be yes, and your no, no”
is an idiom to be honest. It is an idiom to penetrate the superficialities of
life and get down to what is really important. It is an idiom to express
supergrace. A supergrace believer is noble of soul, he is a believer who has
maximum doctrine in his soul.
It is impossible in certain areas of
life to be honest when you are ignorant. You can tell a deliberate lie and that
is dishonesty but to be honest sometimes demands knowledge. For example,
politicians today on the whole are very dishonest because they are stupid,
because they are ignorant of what the establishment really means and how it is
related to God and how God has provided these things for our blessing as a
group of people living together as a nation. All of these things require
understanding, and so “You shall know the truth and the truth shall make you
free” has nothing to do with academic institutions, it has everything to do
with Bible doctrine. What really frees the individual is Bible doctrine
transferred from the Bible to his soul.
Bible doctrine in your soul puts
words in your mouth. God is not trying to tell you to answer in monosyllables,
He is trying to portray the principle through His apostle James that we as
believers in the Lord Jesus Christ must have nobility of soul. An expression of
nobility of soul is honesty, whereas the reversionistic believer expresses
himself through dishonesty, through verbal reversionism. This particular verse
in its prohibition is saying avoid operation strap-on, avoid operation patsy,
avoid operation over-think. These things produce subjectivity and make you the
lowest of the earth as believers. A believer in reversionism is the antithesis
of a believer in the supergrace bracket.
Next we have a negative purpose
clause. I(na mh is translated “lest.” It
means “that not.” There must be a verb with it — “ye fall,” the aorist active
subjunctive of piptw, “that you not fall.” “That”
introduces a negative purpose clause. The word “fall” refers to reversionism
coming under discipline. The aorist tense refers to going through the processes
of reversionism. This is a culminative aorist. So far we have had a series of
aorist tense which have been constative. They tell you what not to do, but if
you go ahead and do it.. For example, you go negative toward doctrine, that’s
one point of time. You continue negative toward doctrine until you build scar
tissue on the left bank of the soul. You build scar tissue on the right bank of
the soul by a frantic search for happiness. False doctrine comes through the
vacuum and attacks the right lobe. You have emotional revolt of the soul. You
have reversionism, the practice of reverse process reversionism. And while you
are doing this you come into a new bracket called divine discipline. And it is
a continuous bracket of discipline. So the aorist tense is a culminative
aorist. After entering into reversionism you will not have just the occasional
divine discipline from getting out of fellowship (which is often neutralised by
rebound) but you get into an area where rebound won’t even help. It is called
in 2 Thessalonians 2 “strong delusion.” So you find yourself under divine
discipline and things become progressively worse until you reach the point of
the sin unto death. In this bracket, the sin unto death, you cannot rebound and
recover. You can do nothing except to repent which is a change of attitude from
negative to positive, and when you do God has provided a grace procedure to
recover. So falling means to fall into divine discipline, to fall into a life
of complete misery, to fall into the worst kind of a life where suffering is
not blessing. God has designed for the Christian life all suffering for
blessing and when you fall into divine discipline perpetuated in reversionism
there is no blessing, it is only cursing, and cursing can only be turned into
blessing through some principles that are involved in reversion recovery when
it is an extreme case.
“into condemnation” — a
prepositional phrase. u(po plus the noun krisij. U)po means under and
krisij means judgement; “that you
not fall under judgement. This refers to the divine discipline of the
reversionistic believer and especially in the area where he begins to practice
reverse process reversionism.
In context, what types of reverse
process reversionism have been practiced? This takes us back to James 5:1-6
where we saw the practice of monetary reversionism, where we saw that money is
a blessing in life but it becomes a blessing to the believer only when doctrine
is first. When the believer goes negative and gives doctrine the shaft, and
then goes simply for money in a frantic search for happiness, then that is the
practice of reverse process reversionism, monetary type. We have also seen
doctrine is rejected and in this case the pastor-teacher is rejected. He is criticised,
he is maligned, he is judged, he is the victim of operation strap-on. And in
place of that we have verbal reversionism, giving the pastor the shaft and then
going for something else, for pseudo objects. In both of these types of reverse
process reversionism they become the subject of divine discipline. The divine
discipline gets progressively worse. First of all there is the light knocking
on the door which is simply the misery of life. But then there is the loss of
health which means that the believer is very deep into reversionism. And
eventually there is the dying stage. This whole bracket is krisij or judgement.
Divine discipline in this passage
refers to any kind of reversionism but you must keep in mind that two types of
reversionism are found, monetary and verbal. Verbal reversionism is an attack
upon authority; on the authority of the pastor-teacher, for example. Monetary
reversionism is an attack upon the establishment.
Translation: “And more important
before all things, members of the family of God, stop making promises with an
oath; that is, neither by heaven, neither by earth, neither by any other oath:
but your yes keep on being yes; and your no, no; that you fall not under
judgement.”
In verses 13 — 18 we have the
principle of redeeming time by prayer. In addition we continue our study of
reversionism, both individual and nation, and the effect it has on human life
and the destruction of prosperity. There are four things we will be studying:
a) Prayer for personal pressure or adversity; b) Prayer for a reversionistic
believer under the sin unto death, verses 14,15; c) Prayer for a reversionistic
believer under discipline — he is very ill, verse 16; d) Prayer for a nation in
reversionism, verses 17,18.
Verse 13 is a welcome interlude. We leave
reversionism and go to supergrace, and in supergrace we find a believer in
prosperity. But he has the right kind of prosperity, his prosperity is based on
doctrine. We are going to see two things: a) He is going to have adversity, he
is going to suffer, but he is going to have happiness in suffering — +H; b) Then we are going to see him in
prosperity. He is going to demonstrate happiness in prosperity. So doctrine
brought him into supergrace. Supergrace means he has happiness regardless of
circumstances. He has happiness in adversity; he has happiness in prosperity.
Therefore we walk right into prayer …
“Is any among you afflicted?” is the
present active indicative of kakopaqew.
Paqew means
to suffer; kako means evil, but it comes to
mean “endure afflictions” .It means to suffer adversity. Here it is a
supergrace believer. Again we have the contrast. Verse 13 is another
parenthesis. At the end of verse 12 “that ye not fall under judgement,” and
then in verse 14 “Is any sick among you.” you have fallen under judgement. So
in effect verse 13 is parenthetical and every time we have a parenthesis we
have a supergrace believer. For example, in verse 10 and 11 we have a
supergrace believer. Now again in verse 13 we have a supergrace believer — “Is
any one among you enduring affliction?” The word “any” is an enclitic
indefinite pronoun tij and it is used for a
category. The category is the supergrace believer. Here is someone who has not
fallen under judgement or divine discipline; here is a believer in supergrace
or growing up and he is expressed here as a category, and in this case a
supergrace category. “Anyone among you (among you supergrace types) suffering
affliction.”
What does he do as a supergrace
type? What are his capacities, his abilities? This is great adversity; “keep
offering prayer” — the present middle imperative of proseuxomai, “keep offering prayer.” The present tense is a customary present, it
is used to denote that which habitually occurs; and it can also be an iterative
present used to describe what recurs at successive intervals. Once you get into
the supergrace life you are going to have little brackets of adversity. Why?
God wants to show the supergrace believer how He can bless him in the greatest
pressures of life. In this periods he will have the perpetuation of +H. How are
you going to express it verbally? We have just seen the reversionist express
himself verbally by criticism, slander, maligning, gossip, operation strap-on,
operation over-think; now we seen the overt expression of happiness in
adversity — “keep offering prayer.” When you get to supergrace you will have
periods of adversity and you will have the opportunity of expressing your
happiness in adversity through prayer — prayers which indicate thankfulness,
which express blessing, which recognise that this belongs to the Lord [“Casting
all your cares on Him”], various types of prayer. The middle voice of this verb
indicates that the subject participates in the results of the action. This is
also a permissive middle in which a supergrace believer voluntarily yields
himself to a course of action seeking to secure from such action benefit or to
express benefit. The imperative mood is a command, not a prohibition. The
concept: a growing believer or a supergrace believer can pray for himself. He
has doctrine, he has the capacity of his priesthood and capacity of priesthood
in the supergrace life indicates the fact he can be under maximum pressure and
offer for himself the proper prayer at the proper time. There even comes a time
when the reversionist cannot rebound for himself but a supergrace believe can
pray for himself constantly.
There are other doctrines which are
mentioned in this passage. There are doctrines dealing with the various types
of discipline which come from reversionism, but prayer is going to be used as
the central expression of blessing in this paragraph. Even though we are
speaking of dying the sin unto death and the place of prayer, or whether we are
unhealthy, loss of health under reversionism, or whether it is national
catastrophe, many adversities and catastrophes will be brought into the
picture. And we are going to see the reversionist helpless, he cannot pray for
himself. He can do nothing but switch from negative to positive volition.
Therefore prayer is going to be seen as the great power in this passage. here
is a believer who can pray for himself. Here is the power of prayer where the
individual can use this power on his own behalf. Remember the principle: Now
one functions under the priesthood of the believer until he reaches supergrace
with supergrace capacity. Supergrace has the capacity to function under the
priesthood, and one of the functions of the priesthood is praying for yourself.
Once you use supergrace never again in that bracket do you have to have someone
else pray for you. You can pray for yourself in every circumstance of life. The
supergrace life is the life of being spiritually self-sustaining, it is the
maximum expression of the priesthood of the believer, it is the only thing that
counts. One of the functions of the priesthood is prayer, so prayer is one of
the mechanics for redeeming time in phase two. Prayer is an expression of the
priesthood of which all believers are a part, and when prayer is used to stabilise
a situation in the midst of pressure or disaster or catastrophe that prayer is
effective, that prayer is powerful beyond your understanding, that prayer
redeems time. When prayer becomes a means of helping others to recover from the
sin unto death, from loss of health, or when prayer is used for the recovery of
a nation, then that prayer becomes a great weapon, a great power in the hands
of the believer priest. Prayer uses the vocal cords for redeeming time just as
gossip, maligning, judging, operation strap-on uses the vocal cords to express
reversionism. Prayer is not the means of redeeming time, however, in every
situation. Prayer is a great weapon in time of adversity but in between we have
prosperity in the supergrace life, and in prosperity you use the vocal cords again.
Notice that since we have started verbal reversionism everything deals with the
vocal cords. The vocal cords express reversionism — gossip, maligning, judging,
criticising, operation strap-on — but on the other hand the vocal cords are
used to express supergrace. Vocal cords offer prayer; now the vocal cords offer
some singing:
“Is any merry?” The Greek word here
is a verb which means to be in prosperity or great happiness — e)uqumew. E)u means good; qemew means soul, and it comes to mean great blessing or happiness in the
soul. Again, we have with this verb the enclitic indefinite pronoun tij and again it indicates a category. It refers to the
same category as in the previous phrase, a believer in the supergrace life, a
believer who is happy, a believer who has both happiness and courage, a
believer who an express his happiness in different ways in different
circumstances. This brings us to the spectrum of happiness. Happiness go all
the way from ecstatics down to tranquillity, and different circumstances call
for different expressions of that happiness. Happiness is a spectrum and it has
many facets, and they are expressed in different ways at different times.
This is a social situation. This is
a place where you are together with one or more persons. This is where you are
having a party of two or a party of many. This is a social type of situation
which is related to prosperity and prayer is not in order. Just because you
have a party you don’t start it out with prayer and end it with prayer. There
is a time for prayer but there is a time to live it up!
“Let him sing psalms” — present
active imperative of yallw, which doesn’t mean to sing
psalms, it means to sing all right but it means whether you are good or bad it
doesn’t make any difference, the musical instruments will carry you. It means
to sing accompanied by music. This is what it means: “Keep singing in the
ecstasy of the moment with full possession of your mental faculties.” That
eliminates the singing drunk!
Here is prayer designed for a moment
of pressure to redeem time, but in times of prosperity there are other
expressions which redeem time and singing is an expression of the soul.
Therefore singing is used to express happiness, love, sorrow, bereavement,
relationship, establishment. It is used to sing about things which are a
blessing.
In this particular passage we have
now come to the point of a prayer for a reversionist under the sin unto death.
We are going to face the sin unto death twice in this passage between now and
the end of the chapter. We have already seen this principle: God wants every
believer to be happy with a happiness beyond human description, and the only
way to get on that particular road is to take the way that has been ordained by
grace which is the way of perception and application of the Word all of the way
to spiritual maturity. Spiritual maturity gives capacity for freedom, for life,
for love, for happiness, for grace, for anything and for everything that is
worthwhile in life. When we have capacity for happiness then God who anxiously
waits for this moment to arrive in our lives can shower out upon us many
wonderful things. All of the things will come to us under great adversity or
prosperity, and we have the capacity for everything in life and there is
nothing too difficult for us.
But if we agree with God in
principle — we want happiness as He wants happiness for us — but we disagree on
the point of mechanics, then we go negative toward doctrine, we are minus
doctrine, and we are in reversionism. Reversionism leads to three brackets.
First of all there is the area of divine discipline. Then there is the area of
knocking a little harder on the door of warning. And this is illness — illness
that is very miserable but not fatal. Then, finally there is the dying area,
dying as it were without dying grace. This is the sin unto death.
In verses 14 and 15 we go to the
dying reversionist. Then in verse 16 we go to the reversionist who is ill and
hurting. Then finally, in verse 17 and 18 we go to a nation in reversionism,
and then in verses 19 and 20 to the most noble person of all, the person who
becomes involved in reversion recovery for others. That is, a supergrace hero
in the Church Age. In verses 14 and 15 we have prayer for a reversionistic
believer under the sin unto death.
Verse 14 — a believer who went
negative toward doctrine and entered into reversionism. As far as this context
is concerned he could have entered into verbal reversionism or monetary
reversionism. But which ever way he went the principle remains the same:
negative volition toward Bible doctrine causes scar tissue on the left bank of
the soul. This opens up mataiothj where false doctrine comes
in and attacks doctrine in the heart or the right lobe: doctrine in the frame
of reference and memory centre, doctrine in the vocabulary and categories,
doctrine in the norms and standards, doctrine on the launching pad. it attacks
every area of doctrine. Then on the right bank there becomes a frantic search
for happiness.
In context we have verbal reversionism.
This is seeking your happiness by putting down others; seeking your happiness
by operation overthink. There is also another type of reversionism: monetary
reversionism where the reversionist puts money before doctrine.
Once divine discipline is
concentrated into illness then rebound will no longer work, and once it comes
into the dying stage, again rebound will not work. So here we are going to
study the dying state and how rebound is not the answer. Instead we have to go
to a principle called repentance. Repentance is a change of attitude, a change
of decision from negative over to positive. The positive will be coming back to
the authority rejected by entering into reversionism. This reversionist
combines verbal reversionism — running down his pastor and rejecting his
message — with monetary reversionism — making money the object of his happiness
— and the two together put him very rapidly under the sin unto death.
Now we move on to the fact that
believers who go God’s way are going to have supergrace and capacity and
blessing. They are going to face adversity in which they will know what to do —
prayer; and prosperity in which they will know what to do — manifested by
singing. You don’t always pray, you don’t always sing, you mix it up according
to the situation.
The reversionist is now in the
bracket of dying. It is not dying grace, it is the sin unto death. Once a
believer gets into that bracket rebound never does the job. There is no place
for rebound when you are dying the sin unto death because you reached that
point by rejecting the authority of the pastor-teacher and the message of the
pastor-teacher. The message: negative volition toward doctrine: the authority:
negative volition toward the communicator. The authority is the big issue.
“Is any sick among you?” “Among you”
becomes very important in the interpretation because we have the preposition e)n plus the locative plural of su. Su is in the plural to
indicate James 1:1 — this is addressed to Jews who are scattered all over the
world. James addresses himself to these people. The plural here will go with
the plural word for elders, not to indicate plurality of elders in one spot but
to indicate that each one has his own right pastor-teacher. “Any” refers to a
category.; “among you” refers to believers who are scattered all over the
world.
The category is now described under
the phrase, “is sick,” the present active indicative of a)sqenew, which means to be weak, to be sick, to be disabled
under conditions of apostasy and reversionism. The present tense indicates
getting weaker all the time. A)sqenew also means to be hopeless,
to be powerless and to lose what strength made you powerless so that you are
even more powerless and you continue to live. So the word is a very excellent
choice of word here because this means under the present tense to be weak and
yet still alive, but tomorrow to be weaker and closer to death, and to be more
and more hopeless and helpless every second the person is alive because they
are dying.
What do they do? “Let him call,” the
aorist middle imperative of proskalew, which means to summon, to
call to one’s self. to call someone in who has authority or has ability. We are
going to see that proskalew has been used twice here.
Once it was used to call in someone who had ability. That was a doctor, the
medical profession. Then when the doctor said the situation was hopeless it
means to call in someone who has authority, the right pastor-teacher.
The aorist tense is ingressive. The
ingressive aorist indicates the individual involved cannot rebound but he has
changed his mind — like Hezekiah when he was dying. The middle voice emphasises
the agent producing the action. In this case the agent is helpless, hopeless,
deficient, weak, powerless, unsettled in mind and body. The imperative mood: it
is a command. There is only one hope left: “call to himself the elders.” again,
we have the masculine accusative plural of presbuteroj. And why plural? To match “among you.” This is addressed to a lot of
people and the point that James is making when he says in James 1:1 — “To the
twelve tribes who are scattered throughout the world”, he addresses himself to
“many” believers in many geographical locations who have different
pastor-teachers. The word “elders” in the plural indicates that not everyone
has the same right pastor, it is never used for a church officer. The word presbuteroj means the one who has authority and it refers only
to the pastor-teacher, never to members of the congregation.
In Acts 20:17 we have the apostle Paul
getting in touch with the pastors who are in Ephesus. There was more than one
local church in Ephesus and so he contacted these people. He called them the
“elders” of Ephesus. The word is in the plural and refers to the Greek word presbuteroj. He contacted these elders and said he would meet
them at the sea port of Miletus, and since there was more than one pastor and
more than one local church in Ephesus a group of these men came. These are presbuteroi; they are called elders. He contacted them on the basis
of their authority. In Acts 20:28 he is meeting with these people, and these
same pastors he now calls e)piskopoj, translated bishop. So presbuteroj and e)piskopoj are synonymous terms for
the pastor-teacher, but this time calling him something else — the overseer. In
verse 28 these same pastors are given a command. It is in the aorist active
imperative of poimainw, which means to shepherd,
to feed. It is exactly the same verb and the same morphology of the verb as
found in 1 Peter 5:2. So basically there are three different Greek words, all
of which are related to one person, the pastor.
These people, wherever they are,
have a right pastor-teacher and they are to call the one whose authority they
have rejected. They are dying now and they cannot help themselves, they must go
back to the original authority for growth, the pastor-teacher. If they are
going to recover they are going to have to come under the authority of their
right pastor-teacher again.
In the local church there is a
pastor-teacher. He is, as the pastor-elder, the policy maker. His function is
to communicate Bible doctrine. He is the highest authority in the local church.
A flock of sheep only has one shepherd. Authority is the principle involved at
this particular point and is the issue in dying the sin unto death. Why does
God eventually take a believer and place him under the sin unto death? Because
he has rejected every authority in life, he is now a mad dog and must be
removed from the earth. God does not appreciate any form of anarchy and God’s
grace rejects every form of anarchy. So under the principle of the grace of God
the issue is authority.
The call for the pastor-elder is the
first sign of positive volition. When the pastor-elder comes there is something
he can do for this man. This is a grace principle. The pastor has been the
target for verbal reversionism. This individual, before he was dying, was
critical of his pastor. He was not only critical but he was a maligner, a judger.
Now he calls for the pastor-elder.
Next: “Let them pray” — aorist
middle imperative of proseuxomai, which means to offer
prayer. This person cannot be taught the whole realm of doctrine in a couple of
minutes. The pastor comes and prays for this person. This word means to offer a
specific prayer. The pastor is summoned because his authority has been rejected
and this person at this point for the first time recognises the authority of
his right pastor. “Them” is plural because different people have different
pastor-elders. This is an ingressive aorist, which means he begins to offer a
prayer. The middle voice is reflexive. There are two great lessons here.
Effective prayer redeems time and the pastor-elder is redeeming time at this
point, whereas the one who is dying has not redeemed time for a long time and
this is the first time that there is any sign of redeeming time on the part of
the dying Christian. “Let him offer prayer” — e)pi
plus the accusative of a)utoj. A)utoj
is an
intensive pronoun and is used here to indicate the direction. The direction of
this prayer is specifically for the dying reversionist. In other words, he
doesn’t pray around for other people, he prays specifically in this prayer for
the reversionist only. It is the aorist imperative so it should be translated
“for him” specifically.
The next verb, “anointing,” is an
aorist active participle of a)leifw. It has nothing to do with
the pastor elder, it is someone who has been there before him. It is the realisation
that this man was dying. A)leifw means to use medication. It
is an aorist active participle. The action of the aorist participle precedes
the action of the main verb. A)leifw is used along with an
object of the verb — the instrumental singular of e)laiwn. A)leifw plus e)laiwn is always used for a
medical practice. It is so used in Luke 10:34, in Mark 6:13. This is a specific
reference to the function of medicine, not to the function of the pastor-elder.
In other words, the pastor-elder never anoints anyone with oil. If it was going
to be anointing with oil then it would have to be a different verb — xriw, from which we get the name Christ, the anointed
one; it means to appoint someone.
This person was very ill and
suspected that he was dying. He called in a doctor; a legitimate function. The
doctor came in and used medication — medical function at this point. However,
the medical function did not succeed in this case because this person is under
divine discipline. There are only two cases where medical function is not going
to succeed: demon induced illness and disciplinary illness. Medicine cannot
help this person. Obviously he would seek that solution. He is under
reversionism, he is antagonistic toward the authority of his pastor-teacher,
toward doctrine; and once he realises he is dying he becomes alert to the knocking
on the door — Revelation 3:20, the warning of reversionism. He now becomes
alert to that and therefore he cannot rebound and recover so he calls for his
pastor-elder. Instead of medical function the pastor offers prayer, and this is
where this man breaks out of the sin unto death. So we must notice the aorist
active participle, “having anointed him with oil,” actually refers to medical
therapy.
Literally, this should read: “Anyone
among you sick from hopeless disease, summon to yourself the pastor-elder from
the church: and having received medical therapy (to no avail) he begins to pray
for him in the name of the Lord.” In other words, there is nothing wrong with
medicine, there is something wrong with a person who is beyond medicine. “In
the name of the Lord” indicates the basis on which the pastor approaches the
dying subject.
Summary
1. This verse emphasises the
function of prayer in redeeming time. The medical approach to illness must not
be ignored or neglected. When this passage is correctly exegeted it notices
several things. There is a type of illness in which medicine has no control
because the illness is brought about by spiritual factors. God is dealing with
the individual. Jesus Christ is standing at the door and knocking. The knocking
on the door is a warning that the person is dying, that the person is going out
under reversionism. It is actually God’s grace in warning.
2. Note that the medical attention
does not heal the illness. That is significant for medicine is a bona fide
profession and many illnesses are cured by medicine. Medicine can handle
everything except a spiritual problem or demon-induced illness.
3. The next verse clearly indicates
a serious and hopeless illness beyond the scope of medical therapy. Therefore
the next verse indicates that when the illness has spiritual connotation it is
prayer that acts as therapy rather than medicine.
4. Therefore our first conclusion:
medicine is not to be neglected or rejected. But there is a place for prayer,
beyond medicine. However, the place for prayer beyond medicine is not when a
believer is dying under God’s plan.
5. Note that both medicine and
prayer work together in this passage; one follows the other. In this case
medicine pronounces a hopeless case and prayer comes in to take up the slack.
Why? Because this is a spiritual issue. There is a place for prayer from the
right pastor beyond medicine where it is a spiritual issue.
6. Therefore in this context prayer
will redeem the time and turn the tide of extreme illness.
7. This passage does not teach
healing by so-called divine healers. There is no place for “divine healers.”
8. The profession of medicine has
certain abilities where illness is involved, but there are certain other
illnesses which depend upon a spiritual solution. These illnesses are designed
as a warning of reversionism and dying, and therefore they demand a spiritual
solution.
9. Paul himself had the gift of
healing (Acts 19:11,12) but this was used to establish his apostleship. Once
his apostleship was established the gift was removed so that he could not heal
his dear friend Epaphroditus in Philippians 2:27, nor his close friend Trophimus
in 2 Timothy 4:20. The gift of healing was permitted certain apostles for a
short time merely to establish their authority, their apostleship. Then it was
removed.
In this case we have a sick person.
He is a reversionist, he is dying, he is under the sin unto death. Therefore
the medicine is not the issue. The only issue is a spiritual one, the prayer of
the right pastor. Reversionism is beyond the help of medicine but never beyond
the help of prayer. As long as a believer is dying but still alive there is
still hope. This passage does not reject medicine, it condones it. However, it
makes it clear that there is a place where medicine cannot go, and that is with
the believer dying the sin unto death.
Verse 15 — “And the prayer of faith
shall save the sick.” Not at all. First of all, it is a person who is offering
a prayer, not his faith. The word “prayer” is e)uxe,
it is used for prayer or a vow. Here it is used for prayer. Next we have an
ablative of source from pistij. However, pistij has a definite article which changes its meaning. Pistij merely means faith, but if you put o( pistij then it doesn’t refer to
faith, it refers to what is believed; it refers to Bible doctrine. This is the
doctrinal one. The prayer (ablative) from the source of the doctrinal one.
There is no prayer of faith involved here. So it is literally, “the prayer from
the source of the doctrinal one shall save” — future active indicative of swzw. Swzw means here to deliver. That
is the basic meaning of the word, it only means salvation in a spiritual sense
where the Lord Jesus Christ on the cross are related in the verse. This is a
future tense, a gnomic future which expresses a fact which may be expected
under normal conditions. In other words, under conditions which the
reversionist calls for the pastor-elder after having repented, the pastor-elder
offers prayer, and that person is healed immediately. The active voice: prayer
from the source of the doctrinal pastor produces the action, not the faith of
the sick person, not the therapy from medicine. Therefore the sick person under
divine discipline for reversionism is delivered. The indicative mood is the
reality of the deliverance of the sick person under reversionism. This is
illustrated by king Hezekiah in Isaiah 38.
“shall deliver the sick” — the word
“sick” is a present active participle of
kamnw, which means to be
exhausted and hopelessly sick, and the present participle indicates dying. So
“the hopelessly sick one” is the best translation.
The next phrase is very important:
“and the Lord”. It is not the pastor-elder who delivers, but God respects the
authority which He has given to the pastor-elder. The pastor-elder has the
highest authority in the local church, therefore God respects that authority
whereas the reversionist dying did not respect that authority; he rejected it
and ended up dying. Now the reversionist has called for the pastor-elder, the
pastor-elder prays to God, and God delivers because God respects authority He
has given under grace.
Principle: You may not respect the
authority of the pastor-elder but God does. That should tell us something. If
God respects the authority that He sets up and we go counter to that authority,
we’ve had it until we wake up.
“The Lord” here is God the Father.
He performs the miracle of healing over the repentant reversionist — “shall
raise him [the reversionist] up.” This is a future active indicative of e)geirw which means to be brought back from a desperate
situation. This is used for resurrection, for resuscitation, and in this case
it is used for restoration from dying. “The Lord shall restore him to health”
is what e)geirw means here. The future
tense is a gnomic future, it is an absolute fact. The active voice: the Lord
does it. It is the prayer of the one who has the authority but in the last
analysis the Lord does it. The indicative mood is the reality of restoration
from dying.
“and if” — ordinarily a 3rd class
condition would be translated “maybe yes, maybe no.” But this 3rd class
condition is placed in a crasis, it is made up of kai,
which means “and, and e)an which is a conjunction to
introduce a third class condition. But it is put together in a crasis — kan, and a crasis introducing a 3rd class condition
emphasises that the sins involved in reversionism came from one’s own free
will. What is the importance of the crasis here? Not maybe you’ve sinned and
maybe you haven’t. You have sinned in reversionism. You have sinned without
rebound, you have accumulated sin to the point of the sin unto death where
there is no recourse of rebound, and all of these sins came from your own free
will.
The crasis teaches us two things: 1.
You have sinned, deliberately or ignorantly, from your own free will. All sin
comes from your volition and it is always contrary to the will of God; 2. If
you sin from your own volition then you can never use operation patsy, you can
never blame someone else for your sins.
“and if he has committed” — the
perfect passive participle of poiew. The perfect tense also has
with it a present active subjunctive of e)imi,
a very unusual construction — a periphrastic, the verb to be plus a participle.
It is one of the strongest verbal constructions in the Greek language. So we
have a crasis 3rd class condition plus a periphrastic which emphasises the
permanent results of these sins. These sins were committed from freewill and
brought the sinner to the point of the sin unto death. The object of this
periphrastic is the objective genitive of a(martia which means sin (singular) — “and if he has produced sin [and he has
from his own free will].” In other words, there is an accumulation of sin under
the sin unto death — “they shall be forgiven,” future passive indicative of a)fihmi — not on the basis of rebound but the forgiveness
goes with the recovery. If you recover you can know that your sins were
forgiven and that you are starting over. This is a gnomic future, it expresses
a fact; it is a passive voice, the reversionist receives the action of the
verb: the reality of the forgiveness of sins, the reality of reversion
recovery.
“him” is an instrumental of an
intensive pronoun, referring to the Lord. It means “by him.” “Forgiven by him”
— they are forgiven by the Lord.
Verse 15 — “And the prayer from the
source of the doctrinal one [the pastor-elder] shall deliver the hopelessly
sick one [the dying reversionist], and the Lord shall restore him to health;
and if he has produced permanent sin, they [the sin which he has produced]
shall be forgiven by him [the Lord].”
In this verse we have the prayer on
the part of the pastor-teacher for a reversionistic believer not under the sin
unto death, but so sick it is difficult to tell the difference. Under divine
discipline through illness there are three brackets of discipline in
reversionism. The first is divine discipline, variety type; the second is
illness in divine discipline, very serious illness; the third area is dying. In
the illness bracket and in the dying bracket a believer cannot recover anything
by rebound. In the last two brackets the only thing the believer can do is to
repent, which means going from negative to positive. In both of these brackets
the authority of the pastor-teacher has been rejected and in both cases he
comes back to the pastor-teacher.
In this verse the believer is very
ill but can actually do something that the dying believer cannot do: “Confess
your faults one to another.” The only word which is correctly translated there
is the word “confess” which is a present middle imperative of e)comologew. O(mologew means to acknowledge or to confess or to name or to
specify. E)c is a form of the preposition
e)k which means out from. When
you put it all together in the middle voice it means to admit or to
acknowledge. The present middle imperative of the present tense is iterative
present which describes what occurs or recurs at certain intervals, namely
reversion in the second bracket, very serious illness. This is not the sin unto
death but is next to it. The middle voice is an indirect middle which
emphasises the agent producing the action, namely a believer under divine
discipline from reversionism. The form of discipline is illness. The imperative
mood is a command to the reversionist, and not found in the King James version
but part of the Greek text is the enclitic inferential pronoun o)un, which should be translated “therefore.” So
literally, “Confess [acknowledge, admit] therefore.” There is no word for
“your”. The word “faults” is incorrectly translated. It is the genitive
singular of a(martia and it means sin in the
sense of missing the mark. So this means to name, admit, acknowledge the sin —
there is no pronoun here. This is a genitive of description and in this context
the genitive of description refers to specific sins, sins related to verbal
reversionism. Again, the genitive of description classifies the category of
information to be confessed and it is a specific type of information. In the
context, by putting together a(martia which relates to verse 9 [criticising
the pastor-teacher], or verse 12 which has to do with the operation strap-on,
and since in both cases the victim is the pastor-teacher, then the genitive of
description classifies the category of information to be confessed — only to
the one involved and only to one’s right pastor-teacher. If a believer does not
have a pastor-teacher or a right pastor-teacher then obviously this is
unnecessary. The genitive of description, then, is very important. This does
not give anyone the blanket right to go around confessing sins to other people.
That is the privacy of the priesthood and the principle is found in Psalm
51:3,4.
The background is the sin of David
and Bathsheba, both of whom were believers. In this particular Psalm David
wasn’t even in the second or third bracket of discipline. He wasn’t dying. He
had some illnesses but he was still able to confess his sins. In verse 5 he
says, “I acknowledge my transgressions.” The word “acknowledge” here is the qal
imperfect of yada which generally
means to know but here it means to know and to express. So it means to confess
all right. The reason that he did is because “My sin is ever before me.” He was
aware that he had sinned.
In verse 4 — “Against thee”; “thee”
is a singular pronoun referring to God, not against Bathsheba and not against Uriah
the Hittite. David hurt a lot of people but when it comes to rebound it isn’t
whom you have hurt, all sin is against God. Therefore rebound is directly to
God and to no one else. We do not confess to people. In the rule you confess
your sins directly to God, and he forgives you — “thee only.” David had sinned
against Bathsheba and others but ultimately the sin was against God; “I have
sinned” — the qal perfect of chata,
which means to miss the mark, the mark being the perfect character of God; “and
done”, a second qal perfect from asah,
which indicates that he manufactured this sin out of something: the lust
pattern of his old sin nature. And he calls what he has done “evil” — “and done
evil in thy sight.” When you rebound as a believer you rebound to the Lord
directly, and it is a matter of privacy.
James 5:16 — Here is the exception.
This is a present middle imperative for a specific case. Confess, name, identify,
acknowledge “the sin”, not “your faults.” This is in the singular and there is
no pronoun in the Greek. It is in the singular because it refers to a specific
sin in context and a specific victim of that sin. In verse 9 the sin is
slander, maligning, judging, criticising the pastor, the victim. In verse 12 it
is falsely blaming the pastor. Verbal reversionism on the one hand, criticising
and maligning and judging the pastor; and on the other hand strapping it on
him. The sin is then limited to verbal reversionism. The only thing to be
confessed to the pastor is being critical, judging, maligning, slandering, or
strapping it on. That is all. And this is not done publicly in front of a
congregation or in front of anyone, it is done privately. This is an exception
really to emphasise a principle in prayer. There are times you cannot pray for
yourself. A reversionist cannot pray for himself when he is afflicted, as we
have seen.
This reversionist wants his pastor
to pray for him but before the prayer he acknowledges the sin. The genitive of
description classifies the category of information to be confessed to the
maligned pastor and the circumstances under which confession of the sin to
another believer is authorised. All confession is made to God. Exception: when
right pastor is maligned and the maligner is sick because of reversionistic
discipline.
Next we have the phrase “one to
another” which is not necessarily a good translation of a reciprocal pronoun: a)llhlon, the reciprocal pronoun which comes from a)lloj which means one of the same kind, but being
reciprocal it means another believer. When a plural subject is represented as
affected by an interchange of action signified in the verb it is called a
reciprocal pronoun. That is why the object of the verb is the dative plural of a)llhlon. This particular noun means members of the family
of God. Hence, the reversionist has maligned and criticised the pastor whose
authority and whose message he has rejected. He can, if he isn’t in
reversionism, confess his sin to God; but if he is in reversionism and under
this type of discipline then he goes to the victim — who is the pastor-elder.
Notice that this is a dative plural of this reciprocal pronoun and it is the
dative of indirect object, used to denote one in whose interest the act of
confession is performed. It is in the interest of the reversionist to do this
because not only is he going in the opposite direction — he has already
repented — but he is now for the first time in a long time accepting the authority
of the one whose message is going to bring him back to the stage of growth. His
only hope of recovery from reversionism lies in the daily intake of Bible
doctrine. Someone has to teach him and that someone is his right
pastor-teacher.
“Therefore acknowledge the sin
[singular] to another [the pastor-elder here, the believer who has been victimised].”
Why? Because when you do so he is going to pray for you. It is in the interest
of the reversionist to confess his sin so that the victim pastor can pray for
him and he will recover from his illness.
Next we have “and pray,” a present
middle imperative. The acknowledgment of the sin is a command to the
reversionist; “pray” is a command to the pastor-elder, the victim, the one who
is the recipient of the acknowledgment or confession. It is the present middle
imperative of proseuxomai, which means to offer
prayer. It is an iterative present and it is used to describe what occurs at
certain intervals. The middle voice emphasises the agent producing the action,
and the agent producing the action is the believer or the pastor-elder to whom
the confession is made. In other words, the agent producing the action is the
victim. This is the indirect middle which has the offended party as the agent,
while in the previous verse the agent was the reversionist. The imperative mood
is a command to the injured party, the one who has been maligning. What we have
in effect there is: “Therefore reversionist, acknowledge the sin to another
[the pastor-elder, the victim] and [pastor-elder] offer prayer.” Note that this
passage only applies where a right pastor-right sheep relationship exists, and
furthermore only under conditions of reversionism on the part of the sheep and
verbal reversionism making the right pastor the victim. Those are the only
conditions to which it applies.
It parallels something which has
been the practice for about 1700 years. Only about 300 years after the Church
Age began did Romanism start to get into some rather anti-biblical practices.
One of them is that all members of the congregation must go to their priest and
confess to the priest, and the priest will assess some penance which they must
follow for forgiveness. That is an abuse. This passage is only parallel in that
we do have a clergyman involved and we do have a member of a congregation.
However, the clergyman is just as much a priest as any pastor is. The
difference is in the fact that the pastor with his gift has the authority, is
the communicator of doctrine and therefore has a message, and the
reversionistic believer has rejected his authority, rejected his message, and
has criticised, maligned, slandered and deceived him. Therefore under
conditions of reversionism he finds himself in a critical condition. So while
there is an apparent and surface parallelism in reality they are not the same
at all. There is no basis for a pastor having people come in and confess their
sins and then giving them chores to do in order to be absolved. That is
legalism. This passage is grace. This is a gracious thing.
Where does the grace lie? In the
fact that a person goes negative toward a pastor’s authority and message (they
hang together) and gets into reversionism. To get out he reverses the process,
he goes positive toward the pastor’s authority and message. His initial step of
positive volition is when he goes to his pastor, or his pastor comes to him if
he is too ill, and he acknowledges the sin, a verbal reversionistic sin. And
the pastor prays for him and he is healed. But the basic principle in this passage
is restoration and prayer: the power of prayer on the one hand, which is grace,
and the grace in restoration from reversionism on the other hand.
The pastor does the praying, and he
prays for another of the same kind, a believer. But this is the preposition u(per plus the genitive of the reciprocal pronoun a)llhlon, and it means to pray for another of the same kind,
and he prays for a reversionist. Notice: the pastor is the mature person
whereas the believer who comes to him is a reversionistic, but they are both of
the same kind, they are both members of the same family. In other words,
reversionism, even the sin unto death does not entail loss of salvation.
Why all of this? — “that” introduces
an adverb as a conjunction. The adverb is o(pwj,
and it means “that” but it is an adverb used, and the adverb used is a
conjunction introducing an unusual purpose clause. The pastor who has been victimised
in the function of his reverse process reversionism hears the confession, and
prays for the one who maligned and slandered. He doesn’t put any penance on
him. There is no legalism in this. He is an agent of grace and, more than that,
he must act in grace. This person is coming back into his congregation and this
person must understand that when he sits again in the pew and he hears things
that hurt him the pastor doesn’t have it in for him, he just covers a passage
of the Word of God that steps on his toes. There is nothing personal in it.
Grace eliminates anything personal when the pastor is in the pulpit and you are
in the pew. It is the passage that steps on your toes.
“that ye may be healed” is the
aorist passive subjunctive of i)aomai, generally used where the
illness is not fatal. This is a culminative aorist which means the discipline
is wiped out, and since the discipline is in the form of illness the illness is
removed. The passive voice: the subject, the reversionist, receives the action
of the verb which is the removal of discipline in the form of illness. The
subject mood goes with a purpose clause.
The procedure
1. The believer in reversionism is
under divine discipline for sins of the tongue.
2. The victim is his right pastor.
3. Therefore he goes to his right
pastor, confesses the verbal sins.
4. Then the victim or right pastor
not only forgives the repentant reversionist but offers prayer on his behalf.
5. As a result of that prayer the
discipline or the illness is removed from the repentant reversionist.
6. And he is in perfect health to
return to the congregation and begin the recovery procedure which is the daily
intake of Bible doctrine.
Translation: “Acknowledge therefore
the sin to the other of the same kind [the victimised pastor-elder], and
[pastor-elder] offer prayer on behalf of the other [repentant reversionist]
that you {repentant reversionist] may be healed.”
This brings us to a principle: polu i)sxuei dehsij
dikaiou e)nergoumenh. Here is the statement. That is translated unfortunately, “the
effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.” There is no word
there for “fervent.” God is not impressed by fervency or sincerity. Notice that
the first word is poluj, and that is the very first
word in this Greek sentence. Notice it is also the last word translated —
“much.” But it is at the beginning of the sentence, not the end.
Polu
is a nominative neuter singular from poluj, meaning “much.” It is
correctly translated in the King James version but it is way out of place.
“Much” is how the sentence begins, not how it ends. The next word is i)sxuei which is the present active indicative of i)sxuw which means to have power. With polu is means to have much power. Now we have something
started — “has much power.” We don’t yet know what has much power but we do
know that the principle states that something has much power. Next we have dehsij, the nominative singular for prayer. Since it is in
the nominative the nominative case is always the subject of the verb, so the
subject of the verb that has much power is prayer. Prayer has much power.
However, the prayer part of the sentence is qualified. Prayer has much power
but it is the prayer of a certain kind of believer. The qualifying word is dikaiou, the genitive singular of dikaioj, and it means a righteous one. It refers to a
believer in fellowship but also with some growth. The principle here refers to
the pastor-teacher or the pastor-elder, the one who has been victimised. So we
have “a prayer of a righteous one (believer) has much power.” “Much” was the
first word. When a word is put at the beginning of a sentence it receives
emphasis.
Now there is one word we have not
yet translated — e)nergounemh, a present middle
participle of e)nergew which means to put
something into operation. The present participle can be legitimately translated
in the English by a little clause, “when”. So we translate it, “when it is put
into operation” or “when it is operational.” So literally then, “A prayer of a
righteous believer has much power when it is operational.”
We have seen so far three occasions
when such a prayer is operational. The first was in verse 13 when a believer
who is a supergrace type, or approaching it, is under great pressure and
adversity. His prayer is operational and powerful. Secondly, when a
pastor-elder is called in for a dying believer, dying the sin unto death
because he is in reversionism, the pastor-elders prayer is operational and
effective. This man not only is healed but his sins are forgiven and he is now
on the road to the recovery of the edification complex. The third illustration
is where we have the pastor-elder as a victim. This time it is a reversionist
who is practising reverse process reversionism, verbal type. The pastor prays
for this person in his illness. His sins are forgiven, he is healed and, again,
he is able to come back and to take in the Word daily. So we have three
illustrations and in each case it is a believer in supergrace, or close to it,
and in each case it is a prayer which is effective. It redeems the time, it is
powerful, it is effective. In each case it is a prayer for one individual. In
the first illustration — verse 13 — the person prays for himself in suffering.
In the second one (verses 14,15) he prays for a hopeless case, a dying person
in reversionism. In the third case, in verse 16, he prays for someone who has
abused him. These are all grace prayers, they are all prayers of great power.
There is no fervency in the prayer at all: “A prayer of a righteous believer
has much power when it is operational.” It means he doesn’t pray all the time
but when he does pray it has much power.
Verse 16 — “Therefore [repentant
reversionist] acknowledge the sin to one another [of the same kind, the
victimised believer], and [the pastor-elder] offer prayer on behalf of another
[repentant reversionist], that you [repentant reversionist] may be healed. A
prayer of a righteous believer has much power when it is operational.”
Summary
1. The prayer of a righteous
believer in this verse refers to a pastor-elder, the same pastor-elder as verse
14. In this case he is the victim of verbal reversionism.
2. In every case where the
pastor-elder is praying for another the individual involved is disciplined by
God in reversionism. This is not carnality. Carnality is simply getting out of
fellowship. 3. The pastor-elder’s authority was rejected when this believer
entered reversionism. The victim, the pastor-elder, is the object of reverse
process reversionism.
4. In each case the pastor-elder has
a power in prayer involved in restoring the reversionist. He is not a healer.
He has the power of prayer in the restoration of a reversionist.
5. But having the power of prayer is
not the issue, the prayer must become operational. The conditions under which
the prayer becomes operational are stated in the context. “A prayer of a
righteous believer has much power when it is operational.” It is one thing to
have power but it is another thing for it to be operational.
6. The repentance of the
reversionist makes such prayer operational. The repentance of the reversionist
is the key. He changes his mind.
7. The conditions under which the
power of prayer is operational have been described in context — verse 14-16.
8. In each case prayer in the hands
of a supergrace pastor is used by God to turn the tide. Prayer is a power in
the hands of the pastor here but it is no power without God. It is a grace
power, it depends on who and what God is, it does not depend on who and what
the pastor is. God, in answering these prayers, simply recognises the authority
of the pastor, an authority which He Himself has given in grace.
9. Here then is power in prayer
which anticipates the next passage where we have power in prayer under national
reversionism. The whole course of national history can be changed by power in
prayer under conditions of reversionism.
Prayer
1. If you are ever going to have any
power in prayer it must be on a grace basis. Therefore grace begins with the
person to whom you address your prayers. The Bible gives us direct rules on who
is the recipient of prayer. It is not “Dear Jesus” and it is not “Oh Holy
Ghost.” Neither the second person of the Trinity nor the third person of the
Trinity are the recipients of prayer. Prayer is always addressed to God the
Father — Ephesians 3:14; in the name of the Son because the Son of the high
priest, and in the power of the Spirit because God the Holy Spirit is the power
in prayer — Ephesians 6:18. But never pray to the Holy Spirit and never pray to
Jesus Christ, always pray to the Father. You are in the family of God, offer
your prayer to the Father. Both the Son and the Spirit offer prayer to the
Father — Hebrews 7; Romans 8:26,27.
2. Three categories of prayer are
directed to God the Father: The prayers of God the Son as our high priest —
Hebrews 7:25; the prayers of God the Holy Spirit — Romans 8:26,27; the prayers
of the believer priest — Hebrew 4:16
3. The agenda for prayer should
include: a. Confession of sin — 1 John 1:9; b. Thanksgiving — Ephesians 5:20;
c. Intercession — Ephesians 6:18; d. Petition — Hebrews 4:16. That is an agenda
for private prayer.
4. Prayer ultimately depends upon
God. No one has any great ability in prayer because of who and what they are.
5. There are some principles in
prayer: a. Prayer is most effective when you are functioning under GAP — John 15:7; b. Prayer is an exhale of the faith-rest technique —
Matthew 21:22; c. Prayer demands cognisance of the will of God. If you start
praying for things which are not God’s will or if you pray for things that come
another way, like praying for the Holy Spirit (you don’t pray for the Holy Spirit,
you have the Holy Spirit), they are not answered; d. Prayer must be offered
under the filling of the Spirit condition — Ephesians 6:18; e. Prayer is never
effective of you are out of fellowship or in reversionism — Psalm 66:18; f.
Prayer must always line up with the principles of grace; g. Prayer is a part of
the divine decrees — Jeremiah 33:3, God knew billions of years ago every
effective prayer you would ever utter, He took cognisance of it and He answered
it then; h. Prayer is related to category #1 love — Psalm 116:1,2.
6. Nine reasons why your prayer
isn’t answered: a. Because you are not filled with the Spirit — Ephesians 6:18;
b. No faith-rest function — Matthew 21:22; c. Mental attitude sins — Psalm
66:18; d. Lust type selfishness — James 4:2-4; d. Lack of obedience — 1 John
3:22; e. Noncompliance with a specific and known will of God — 1 John 5:14; f.
Pride is a basic mental attitude sin and resultant self-righteousness enters a
lot of prayers — Job 35:12,13; g. Lack of compassion or grace orientation —
Proverbs 21:13; h. If you are having a fight with your wife or your husband
your prayers can’t be answered: Lack of domestic tranquillity 1 Peter 3:7.
7. There is a principle of grace in
prayer — Hebrews 4:16. a. Prayer is the privilege and extension of grace. You
neither earn it, nor deserve it nor work for it. It is impossible to approach
God in prayer on the basis of human good or human merit; b. The believer priest
approaches God in prayer on the basis of his high priest, Jesus Christ, and the
merits of his high priest. That is grace; c. The Father is propitiated with the
work of Christ but is not a respecter of persons in cases of believers offering
prayer; d. Therefore, God does not hear my prayer because I am fervent, moral,
sincere, religious, self-effacing, or eloquent; e. God hears my prayers because
of the function of GAP through the grace system,
the ministry of God the Son [grace], the ministry of God the Holy Spirit
[grace]; I can neither earn nor deserve nor work for the right.
We have seen prayer for the
individual in adversity — verse 13. In verses 14 and 15 we have seen the power
of prayer on the part of the pastor-elder dealing with the problem of a dying
reversionist. In verse 16 have seen the power of prayer on the part of a
pastor-elder dealing with a believer in reversionism very sick but not dying as
yet. In verses 17, 18 we have prayer for a sick nation, prayer for a nation in
reversionism, prayer for a nation which is about to be destroyed.
On the surface in verses 17,18 there
doesn’t seem to be a whole here for us, but when you couple these two verses
with two chapters in Kings this is the story of how a nation was delivered in
its time of great catastrophe. The fifth cycle of discipline was about to occur
in the northern kingdom when the events which are described here came to pass.
In verse 17 the word “Elias” in the
Greek is H)liaj. This is taken from the
Hebrew Elijahu (pronounced Aleeyahu).
The name talks about how Jehovah Elohim delivers. It refers to Elijah. “Elijah
was” — imperfect active indicative of e)imi. E)imi means that he kept on being
around. He was “a man,” a)nqrwpoj, a generic term but also
used to indicate the fact that he was a spiritual giant. A)nqrwpoj is a catchall word, and here it is used in the
sense of ish elohim, a “man of God.”
Elijah was a man in every sense that a man could be manly. He was noble of soul
because he had a lot of Bible doctrine. He was a supergrace believer, he was
strong, he was courageous, he had great moral courage, and he was the man who
stood in the gap and made it possible for his country to be delivered from the
fifth cycle of discipline. One man stood in the gap in time of great national
disaster. We will see from this passage how he stood in the gap with prayer. Remember:
“The prayer of a righteous man has much power when it is operational.” When
Elijah becomes operational in prayer it is because he has used every facet of
the supergrace life and he has come down to the wire with prayer. His
supergrace manliness plus his prayer was the means of delivering his country.
The next phrase says he was “subject
to like passions” .This is a compound adjective o(moiopaqhj which means of similar feelings, circumstances and pressures. If you as
a member of the human race have had some adversity, then you know how Elijah
felt. If you have had some pressures, had your feelings hurt, been
disappointed, disheartened, sad because of events due to the situation we face
today in our nation, then you know exactly how Elijah felt. Elijah was not only
a supergrace hero, he was a patriot, he loved his country, he loved his Lord,
and he stepped into the gap and faced almost certain disaster. He was willing
to give his life for his Lord and his country and to do it all at the same
time. So he was a man, a human being, who kept being similar in feelings,
circumstances and pressures, not “as we are” but “to us.” We have the
associative instrumental plural of the personal pronoun e)gw. The pronoun e)gw in
the plural refers to believers in the Church Age, to you and to me. Elijah
faced maximum apostasy, he faced maximum reversionism which threatened his
nation with total catastrophe. His nation was on the verge of the fifth cycle
of discipline just as our nation faces the same thing today. There is,
therefore, a direct parallel between what Elijah faced in his day and what you
and face today. He prayed for his nation in disaster that God would knock on
the door, and knock on the door for three and a half years. At the end of that
time he prayed that God would stop knocking on the door, and God stopped
knocking on the door. As a result the nation was delivered. “Elijah, a human
being, kept being similar to us in feelings, circumstances and pressures.”
The next principle is a very
important one because it says, “and he prayed.” He is comparable to a
pastor-elder today, he was a prophet. “And he prayed” is the aorist middle
indicative of proseuxomai, which means to offer
prayer. It is used here and in verses 13,14 and 16 for a prayer which redeems
time. it is in the aorist tense, an ingressive aorist — he began initiating a
prayer which was given in part at the beginning of three and a half years and
was concluded at the end of that three and a half years. This prayer of a
supergrace hero is the basis for delivering his nation. But it is deliverance
through Jesus Christ knocking on the door. He began to knock on the door, and
the discipline which warns, and here is where they had the no-rain situation.
This affected the agricultural economy and the warning lasted for three and a
half years. At the end of that three and a half years the nation is going to
repent and recover from reversionism. It is an ingressive aorist for initiating
a prayer for awakening discipline to the reversionistic nation. The middle
voice is an indirect middle which emphasises the agent producing the action.
The agent is Elijah. The indicative mood is the reality of the fact that the
prayer of a supergrace believer when operational has much power. This is the
reality of much power in time of national catastrophe.
The word “earnestly” does not occur
in the Greek. it is translated like an
adverb. In reality it is a noun, and it is the instrumental singular of proseuxh and it means “by means of prayer” .So literally, “by
means of prayer he began to pray.” This is one of those operational prayers
which has much power.
“that” is not found in the original
but is actually used to translate an aorist infinitive of purpose — “that it
might not rain” is actually an aorist active infinitive of brexw which means to rain, and with the negative mh it means not to rain, “not to send rain” .This is
the constative aorist. The active voice: the subject [God] produces the action
of the verb, plus the negative, it is a request not to send rain, and God
withholds rain. The infinitive denotes purpose, the purpose is the warning of
divine discipline. It is God knocking on the door of the nation warning them of
national catastrophe, warning them that the nation will be destroyed by the
fifth cycle of discipline.
“on the earth” — e)pi plus gh — “upon the land.” The
words “by the space of” does not occur, it is used to translate an accusative
of the extent of time. The phrase “for three and a half years” is all in the
accusative, and this is called an accusative of the extent of time.
Translation: “Elijah was a human
being similar to us in feelings, circumstances and pressures, and by means of
prayer he began to pray not to send rain: and it did not rain on the land for
three and a half years.”
Summary
1. For three and a half years God
knocked on the door of the northern kingdom.
2. This knocking on the door is
divine discipline as a warning to reversionism. In this case the warning of a
nation of reversionists.
3. The warning was of coming
national disaster. God brings along discipline, national catastrophe, to warn
of the coming of the fifth cycle of discipline.
4. While believers and unbelievers
in this apostasy were wasting time through reversionism, and through the
practice of reverse process reversionism, Elijah the supergrace believer
offered the only prayer he could offer and then walked out on the whole deal
for three and a half years.
A prayer of a righteous
believer [like Elijah] has much power when it is operational. For his country
Elijah prayed once, then he redeemed time for three and a half years and even
prayed for other people occasionally. Then at the end of that time he prayed
again. The time of the two prayers was the time the prayer was operational. But
for three and a half years his prayer for his country was not operational. He
prayed that God would knock on the door, that it would not rain. That was
fulfilled. For three and a half years it did not rain.
A prayer of a righteous one has much
power when it is operational. Why? This is a supergrace prayer, he knows when
to pray. He prays once and he prays again for his country three and a half
years later. This is one of the most powerful prayers of all time. It is
divided into two parts; part one is in verse 17; part two is in verse 18.
However, before we can get to part two we need to understand more of the impact
of this prayer. This prayer was based on doctrine — Deuteronomy 28:23-24.
1 Kings 17:1 — Elijah was a member
of the northern kingdom who lived across the river in Gilead where half of the
tribe of Reuben was posted. Gilead is east of the Jordan, outside of the land
but Elijah belongs to the land. In other words, he is one of those persons who
lives on the wrong side of the tracks as far as the historical Jew was concerned.
He did not cross the river, and when he finally did cross the river he didn’t
come to live in the land. According to the words of King Ahab he came as a
troublemaker. But the trouble was already in the land because the trouble was
reversionism; a maximum number of people, believer and unbeliever, were
involved in reversionism. The country was about to be destroyed, therefore one
man had to be brought across the river. That one man was a supergrace hero with
maximum doctrine in his soul. He also had the gift of communication. In the
Church Age he would be called a pastor; in his own dispensation he is called a
prophet, he had the gift of communication. He is called the Tishbite because he
came from a town called Thisbe in Gilead. He crossed the river because God
commanded him to do so, and he cane now to the nation with a message. Elijah
means “Jehovah is my God.” He apparently had a background that indicated
positive volition for a long time. However, other things about his environment
are missing. Why? Because they are not important. There is no reference to his
background outside of his own town, there is no reference to his family, to his
education, to anything about him. Therefore we know something immediately:
environment and background mean nothing to a person who enters supergrace. A
person who is a supergrace hero has overcome any handicaps of the past, and no
supergrace believer ever complains about his birth — born out of wedlock, born
on the “wrong side of the tracks” or choking from a silver spoon in his mouth,
he never complains about his education or lack of education, he never complains
about how nature endowed him. And anyone who is a believer can completely
mystify and destroy the psychologist, the psychological counselor and the
psychiatrist by taking in doctrine every day and going to supergrace. A
supergrace believer is never the product of his environment. He is never the
product of past handicaps or failures, he is a total product of grace. He is a
grace man all the way and that is why we have no more information about Elijah.
We just know from his own town and from his country that he was born on the
wrong side of the tracks. But that doesn’t throw him at all. He could have been
born a Chinaman and done the same thing. He was a Jew, but there was a time
when the Chinaman was considered one of the minorities. He could have been born
a Jap.
One thing about the Japs in this
country, they never were bothered and I have never heard one Jap ever squawk
about the Japs getting a bad deal. They were a very industrious people who came
to this country and they fought for their country in world war II. I never saw a Jap who couldn’t get a job during the depression. I
never saw a Jap who didn’t work his head off or who was unclean, who had long
hair. I’ve seen Japs fight for the country, Japs get decorated, and I never saw
a Jap who called himself a Jap either. He was American. They are industrious,
they are vigorous. They fought for this country and they got kicked in the butt
by the Government who ran them all off into detention camps, stole their land
in many cases, and they got kicked around every way they could be kicked around
but I never saw a Jap who ever complained. They always pulled themselves up
and, by the way, I never saw a Jap starve. Why? because they cam over here and
they caught on to Americanism right away and they became Americans. And I’ve
seen Chinamen and I’ve seen Mexicans who were no good. And you can’t make a
silk purse out of a sow’s ear. I want to tell you something. There is no
“black” and there is no Mexican and there is no Chinaman and there is no other
minority, whoever they are (we are finding new minorities in the welfare state)
who cannot rise totally above all of his circumstances on the basis of Bible
doctrine and God’s grace. There is no such thing as a minority in this country,
there are just Americans.
Once you get Bible doctrine there is
no such thing as a past. There is only fantastic capacity for life.
Gilead doesn’t give Elijah anything.
And that isn’t all, he is a Tishbite and he is from a town called Thisbe. He
never went back to Thisbe either.
“as the Lord God of Israel liveth”
he says. God is alive to this man. This phrase means that this man is occupied
with the person of Jesus Christ, one of the signs of a supergrace believer. The
Lord God of Israel is Jesus Christ, and He is very much alive to him — the qal
imperfect of chayah, “He keeps on
living” — category one love toward Jesus Christ plus capacity for category one
love from the supergrace life. Notice: “he said to Ahab,” and what he said was
a qal imperfect of amar, and the
point is he had said quite a few things to Ahab. We do not have his exact
words, we have the gist of what he said.
“before whom I stand” — the qal
perfect of amadh. The qal perfect
means “I stand there in the past, I keep on standing there I am standing before
you O king. I stand before the Lord, and I’m in a place of perfect security and
perfect prosperity. I’m here as the Lord’s representative to tell you what I’m
going to do.”
“there shall not be dew nor rain
these years, but according to my word” — that’s what the Lord says to you
“Buster” !"My” word is not Elijah’s word, it is the Lord’s word. he stands
before the Lord, he is standing before a king (Ahab). Amadh is used to stand before a king and make a petition, or ask a
request, or gain a hearing. But while he stands before the king he looks over
the top of the crown and sees the Lord Jesus Christ, the King of kings, and he
says, “I’m standing in front of you but I stand before a King.” And it is
according to His word and there is not going to be any dew and there is not
going to be any rain, and you know what that means Ahab! That means you’ve had
it. That means depression.
Ahab
1. He was more evil than all the
previous kings of Israel. In the kings of the northern kingdom he now held the record for evil. We know this
from 1 Kings 16:30.
2. He married an unbeliever — 1
Kings 16:31. Not only that but his wife hooked him into phallic reversionism.
He built up an altar for Baal in the temple he had built where they could
practice phallic reversionism in the name of God. In verse 33 he held the
all-time record for sin up to that point. Verse 34 — Jericho was rebuilt but Jericho was under a curse [Joshua
6:36] and there was a curse upon anyone who rebuilt
Jericho. So verse 34 is a warning as to the national reversionism which was
upon them because this was the
fulfillment of that curse.
When God says there will not be rain
or dew, that is a reference to Deuteronomy 11:16,17. But more than that it is a
reference to Leviticus 26:19 and Deuteronomy 28:23,24 where the laws of divine
establishment are related to free enterprise in economy.
The message, again, is a message
that there is going to be depression and that there is nothing that you can do
to stop this depression. Why? Because I am going to pray for this depression.
“A prayer of a righteous man [a supergrace hero] has much power when it is
operational.” And he is going to pray for it.
Verse 2 — “And the word of the Lord
came unto him saying” — this is to Elijah now. He has prayed that prayer and
gone. He is now warned to get out of there. This is the first of three
occasions when God said move.
Verse 3 — “Get thee hence” — Get out
of town; “turn eastward, go back across the river.” You’ve come across the
river and given your message, now turn around and go back. “Hide yourself by
the brook Cherith [kerith, taken from
the verb karath which means to cut
off. The noun means ‘cut off.’ In other words, Elijah came across the river,
delivered his message in Samaria and then cuts back across the river at a
different spot. There is a brook that comes off the Jordan called Cherith where
he is told to go. That is exactly what he does, he obeys orders.
Verse 4 — he also gets his command,
“drink of the brook … I have commanded the buzzards to feed you.” The words “I
have commanded” indicates that God had set everything up for Elijah. It is a
piel perfect of tsawah. God always
prepares the way for a supergrace believer. When a supergrace believer steps
out, no matter what he has to do, no matter what dangers he faces, no matter
what problems he faces, God always provides.
He went and did according to the
word of the Lord, according to verse 5. The word “he went” we find many times
in this passage — jalak means to
walk. He walked from one spot to another as the Lord commanded. But it says “he
did,” which is the qal imperfect of asah.
This is important. Asah means to
manufacture something out of something. He manufactured obedience out of
doctrine. That is why asah is used.
He went and did according to the word
of the Lord, and the word “did” is asah.
He manufactured obedience, he manufactured his life out of doctrine. The only
way to obey God and to follow the principles of divine guidance is to
manufacture obedience out of doctrine.
“for he went and dwelt” — qal
imperfect of jashab which means to
dwell in a place of happiness or blessing or prosperity. And even though he was
alone he was extremely happy. He is not always going to be alone. There is a
woman, she is called in verses 9 and 10 a “widow woman.” Actually, she is ishah [woman of] almanah [forsaken, or bad.] And she has a son, and she is not a
widow. She has never been married. Now remember, Elijah is a supergrace type.
Where is he going to go when he gets lonely and things get bad, he is going to
go to an ishah almanah.
Verse 6 — God kept His word. The
buzzards brought him bread and flesh in the morning, and he drank from the
brook. Every day when Elijah went down to the brook he noticed something. It
was getting lower and lower. This was his source of water. Why was it getting
lower? Because back up there is the Jordan and the Jordan is drying up. The sun
shines every day, and water evaporates but there is no rain. There is no shade
and the sky is as brass. So the water level of the Jordan is going down, and if
the Jordan is going down then the Cherith is going down. This is where God
wants you to be and every day you watch your water supply going lower and lower
and lower. What are you going to do? Everyone faces what Elijah faced in verse
7. We all have our dried up brooks.
We have in verse 7 the qal perfect
of jabesh. The brook was one day
nothing but dry, hot sand. It dried up completely because there was no rain in
the land. Many times the supergrace believer or the growing believer finds
himself in a test area. And why have a dried up brook? It gives you a chance to
use doctrine. Notice: He is out of water but not out of doctrine. The only
person who would panic and be down there digging in the river bed or scouting
up and down looking for a new water hole is a reversionist. But this man has
doctrine in his soul. He didn’t lose his doctrine. When the water went down
every day his doctrine didn’t go down. Doctrine is going up while his water is
going down. And when the water has gone he still has every bit of doctrine that
he ever had, and more. Therefore his life is doctrine, not water in the brook.
Did you ever value something and lose it — a thing, a person, a circumstance.
Well that is what Elijah has done. God has to entertain Elijah for three and a
half years. he has to live for three and a half years and finish up the prayer.
In that three and a half years God has a variety of things to entertain him.
When that brook was dry he was in the same situation as the Exodus generation
was at Meribah, only they were reversionists and he is a supergrace hero. So
when you get your no water situation you lose a friend, you lose a situation,
you lose things that are important to you, you lose something you associate
with happiness. When your brook is dried up what are you going to do? If you
come to Bible class and take it in until you grow up it isn’t going to make any
difference. You are just going to find out how God is going to entertain you
next. When you have capacity for freedom, capacity for life, capacity for love,
capacity for happiness, and capacity for prosperity, you also have capacity for
pressure. When you have capacity for pressure you are loaded up with doctrine
in your soul. With that doctrine in your soul there is no dried up brook in the
world that will ever bother you. We are facing some national dried up brooks.
Are you ready for it or not? Whether you are ready for it depends on the
doctrinal content of your soul.
So here is the crisis: no water. But
with Elijah it was no problem at all. He just sat down and says, “Lord, what’s
next?” And almost immediately, verse 8, “And the word of the Lord came unto him
saying ...”
Verse 9 — “Arise, and go to
Zarephath.” Why Zarephath? That’s the land of Jezebel — Sidon, the land of
Jezebel, a land of apostasy and reversionism, the centre of Baal worship in the
ancient world at this time. And yet even though it is the centre of phallic
reversionism and phallic apostasy there is a fallen woman who is also moving up
the line. She has positive volition, she has repented and she wants to recover
from reversionism. All she has in the world at this time is a son whom she
loves and about a day’s ration when the prophet arrives.
“which belongeth to Sidon [the home
of Jezebel]” — and then we have the same verb again, jashab [dwell there in prosperity and happiness]; “and stay there.”
This is the qal perfect of jashab —
“behold, I have commanded” — the piel perfect of tsawah. He commanded the buzzards and now He commands a fallen
woman, a forgotten woman — ishah almanah.
Almanah means forsaken, deserted, rejected, and sometimes fallen. Some guy
walked out on this doll and left her flat. All she has at this time is a desire
for doctrine, she doesn’t have any doctrine. She is going to be a congregation
of one for roughly three years. At the end of three and a half years the
congregation will split up — “a forsaken woman to sustain thee.” What does it
mean here to sustain? This is the piel infinitive construct of kul. It has with it a second masculine
singular suffix referring to Elijah and only Elijah. Elijah is going to have a
trade-out here. He is going to give her doctrine; she is going to give him
social life, food and companionship, as it were, for roughly three years. That
is what kul means, it doesn’t mean
she is just going to cook. The piel stem is intensive. If this had been in the
qal it would mean that she was simply going to hold him up. Kul in the qal means to hold someone up,
to prop them up. But she is not going to prop him up. The piel stem means she
is going to be a great blessing to him. Here is grace. God has graced out a
supergrace hero by the name of Elijah. At the same time He is going to grace
out a forsaken, lonely woman. She is also in a very strange situation because
her country, like the northern kingdom, is suffering from phallic reversionism
and she is a victim of this system.
Verse 10 — “So he arose and went to
Zarephath, and when he came to the gate of the city, behold, a widow was there [ishah almanah], a woman forsaken was
there gathering sticks; and he called to her and said, ‘Fetch me, I pray thee a
little water in a vessel, that I may drink’.”
Verse 11 — “And as she was going to
fetch it, he called to her and said, ‘Bring me I pray thee a little food too’.”
That was the wrong thing to say to this woman. Why do you think she was out
there gathering sticks for. She has given up. She is going to die. She looked
in the cupboard that morning and she figured they had one day’s food — one meal
for her and her son. She is going to sit down with him and they are going to
eat that meal, and then they are going to die. They’ve had it. She’s going out
in a blaze of glory with one fine last meal, and here comes this character and
says, “I’ll take that meal.” All of this is the way God graces out people. She
has one meal left; she is already contemplating one last fling, and Elijah
comes along and says “I’ll take your last fling.”
Verse 12 — “But she said, ‘As the
Lord your God lives, I have no bread, only a handful of flour in a barrel and a
little oil in a jar, and behold, I am gathering two sticks that I may go in and
prepare it for me and my son, that we may eat it and die’.” And you want to
spoil our last meal!
God timed this perfectly. God makes
sure that the brook Cherith would dry up at the right time so Elijah could pop
over here to Zarephath where a woman’s barrel was going down. Her barrel went
down at the same time that the brook went down. In effect, she was having a
dried up brook of her own. Misery just loves company and so God sent her
company for her dried up brook, and they are going to have a dried up brook
party. That is grace.
We are actually studying the verb proseuxomai which occurs in James 5:17,18. It is used for Elijah
in verse 17 beginning a prayer, and that is an ingressive aorist. Then it is
used for the termination of that prayer three and a half years later, and that
is a culminative aorist. The same verb is used. We are observing at the end of
the fifth chapter of James the tremendous power of prayer. The final
illustration of the power of prayer is in time of national reversionism. Out of
nowhere Elijah came into the picture, he crossed the river and became the great
prayer warrior. First he prayed for discipline, that God would knock on the
door. Then he prayed for the removal of the discipline. We are observing now
what happened during the interim between the beginning of the prayer and the
ending of the prayer. This fill in from 1 Kings chapters 17 and 18 is the basis
of understanding the nature of Elijah’s prayer at the end of three and a half
years. The prayer was begun and discontinued. It was begun by praying for rain.
We are now observing some of the details.
1 Kings 17:12 — “And she said,” the
qal imperfect of amar to indicate a
general conversation, part of which is recorded in the Word of God, that which
is necessary for our understanding. “As the Lord thy God liveth, I have not a
cake.” This is not a cake as we understand it today. The Hebrew word which is
used here is maog, and maog is the way they baked bread in the
ancient world. They baked it in a round shape. But we would actually have to
say following the true concept which is here, “I do not have a loaf of bread”
.She said, “I do have a handful of flour in a barrel, and a little oil in a
jar” — what she is getting ready to do is to bake about a tenth of a loaf of
bread. She and her son will then have a piece of bread apiece and then they
will sit down to die “… for me and for my son that we may eat it” — the qal
imperfect of akal; “and die” — and
here we go from the imperfect to the perfect. That is the end. The verb is muth. When it is all over they have one
thing left and therefore it is in the perfect tense. That means finish; that’s
it!
Obviously this is a very depressing
situation. Elijah has been alone, he was told to go and hide himself. Then he
was told to get out of his hiding place after the brook dried up and to march
across country, to go all the way from the Jordan and go straight through his
own country where Ahab was looking for him, and then into the neighbouring
country which is Sidon.
Verse 13 — “And Elijah said unto
her, Fear not.” When most people say “Fear not” it is just words; it doesn’t
mean anything. But Elijah has the gift of communication and he communicates to
this woman right now. When he said “Fear not” he put it in a very strong way.
The word is the qal imperfect jussive of yare,
and with the negative we could translate it “Stop being afraid.” One reason why
this woman is so despondent is because of mental attitude sins. Fear is a
mental attitude sin. There has to come a time when you stop being afraid. As
long as she has mental attitude sins this always leads to despondency, and she
is an unstable despondent woman. She has a need and Elijah has a need. They
actually need each other and they have now found each other. This is not a case
of right man/right woman, this is a case of category three. Each has a need
which the other will fulfill. This is the beginning of a phenomenal friendship.
Apparently everything she needs in a friend: he’s here. Everything that he
needs in a friend: she’s there. Which indicates, by the way, that category
three can be between opposite sexes — it is a little more complicated. A great
category three friendship between a male and a female is possible but it does
have complications.
“go and do as you said you would” —
one thing about a person who is in mental attitude sins is that they not only
get despondent but they’re always unstable. Elijah, as it were, holds her feet
to the fire — “just go and do what you said you were going to do, be
consistent. However when you cook the meal, that’s when you are going to change
to program.” She is now under the supervision and the authority of Elijah. She
is no longer her own woman. Where has it gotten her being her own woman?
Despondency, discouragement, and a terribly miserable situation. From this
moment on she is going to take orders. And Elijah said, first of all, “Be
consistent.”
“But prepare me [asah again] a little piece of bread
first, and bring it to me, and, afterwards, make for thee and thy son.” If she
takes all of the flour in the barrel and all of the oil in the jar and prepares
a small disk of bread, which we would call a loaf but is a circular disk of
bread, and Elijah eats it there is left after that, zero! In other words, there
is no more flour and there is no more oil, and there are no more cakes of
bread. She has that much straight so Elijah has to add a little more
information, and he does: “For thus saith the Lord God of Israel (Verse 14),
The barrel of flour shall not waste” — the qal imperfect of kalah. Kalah means to end in the qal
stem: “shall not be terminated” — Elijah does not say, ‘You will not die,
you’re son will not die,’ he says in effect, the flour barrel won’t die. “The
barrel of flour shall not be terminated, neither shall the jar of oil fail” —
qal imperfect of chasar which does
not mean to fail, it means to diminish. The oil will never go down. Every day
you will use up all the oil in the jar and the next day the same amount of oil
(food for three) will be there again. Use it all. Why does he say that? She was
going to use all that she had there anyway. He wants her to do that now every
day until rain comes again. There is a depression all over the middle east
because of the no-rain situation, and he says, Use up today every bit of it,
and tomorrow there will be more.
Principle: We as believers live one
day at a time. We are to use up every day. We are to spend what doctrine we
have on every day. Every doctrine we have in the right lobe, use it today. It
will be there tomorrow, and the next day and the next. There will always be
doctrine in the barrel, there will always be the ministry of God the Holy
Spirit in the vessel. Use today what you have in your soul. You may not be here
tomorrow, use doctrine today. Doctrine in the soul, as we have seen in James 5,
is analogous to money in the bank, it is the capital for phase two. The blood
of Christ is the capital for phase one; doctrine in the soul is the capital for
phase two. The whole objective of the book of James is to load up your account
so you can spend it daily. This is what Elijah is teaching the forsaken woman.
Immediately a relationship was
established. He has the gift of communication, it was called in the Old
Testament “prophet”; it is called in the New Testament “pastor-teacher,” or
“pastor-elder.” He communicated to her, she recognised his authority, she
obeyed. She had no direct conversation with God, he quotes.
Verse 15 — “And she went and did
according to the word of Elijah” — she followed instructions implicitly, and as
a result of that there was food every day — “and did eat days” .The word “many”
is not found in the original and it is not necessary. They ate one day at a
time. You can only eat one day at a time. God says, “Look, I am the source, and
I have been around for a long time and will continue to be. You live one day at
a time, I’m always here.” Faith-rest is spending capital; faith-rest is
capacity for life plus spending capital. So everything is going fine now.
Elijah had to talk to himself or to the buzzards who provided that food for him
for a while, now he has someone to whom he can talk and have a social
relationship and visa versa. The woman has had a lot of bad experience, which
is why she is called ishah almanah;
she is a forsaken woman. Hard times means that she has had it. Undoubtedly she
had made a lot of her own trouble.
Everything starts out fine, as
things always do. After a while you forget that every day God is providing
food, you just get used to the idea. Every day there was always enough flour in
the barrel and enough oil in the vessel, and there was always sufficient. So
that was no longer an issue. So now we’re not going to starve to death, and now
we are having a jolly good time and everyone’s having a ball, Elijah has come
to stay. The son loves Elijah very much and she loves Elijah and Elijah loves
here and they are having a fantastic relationship. Then, as always, God says,
“Hey, you all have forgotten about me.” In other words, here comes trouble, and
trouble comes.
I has happened to every one of us.
There comes a time when you’re so happy that you can’t stand prosperity, you
forget the source. Lest we forget, God reminds us with a good jab, and here
comes the good jab.
By the way, what happened to Elijah
between verses 17 and 18 of James 5? That is what we are finding out. That is
why we are going to understand his prayer a little better when it comes.
Verse 17 — “And it came to pass
after these things” — after everything was going along beautifully. After a
whole lot of prosperity we have a tendency to forget the source, and forgetting
the source may mean neglecting to build up our capital, Bible doctrine in the
soul; “that the son of ishah [the
woman], the mistress of the house.” She is no longer ishah almanah. Why? Because she now has a friend. God provided her
a man friend; “fell sick” — a sudden, dramatic illness; “and his sickness was
so exceeding” — is what the Hebrew says; “that there was no breath left in
him.” “No breath” calls for a little analysis. First of all the word “breath”
is, our old friend neshamah which
means the spark of life. This is what you get when you’re born, this is when
you become a person. There was no spark of life left. “There was not left” is
the niphal perfect of jathar. The hiphal
stem is passive and the perfect tense means death. There was not left in him
the spark of life. He’s dead. The mother loves the son dearly; Elijah loves
this boy dearly. He is probably in his early teens. It is the best we can
figure because later he comes out in a mistranslation which comes at the end of
chapter eighteen: naar which means a
young man in his early teens. It is translated “servant.”
Get the reaction. As long as things
go all right a woman is one kind of a person; she is something again when it
isn’t. This doll has been purring for six month or a year and everything was
going fine.
Verse 18 — “And she said unto
Elijah, What do I have to do with you,” which means, You so and so! All she has
done day in and day out is to purr, everything has been fine — “O thou man of
God?” This is sarcasm, he’s not the man of God now. She was ishah almanah [forsaken woman]; he is ish ha elohim [man of the God], but now
she uses it in sarcasm. And she says, I’m through with you, man of God. Get
lost, man of God. “Art thou come unto me to call my sin to remembrance.” What
on earth does she mean by that? First of all, to call to remembrance is the
verb and they put “my sin” in between and split the verb. Let’s see if we can
pull it back together. This call to remembrance is zakar in the hiphil infinitive construct. In the hiphil stem we
have the causative active voice — “to cause me to remember my sin.” Apparently
in these wonderful chats and in their relationship they had each talked about
their past and her past was hooked up with a lot of idiotic characters where
she had made a lot of mistakes. So Elijah is tops and she probably told him
what a wonderful person he was. She had noticed the great contrast between
Elijah and the crowd with whom she used to run. Apparently she had mentioned
some of her affairs along the way and now what she is saying in effect is it’s
all Elijah’s fault; that somehow since she has communicated her lurid past that
Elijah is responsible for the death of her son.
“my sin” — it should be translated
“my guilt.” It is not a sin, it is a whole lot of sins in one package and it is
her guilt complex. It should be “Have you done this to cause me to remember my
guilt?”
“and to slay my son” — the attitude
is, You did it Elijah. He’s dead, it is your fault! The hiphil infinitive
construct of muth. Muth doesn’t mean
to slay, it means to cause to kill in the hiphil — “to cause my son to die.” A
beautiful case of operation patsy.
Why did this boy die? Was it Elijah’s
fault? No. Was it the woman’s fault? No. Was it both of their faults? Possibly,
because under Romans 8:28 where all things work together for good, they had
been so long in prosperity they had forgotten the source of prosperity.
Thanksgiving is remembering the source: God in His grace. You may lose things
in this life from time to time but you never lose the source. You can’t lose
it, that’s your eternal security.
Apparently both of them had
forgotten the source of their prosperity so it is time for a reminder. In
reality, not so much has Elijah forgotten, he is a supergrace believer. It is
the woman who has forgotten the source of prosperity. And how do we know it is
mostly her fault, if not all her fault? Because what Elijah does in this crisis
indicates he still is a supergrace believer. Under supergrace he still has
capacity for freedom, capacity for life, capacity for love, capacity for
happiness, capacity for grace, capacity for prosperity, capacity for adversity.
He has all the capacities of the supergrace life. So it has to be her own
fault, and when it is your own fault you always try to blame someone else. It’s
her fault and she blames the one whom she loves — Elijah. It’s your fault, she
says. In reality she has forgotten the source of her prosperity and blessing.
God is the source. And probably she has her eyes on Elijah to the exclusion of
the Lord. It is not Elijah’s fault because he is occupied with the person of
Christ and his capacities are good. He takes this very well, as only a
supergrace believer would. He didn’t argue with her, he didn’t say you ...! He
simply says to her, “Give me your son.” She is holding her son in her arms, not
carrying him.. He’s dead and she’s hugging him. We know this from the Hebrew.
“And he took him out of her bosom, and carried him up into a loft” — into the
upper chamber, the finest room in the house; “where he lived in prosperity, and
laid him on his own bed.” Elijah is so well up on doctrine he knows exactly how
this boy is going to be healed.
Verse 20 — “And he cried unto the
Lord, and said, O Lord my God [my Elohim], hast thou also brought adversity
upon the widow [the forsaken one] with whom I sojourn, by slaying her son?”
That is all of his prayer. It sounds like a reproach but in reality Elijah is
reminding God. He doesn’t really need reminding but Elijah knows his ground. He
is doing a very bold thing; that when he left the dried up brook at Cherith God
said ‘I will provide a forsaken woman for you.’ And Elijah is holding Him to
His promise — verse 9. So he is not reproaching God, he is reminding God that
God cannot forsake His word, it is incompatible with the character of God. God
cannot go back on His word. Therefore to show what he means he now does a very
interesting thing. he stretches himself out over the dead boy. This boy is
dead; Elijah is alive. In effect he is setting up a beautiful analogy. He
interrupts his own prayer. As God is living and the boy is dead so the always
living God can make the boy alive again. He can resuscitate the boy, He has the
power to do so. And the analogy is, he places himself, a living person, on top
of a corpse, a dead person, a living person over the dead, a reminder to God
that anything which has relationship to eternal life it is no problem to God to
bring him back. In other words, positional truth to us.
He stretched himself upon the boy
not once but three times. In doing so he pictures Christ being identified with
our sins, and the living is identified with the dead so that the dead becomes
living. It is a beautiful picture of what Christ did for us, and he did it
three times because he knew about what Christ was going to do, He was not only
going to die for our sins but He was going to die physically and be three days
in the grave. So he did it three times. It is going to be an illustration of
resurrection.
At the end of verse 21 he does
something else. He said, “I pray thee.” He resumes his prayer. “Let this
child’s soul come into him again.” He is dead, his soul is gone. The qal
imperfect of shubh doesn’t means to
come again, it means to return. That is the finishing of the prayer.
Verse 22 — “And the Lord heard the
voice of Elijah, and the soul of the young man returned” — qal imperfect of shubh; “to him again, and he revived” —
qal imperfect of chajah; “and he
lived [not revived] again” — resuscitation.
Verse 23 — “And Elijah took the
child, and brought him down out of the chamber into the house, and delivered
him to his mother.” Outside of saying ‘Give me the boy” this is the first time
that Elijah has said anything to her. “And Elijah said, Look, you son” — qal
perfect; “has become alive.” This time it is a different verb, very similar — chaja, which means he has begun to
live.
Verse 24 — the woman changes her
tune. “And isha said to Elijah, Now
by this I know” — she has been sitting across the table from him for at least a
year. They have had marvelous prosperity in a time when there is tragedy all
around. They have had this wonderful thing and here is how superficial this
woman can be. She has to wait for a miracle to say “I really know that you are
a man of God.” You don’t know a man is a man in a moment, it is how is he
today, tomorrow, the next day, etc. This man was a man all the time. A woman
has a tendency to forget when she gets crossed. “Now by this I know” — qal
perfect of yada which means I’ve just
come to figure it out! — that you are isha
ha Elohim, a man of God, that the word of the Lord in your mouth is
doctrine” — emeth: doctrine.
We have an elapse of time here going
into chapter 18, and all of a sudden the word of the Lord comes to Elijah the
third time. This is in the third year. This time he is told, “Go show
yourself.” First of all he was told to run and hide, then cross the country and
find, now go and show yourself. These are all different commands and only a
supergrace believer can sort them out and, understanding their meaning and
purpose, go ahead an execute.
1 Kings 18:1 — this is quite a
contrast from chapter 17:2 where he was told to hide. In 17:8 he was told to
go. Now in 18:1 he is told to show himself. These are all different types of
commands requiring the flexibility of the supergrace life. Elijah was a
supergrace believer and was therefore qualified for the variation of commands
that came his way. Most people get set in their ways so that if God wants them
to do anything except lean three points to the starboard they’ve had it. All of
their lives they have been reaching toward the objective of leaning in a
certain direction, perching in a certain way, they think they have the
Christian way of life down pat, and so they do it a certain way every day, day
in and day out whether it is wrong or right. Therefore it takes the
breakthrough of Bible doctrine and the supergrace life to bring a believer out
of this type of thing.
Between the proseuxomai of verse 17 and the proseuxomai of verse 18 in James chapter 5: In verse 17 we have the ingressive
aorist — he began to pray; in verse 18 we have a culminative aorist: he ended
the prayer. And between verses 17 and 18 we have the elapse of three and a half
years, and we are examining what occurred during that period. Elijah has
already passed the Ahab test: faith and courage in proclaiming the Word of God.
He has passed the test of the brook of Cherith: Faith in waiting for God’s
solution. He passed the Zarephath test: The reality of Bible doctrine when
you’re right and everyone thinks you’re wrong. He also passed the tragedy test
in the crisis.
Now he is told to go and once again
face Ahab. There is a price on his head. It is very interesting they way God
will bring him face to face with Ahab before any of Ahab’s troops get to him
first and make some money on the bounty. “Go show thyself unto Ahab, and I will
send” — ‘I will send’ is literally, ‘I will give.’ It is the qal imperfect of nathan. “I will give rain upon the
earth.”
In verse three we go from a
supergrace believer to a reversionistic believer. We have a little aside here
in which we meet Obadiah, the governor of the palace in the reign of king Ahab.
He is a believer. “Ahab the king had called Obadiah, who was the governor of
his palace. (Now Obadiah feared the Lord greatly” — qal perfect of jaree which means here to trust. The
adverb meodh with it means that he
had always been a well-known believer in the land, which indicated that at some
time in his life he had made progress to some point of maturity. One of the
things that he did when he was a very mature believer is recorded in verse 4.
It is interesting that the things that we do that are right, when we do them
not only are they right but they manifest a certain amount of maturity in the
application of Bible doctrine. But these same things which we have done right
in the past must never be a source of pride, they must never be a source of
later on using them in a reversionistic sense and that is exactly what happened
when this man went into reversionism when he always wanted everyone to remember
the great things he had done for the Lord.
Verse 4 — “For it was so, that when
Jezebel cut off the prophets of the Lord, that Obadiah took and hundred
prophets, and hid them by fifty in a cave, and fed them with bread and water.)”
In other words, he saved the lives of a hundred prophets.” So he had in the
past had enough compassion, enough doctrine, enough maturity to do something
that was wonderful for the Lord. Now we find him as a reversionistic believer
in verse 5. He is no longer interested in saving preachers, no longer
interested in the Lord; he is now very much occupied with the horses and mules
which belong to the king. Ahab was a big rancher on the side, and now that the
famine has hit the land the mules may die and the horses may die, and to king
Ahab this would be a total disaster. The fact that his people are dying, that
his people are suffering, doesn’t seem to bother him too much, but Ahab had
this big thing for horses and mules. It would be a most awful thing if the
horses and the mules died. Ahab was also a believer and a reversionist and he
has as the governor of his palace Obadiah, a believer, also a reversionist. It
is very interesting in verses 5 and 6 to see how two reversionists spent their
time.
Verse 5 — “Ahab said to Obadiah,
Search the land, go to all the places of water, unto all the brooks; perhaps we
may find grass to save the horses and the mules alive.” To “save alive” is the
qal imperfect of chajah. he said in
effect “that the horses and the mules might keep on living.” The idea: I don’t
care about people but I sure don’t want to lose my horses and mules. This is
often the way people are, they lose their perspective in reversionism. There is
no concern of the part of either Ahab the king or one of his high ministers for
the people, but they are spending their time in a reversionistic occupation.
Verse 6 — we now have two
reversionistic believers going through the land looking for grass so that the
horses and the mules won’t die. This is a typical concept of reversionism. You
might ask yourself a question: What is it that gets you off the track from
Bible doctrine? What is your horse and mule when it comes to what is really
important in life? Without Bible doctrine you’ve had it. What is your horse and
mule? Is it a woman or a man or money or success or fame? What is it that is so
important to you that you haven’t time for Bible doctrine, that you haven’t
time for the spiritual manna from heaven — GAPing it daily. Here are two
reversionistic believers and they are really on a big mission. They are
hustling around for one big thing: to save quadrupeds. Forget the bipeds, just
save the quadrupeds.
If you go a little deeper you might
realise that there is a purpose in all of this. Ahab is married to Jezebel who
was a very beautiful woman. Not only did she have beauty but she was smart.
There are beautiful and dumb women; there are beautiful and smart women; there
are beautiful and in-between women. Most people never get beyond the fact that
they are beautiful. However, with Jezebel you have to get beyond that fact, she
was a very brilliant woman. She used her mentality to scheme, to run things,
and to stir up trouble. She is one of the all-time record holders in the field
of making trouble. Ahab is married to this woman and since the day that he
married her he went into reversionism. And from the most beautiful woman in
that part of the world he is now more interested in horses and mules than
people. Why? Because he has learned in reversionism — which is the wrong way to
learn it — that people aren’t much. They are unstable and inconsistent. because
of this Ahab is no longer interested in the people.
What could have helped him as a
king? Bible doctrine — to keep growing; he is a believer. All he had to do was
to grow in grace, to GAP it daily, and he would have
been the man of the hour instead of Elijah. But a king wasn’t doing his job
because he was in reversionism. However, he had a great administrator, the
governor of the palace. And here is a man, Obadiah. He, too, has had some great
experiences with people. There are people who blessed the name of Obadiah every
day — fifty preachers in one cave and fifty preachers in another cave. These
prophets think the world of Obadiah, they have told him so many times. Whenever
he gets down, all he has to do is to make a trip to one of those two caves and
hear what a great person he really is. And that gives him quite a lift. It
always gives a reversionist a lift. But once again, he finds himself not saving
any more prophets but instead he is trying to save horses and mules. Part of
this is because of his association with the king and his job but mostly it is
because of his reversionism.
Here are two men who are working
very hard. They are spending their time on a great mission, and earthshaking
mission: where to find grass and water to save horses and mules. You can
sympathise with them in one way because where people are concerned they’ve had
it, but you can never be sympathetic with a reversionist. To be sympathetic
with a reversionist is to end up under the sin unto death yourself sooner or
later. So here we find them out doing nothing. People are really impressed with
their own importance. You don’t have to be important to be impressed with your
own importance. The doctrine is called the dignity of man. Now man doesn’t have
any dignity, man (mankind) is an ass. He has an old sin nature. But here is the
whole situation: people like to think that they’re really important, and the
more they are doing something the more they realise they are.
God has a marvelous sense of humour,
it encompasses all kinds of people. Here is Ahab, the ruler of a nation of
people. Here is Obadiah, the deliverer of 100 very important people — prophets.
Here are two men whose lives are related to ruling people, running people,
taking care of people. But look at them. What are they doing? They are out
looking, searching diligently, they are on a very important mission. They are
doing just what you are doing every day. When you walk to your car and get in
it, do you feel important? Where you drive to wherever you go in the day time,
do you feel important? Has anyone told you lately how important you are? Has
anyone made you feel wanted? Has someone said to you on the job, That was well
done? — and that gave you the rosy glow for at least 30 minutes? To go around
thinking that you’re important, to go around thinking that somehow you’re
really doing something great in life. You know what the cure for that it?
Doctrine! The more doctrine you take in the more you realise how important the
Lord is. A supergrace believer is occupied with Christ. A reversionistic
believer is occupied with his own self-importance. A reversionistic believer is
having a great affair with himself. He has no rivals, he really loves himself.
A reversionistic believer always considers anything he is doing at the moment
more important than anything else in life. But a supergrace believer realises
that God was here billions and billions of years ago and will be here billions
and billions of years afterwards; that man is not important. David, one of the
greatest kings of all time, caught on. When he entered into that beautiful
stage of supergrace where he had capacity for love of Jesus Christ he said to
God: “Why consider man at all? What is man that you are mindful of him?” The
smartest creature in the world, outside of angels, in reality becomes the
dumbest creature. And the dumbest creature, the horse and the mule, what are
they doing for grass? Nothing. Neither the mule nor the horse in the kings
stable is going out hunting for grass. They are standing around in the stable
waiting for some biped to come along and give them grass and water. They don’t
go out after it.
The lesson that God the Holy Spirit
wants you to understand is this: You can learn more from a horse and a mule
than you can from a smart person. The horse stands around and waits to be fed,
he doesn’t get out and hustle, he doesn’t have any big missions in mind. The
horses and the mules were doing nothing; the bipeds, reversionistic type
believers, are out looking for water and grass. For some of you, your life is
right there. Your life is looking for horses and mules, and some day there will
be a great plaque on a tomb: “He saved the horses and the mules” .And that is
all your life is going to amount to until you get with Bible doctrine. Neither
my life nor your life is worth anything apart from Bible doctrine in the soul.
So it is wonderful to stop and
admire the Lord’s wonderful sense of humour: “What is man that you are
cognisant of him, or the son of man that you ever provide anything for him?”
The horses and the mules were really dumb but smart. They were smart because
they didn’t do anything and they were fed. But the man is stupid. God has
provided everything and he doesn’t want it. Imagine searching throughout the
land for food and water for horses and mules rather than having a life of great
happiness and blessing.
So we are going to leave Ahab and
Obadiah searching. We know that Obadiah went west. The reason we know that is
because in verse 7” “And as Obadiah was in the way, behold, Elijah met him” —
this is no accident, this is Romans 8:28. Of all of the people to meet this is
the perfect one — “and he [Obadiah] knew him,” hiphil imperfect of nakar — he was caused to recognised him.
Obadiah ran into Elijah; he recognised him. Why did he recognise him? The
hiphil says, because everyone knew Elijah, he was a famous man. Obadiah thinks
he himself is a famous man. But Elijah did not recognise Obadiah. Elijah
recognises the Lord. Elijah is not being impolite or anything but he doesn’t
know Obadiah. Obadiah thinks Elijah should know him because he is going to say
so later on: “Remember me, I’m the one who saved 100 preachers.” Obadiah thinks
that everyone should know him. The point is this: When these two men meet, one
is relaxed and one is straining. Elijah is relaxed, he is not pushy. He doesn’t
whip out his press notices, he doesn’t try to impress Obadiah. Elijah is
impressed with the Lord, the Lord is his only celebrity. He is so full of doctrine
that when he meets someone he is very relaxed about it, but Obadiah isn’t
relaxed at all, he’s pushy. All reversionists are pushy, they are just pushy in
different ways and some hide it better than others. But if you’re going to get
into reversionism remember that you’re going to be arrogant. Many of you think
you know what arrogance is. You think it is someone who stands up to you or is
dogmatic. That isn’t arrogance. Some of the most mealy-mouthed, spineless,
wishy-washy people who ever came along are arrogant. And you cannot get into
reversionism without getting into arrogance. Here is old humble pie Obadiah,
mealy-mouth yes this, Amen that, brother this and sister that, God-willing and
all the rest, and he is an arrogant fool. Why? He is in reversionism.
Guess what Obadiah did — “and fell
on his face.” He gave Elijah the recognition of a king: obeisance — “and said,
You, my lord Elijah.” He recognised him for what he was.
Verse 8 — “And he [Elijah] said, I
am” — and apparently he recognised his appearance as being high in the office
of the king’s administrators, so he said, “go tell thy lord, Behold, Elijah is
here.”
Verse 9 — here is a typical
reversionist! Where has Elijah heard this before? He heard it from the woman at
Zarephath. “In what have I sinned, that thou wouldst deliver thy servant into
the hand of Ahab, to slay me?” He said almost the same thing that the woman
said. “Have I sinned” — qal perfect of chatah.
This bird is worried about his reputation. In other words, ‘Why do I have to go
tell him, he’ll kill me. Have I sinned that you are punishing me?’ The
reversionist is always worried about what other people think about him. What a
trap that is, to be constantly concerned about what other people think, to live
your life to please other people. He is running around being important, doing
nothing. He is concerned about what other people think; he is concerned about
his reputation. Our reputation is well established by the Word of God: “All
have sinned and come short of the glory of God.” We have a marvelous
reputation! And what have you done to improve it? Whitewash a couple here and
there, change your brand of sin to a more respectable type. That doesn’t
impress God, just your friends who are impressionable. Elijah is not impressionable.
Notice what Obadiah says at the end:
“Would you deliver thy servant into the hand of Ahab?” Notice that he call
himself the servant of Elijah. He is not, he is the servant of Ahab. And if he
is Ahab’s servant, why is he so afraid of Ahab? Reversionists always twist
things up. Reversionism can’t tell the truth. It is impossible for a
reversionistic person to be honest. He can’t live an honest life, a noble life,
and he can’t express himself in terms of truth. Reversionism simply cannot be
honest.
“to slay me” — the hiphil infinitive
of muth. He doesn’t say to slay me —
not yet. The word for “slay” is harag.
He says “to die.” Later on he will talk about being killed by Ahab but right
now he says, “Have I done some terrible sin that you would deliver your servant
under the power of Ahab to die?” Do you want me to die? We don’t know if Elijah
has any big thoughts on the matter one way or the other, but here is the
important thing: Here is a man trying to keep alive horses and mules and is
full of his own self-importance, and all of a sudden it occurs to him that he
might die. And he is accusing Elijah of being impervious where human beings are
concerned. he is accusing Elijah of being hardened toward people when in
reality he is talking about himself. Reversionists invariably describe
themselves.
Verse 10 — “As the Lord thy God,
liveth,” — he is explaining about the reward posters — “there is no nation or
kingdom, where my lord has not sent to seek you. And when they said, He is not
here, he made them take an oath on that kingdom and nation, that they had not
found you.” In other words, extradition was in order but no one had seem him.
Verse 11 — “And now thou sayest, Go,
tell thy lord, Behold, Elijah is here.”
Verse 12 — “And it shall come to
pass, as soon as I am gone” — Notice: Reversionists always anticipate the worst
and rationalise it to the point of their own death. A reversionist dies many
times before he dies; “the Holy Spirit” — ruach
Adonai — “shall carry thee where I do not know where to find you: and so
when I come and tell Ahab, and he cannot find you, he shall slay me.” Now we
have harag which means ‘he will kill
me violently.’ “But I, thy servant, fear the Lord from my youth.” Again we have
jaree, and that is correct, he is
saved; “I have trusted in the Lord from my youth.” Reversionists never know
where to place the emphasis. The fact that he has been saved a long time means
that he should be a supergrace hero. There is no merit in longevity unless one
progresses in longevity. It is the daily function of GAP that counts.
Verse 13 — “Was it not told my lord
what I did when Jezebel slew the prophets of the Lord, how I hid a hundred men
of the Lord’s prophets by fifty in a cave, and fed them with bread and water?”
Why would you want to kill off a good believer like me?
In the first place Elijah doesn’t
know this guy. He doesn’t want to kill him. He has no mal-intent. He just wants
him to deliver a message. But a reversionist just simply can’t take something
like that, he has to make a federal case out of it. You see how reversionists
are? They are just so full of their own importance that they have to let you
know that if I go as a messenger the greatest Christian in Christendom is
going! And if I die, just tell everyone I tried!
Verse 14 — “And now thou sayest, Go,
tell thy lord, Behold, Elijah is here. And he will kill me” — the qal perfect
of harag again. It is in the perfect
tense to show that as far as he is concerned he is already dead.
Verse 15 — so Elijah pumps up the
messenger a little bit, gives him a backbone, gives him a promise: “And Elijah
said, As the Lord of hosts [the Lord of the armies, the One who does the
fighting] liveth, before whom I stand” — qal perfect of amadh, meaning ‘I have a relationship’ — “I will surely show myself
unto him today [I am not running and hiding].” That convinced Obadiah.
Verse 16 — “So he went to meet Ahab,
and told him; and Ahab went to meet Elijah.”
Notice: A reversionist always has
his eyes on the past; he lives in the past. His only orientation to the future
is his self-importance. A past victory has become a source of pride; that is
because of reversionism. A past victory had become a source of complacency;
that is because of reversionism. Obadiah had his eyes on what he had done for
the Lord in the past rather than what he should be doing for the Lord in the
present. He was also a coward, he was afraid to die. Reversionists are always
afraid to die, that is what makes the sin unto death so interesting! He has
human power but it is no power at all. As compared to the power of God he is a
pip-squeak. He has human power and he forgets all about his human power and he
forgets all about his human dignity of office once he is told to run this
errand. So with his eyes on himself, “I have done this, I have done that.
Haven’t you heard about me?” He is finally convinced that he can go.
Verse 17 — the confrontation. “And
it came to pass, when Ahab saw Elijah, that Ahab said unto him, Art thou he
that troubleth Israel?” We have now met a politician! A reversionist is not a
statesman, he is a politician. Just as Obadiah revealed what he is really like
so Ahab as a reversionist reveals what he is really like and tries to pass the
buck to someone else. It is Ahab who is the troubler of Israel. “He that
troubleth” is the qal active participle of akar.
The qal active participle is linear aktionsart — “Are you the one who has
caused all the trouble in Israel?” “Are you the one who is responsible for this
terrible depression?” “Are you the one who is responsible for all these people
dying?” “Are you responsible for the fact that I can’t find food for my horses
and mules?” “Are you the one who is causing all this trouble?” “Are you the one
who has turned my wife Jezebel into a terrible nag?” “Are you the one who has
brought all this terrible misery into my life?” And, you see, he has brought
all of it onto himself. A reversionist has a blind side. His blind side is the
fact that he has free will, just as we have seen that the woman had free will.
She decided to marry. She decided to go with this guy. So Ahab the king has
free will. Being a king hasn’t robbed him of his volition, not at all. But
isn’t it interesting, he brought all of this on himself and yet he takes the
responsibility for none of it. Typical of reversionism!
Verse 18 — Elijah gave him a very
simple answer” “And he answered, I have not troubled Israel; but you, and your
father’s house.” And now he explains the problem. Why is the country falling
apart? — “you have forsaken the commandments of the Lord.” “You have forsaken”
is a qal infinitive of azabh. Azabh
means to desert something of which you are a part, which indicates: a) Ahab was
a believer; b) Ahab at one time was a believer growing in the Lord; c) Ahab has
now gone negative toward doctrine. ‘You have forsaken the commandments of the
Lord’ means to go negative toward Bible doctrine. That is the source of the
trouble: “you and all the people of the land have gone negative.” When you go
negative toward doctrine, that is where reversionism begins. Negative toward
doctrine puts scar tissue on the left bank of the soul, scare tissue on the
right bank. That causes the opening of mataiothj and the attack on doctrine in his heart. That leads to emotional revolt
of the soul, then to the practice of reverse process reversionism. And the type
of reversionism that is mentioned: He has forsaken the God of Israel, Jesus
Christ, and he has gone for Baal — “you have followed Baalim” — Baalim is
plural. This is the qal imperfect of jalak
means to walk after — you keep on walking after different gods on different
mountains, various temples of Baal. This is an expression of reverse process
reversionism.
Verse 19 — “Now, therefore, send,
and gather to me all Israel to Mount Carmel, and the prophets of Baal, four
hundred and fifty, and the prophets of thy groves, four hundred, who eat at
Jezebel’s table.” They don’t eat at Jezebel’s table. She has a slush fund. They
are paid out of her slush fund.
Verse 20 — “So Ahab sent unto all of
the children of Israel and gathered the prophets together to Mount Carmel.”
Now we are going to have the great
issue portrayed. We have all Israel, we have 450 prophets of Baal, we have 400
prophets of the Ashera, and now in verse 20 we have them all collected
together. Verse 21 — here is the national issue in reversionism. And just
before we have the second part of Elijah’s prayer it is imperative to
understand what has happened to the people. We know what happened to Ahab, he
went into reversionism. We know what happened to Obadiah, he went into
reversionism. What about the people?
“And Elijah came unto all the
people, and said, How long halt ye between two opinions?” — incorrect. We have
the qal active participle of pasach.
In the qal active participle we have linear aktionsart, and pasach means to limp. It is found twice
in this passage. It is not correctly translated either time. Here it is
translated “halt” in verse 21; in verse 26, “they leaped upon the altar” should
be “they limped around the altar.” Limping is a picture of national reversionism.
The people limped. As a nation we limp between two opinions.
“If the Lord be God, follow him; but
if Baal, follow him.” This is the problem. The people are bouncing back and
forth, they are oscillating between Baal and the Lord. “And the people answered
not a word.” Why? They have nothing to say. They are stuck for an answer.
Verse 22 — “Then Elijah said to the
people, I, even I only, remain a prophet of the Lord.” There are other people
who have not bowed the knee to Baal, but it is true he is the only prophet of
the Lord who is standing up; he is a supergrace hero; “but Baal’s prophets are
four hundred and fifty.” All he is saying here is, I am one prophet and there
are 45. So it is one verses four hundred and fifty, now let’s have a contest.
Verse 23 — “Let them, therefore,
give us two bullocks; and let them choose one bullock for themselves, and cut
it in pieces, and lay it on the wood, and put no fire under it; and I will
prepare” — asah, qal imperfect, means
prepare, manufacture; “the other bullock, and lay it on the wood, and put no
fire under it.”
So what we are going to have is a
contest. We have 450 to get one altar going and we have one to get the other
going.
Verse 24 — “And call ye on the name
of your gods, and I will call upon the name of the Lord; and the God who answereth
by fire, let him be God.” They agreed to it, and so on. Why? Baal is equivalent
to Apollo; Baal is also a god of fire. That’s why he is the little fat man that
sits on the stove and they burn the children as an offering. What kind of a
sacrifice do you offer to Baal? Children. He is the fire god, and obviously the
fire god has it all going for him! So they all think this is a great deal
because the God who it true will put fire on the altar, and since this is an
altar to Baal they can’t miss. He is the fire god. Many do and many do not know
who Elijah’s God is. They agreed to it because it looked to them like a sure
winner.
Verse 26 — “And they took the
bullock,” the beginning of the sacrifice, “which was given them and they
dressed [prepared] it” — qal imperfect of asah;
“and called on the name of Baal from morning until noon, saying O Baal, hear
us.” They didn’t say “hear,” they gave the qal imperative of anah which means to answer, not to hear.
But there was no voice; there was no answer. “And they leaped upon the altar.”
But they didn’t leap, they limped. This time it is the piel imperfect of pasach. The piel means they went through
all of their prostrations, they worked and they worked and they worked, and
still no answer. They went through every ceremony and every ritual.
Verse 27 — “And it came to pass at
noon.” By this time the Lord’s sense of humour had communicated itself to
Elijah; “that Elijah mocked them,” hiphil imperfect of talal. He didn’t mock them, he was caused to ridicule them.
Remember they had been screaming and shouting and were getting hoarse, and he
waits until there was a lull and then gives them a bit of advice which shows
his marvelous sense of humour; “and said, Cry aloud” — literally, ‘Shout with a
greater voice [with a voice of greatness]’ — “Shout louder because he is a
god.”
Now he suggests four things which
shows that Elijah was familiar with the theology, the false teaching of Baal.
First he says “he is talking” .But that isn’t what he said at all. it is the
qal perfect of siach, and siach means to complain. Baal is so busy
complaining about the lack of sacrifices or so busy complaining about you all
that he can’t hear you. This is ridicule. Then he says, “or he is pursuing.”
This is a paronomasia — siag, and
this is not a verb, it is a noun and it means to go into retirement to
fornicate. This has to do with the phallic cult; “or he is on a journey"—
he is far away, you’ll have to call him back; “or maybe he is in a drunken
sleep” — by now they could have awakened him from an ordinary sleep, but when
he gets drunk you have to yell louder; “and he must be awakened” — and sobered
up. So it is all very beautifully handled by Elijah. And they took him seriously!
They caught their breath and they started screeching again.
Verse 28 — “And they cried aloud,”
they kept on doing it. And now to impress him they also start to gash
themselves, “and cut themselves” — the hiphil perfect of gadadh. They did it to themselves. To impress their god that they
were sincere they started taking out their knives and slashing themselves.
They’d slash their arms and hold up their bleeding arms for their god to see,
and then they would slash somewhere else. This was supposed to impress their
god. Principle: No wonder these people are limping! They are limping in their
souls because they always thought that the final trump card, the thing that
would really get God on their side was self-denial — some kind of asceticism,
some kind to show there sincerity they cut themselves and bleed. That is the
tragedy of reversionism. To be filled with self-denial, to deliberately go in
for some form of suffering to impress God. Any suffering that God brings your
way will impress Him, He will provide with it grace. Any time you bring
suffering along to impress God, He is not impressed at all.
“until the blood gushed out upon
them.”
Verse 29 — “And it came to pass,
when midday was past, and they prophesied” — the hithpael imperfect of naba — they prophesied to themselves.
They were speaking in tongues! The hithpael doesn’t mean they were giving great
messages or prophesies to others, they were babbling to themselves; they were
actually speaking in tongues. Reversionism is always impressed with speaking in
tongues, and the less sense it makes and the more it babbles the more they are
impressed. And speaking in tongues plus extreme self-denial really impresses
them and they assume that what impresses them impresses God. They didn’t
prophesy, they began to speak in tongues. They spoke to themselves, “until the
time of the offering of the evening sacrifice, and there was neither voice, nor
any to answer, no one paid any attention.” By now even the people of Israel are
bored. No one paid any attention.
Verse 30 — they had worn themselves
out; they had the first crack at it. Now Elijah called all the people around
him, “and he repaired the altar of the Lord which was broken down.” And to do
it he took twelve stones. He recognised the unity of Israel, even though at
this time they were divided two and ten: the northern kingdom, ten tribes; the
southern kingdom, two.
Verse 31 — “… to number the tribes
of the sin of Jacob, unto whom the word of the Lord came, saying, Israel shall
be thy name.”
Verse 32 — “And with the stones he
built an altar in the name of the Lord; and he made a trench around the altar,
as great as would contain, as would contain two measures of seed.”
Verse 33 — “And he put wood in order
[he chopped it], and cut the bullock in pieces, and laid it on the wood, and
said, Fill four barrels with water, and pour it on the burnt sacrifice, and on
the wood.”
Notice something. Water is scarce,
and the very fact that he would use water for this instead of saving it for
drinking indicates he is well aware of God’s plan. Right now you know that
there is going to be rain and there is going to be plenty of water. And
sometime before he offers that prayer, he is now ready. When he says take the
barrels there it was the drinking water of the people.
Verse 34 — “He made them do it a
second time — and a third time.” When Elijah poured water on the sacrifice and
the wood, everything; he was creating problems which only God could solve. The
principle is that believers create problems but God’s plan is greater than any
problem that we could create. Man can only create problems and trouble; God can
solve those problems and trouble. Therefore the act of Elijah had great
significance. he was now using human energy to create problems, to make it a
hopeless situation. Grace is designed for hopeless situations.
Verse 36 — “And it came to pass at
the time of the offering of the evening sacrifice that Elijah, the prophet,
came near, and said, Lord God of Abraham, Isaac, and of Israel.” In this manner
he shows the perpetuation of the unconditional covenants and relates them to
grace; “let it be known” — the niphal imperative of jada. The niphal stem is passive: “may it become known” — “this day
that thou art the God in Israel, and that I am thy servant, and I have prepared
[manufactured, qal perfect of asah]
all these things at thy word.”
This is not the rest of the prayer,
this is a prayer to establish his authority. The prayer for the restoration of
the land will come later. Notice again, we have a prayer within a prayer.
Elijah began a prayer when he left Ahab’s palace and it hasn’t rained for three
and a half years. That is proseuxomai, ingressive aorist. He will
eventually proseuxomai again but at this stage we
have another prayer within a prayer. We had a prayer within a prayer when the
sin died, now we have a prayer within a prayer on Mount Carmel. This is not the
prayer for restoration.
Verse 37 — “Hear me” — qal
imperative of anah and it means
‘answer me’; O Lord,” then he repeats, “answer me O Lord, that,” purpose
clause, “this people may know that thou art the Lord God, and that thou hast
turned their heart back again.” The words “thou hast turned” is the hiphil
perfect of sababh which means to turn
around; “that you have turned around their right lobes.” Before there can be
the answer of the prayer of a righteous man it has to be operational. Before it
can be operational there must be repentance. This is a prayer for the
repentance of the people so he can go back and finish his prayer. The fire
coming down to the altar will lead to the repentance of the people in
reversionism. When they repent, then he can go up higher on the mountain and go
to God and finish a prayer he started three and a half years ago. Until they
repent he can’t do it. So this is a prayer to turn around their right lobes.
They are in reversionism.
Verse 38 — “Then the fire of the
Lord fell and consumed the burnt sacrifice, and the wood, and the stones, and
the dust, and absorbed the water that was in the trench.” Why? Why did Elijah
pray that prayer three and a half years before? So that there would be knocking
on the door — divine discipline. Now, after three and a half years of divine
discipline, a demonstration — fire from heaven from the Lord. This will cause
the people to repent from negative to positive, and when they go from negative
to positive, then what? Then Elijah can go back and finish his prayer. What is
holding up the prayer of Elijah? For three and a half years God must knock on
the door. Discipline. And after the three and a half years, and the
demonstration, then the people will change from negative to positive for
doctrine. They will repent, and when they repent in reversionism that is where
the country is going to be delivered. Then the right pastor-elder, in this case
the right prophet, will offer a prayer. He cannot pray until there is
repentance, and we know this from the context — verses 14 and 15 of James 5.
There was repentance on the part of the dying reversionist. Verse 16: There was
repentance on the part of the very ill reversionist. Verses 17 and 18: Before
there can come rain and prosperity to the land, before the country can be
delivered, there must be repentance in reversionism and the fire from heaven
was to bring repentance from reversionism. This is the basis of fulfilling a
principle: “the prayer of a righteous one [Elijah] has much power when it is
operational.” There is no operational prayer until there is in the soul of the
individual, or in a group of souls in a nation, a change from negative to positive
volition toward Bible doctrine. And once there is such a change then there is a
legitimate prayer, and Elijah waited three and a half years to pray that
prayer. It was a prayer he could not pray — when he prayed that it would stop
raining it stopped raining. That’s half a prayer. The other is that it would
start raining again, but he could not pray that until there was repentance.
That is why the fire came down from heaven and, in verse 39, that’s why the
people saw it and fell on their faces and said, “The Lord, he is God; the Lord,
he is God.”
James 5:17 — Elijah was a man of
similar feelings, circumstances and pressures as us. Elijah went what we go
through, and more besides. The believer of the Church Age has the same
situation that Elijah had. Elijah is just like we are as far as life is
concerned. He faced maximum apostasy, he faced reversionism, he lived in a time
when his own nation was on the verge of collapse and was about to go out under
the fifth cycle of discipline, and as a supergrace believer he was the man who
stood in the gap and he did it by a prayer begun at one point and concluded
three and a half years later with a lot of interesting interruptions.
At the end of verse 16 — “A prayer
of a righteous one [supergrace type] has much power when it is operational.” We
have seen the conditions under which such a prayer and such a power becomes
operational. Under the conditions of repentance in reversionism this powerful
prayer comes into existence. Case history number one: a person can pray for
himself as a supergrace believer — verse 13a; case history number two: when a
believer is dying the sin unto death in reversionism and repents this prayer
becomes operational by his pastor. The pastor-elder comes and prays, the
believer is healed from his disease and his dying, he is forgiven his sins and
he is now ready to start the road back to the ECS and
the supergrace life; case history number three: verse 16, a man maligned his
pastor-teacher having rejected the message and the authority wound up in
reversionism and repented when he got under terrible illness. Under this
illness and his repentance he confesses the sin, the pastor goes into operation
with the prayer, he is healed immediately, his sins are forgiven. He is now in
a position to day by day take in the Word of God, to grow in grace and to move
to supergrace; the fourth case history: when a nation goes into reversionism so
that the nation is about to be removed from the earth and its people going into
slavery. At that point when there is repentance then someone can pray and that
nation will be delivered. It has to be someone with the gift of communication.
The person with the gift of communication has to be in the supergrace bracket,
and he can pray and the nation will be delivered. We have seen the conditions
under which this was possible. We saw the people repenting when the fire came
down from heaven and they began to call out “Adonai [Jehovah] He is God” .Then,
after that was uttered by the people indicating their national repentance, Elijah
can go back and finish his prayer.
In verse 17 we have the beginning of
that prayer: “he prayed” — aorist middle indicative of proseuxomai. This means to offer prayer, and this is one of
those prayers with power “when it is operational” .In this particular prayer we
have an ingressive aorist. He began the prayer at Ahab’s palace. Three and a
half years later on Mount Carmel we have the culminative aorist of the same
verb, proseuxomai — he concluded the prayer.
In chapters 17 and 18 through verse 40 we have what happened during the
interim, what conditions that came into existence which caused the national
repentance that made it possible for the nation to be delivered — a nation about
to be destroyed from reversionism.
We are going to see the termination
of this prayer. It is based on the same principle. The whole buildup of James,
before James makes his final point in verses 19 and 20, is the fact that a
supergrace believer has capacity for freedom, capacity for life, capacity for
love, capacity for happiness, capacity for prosperity, capacity for grace,
capacity for adversity. And, add to it, capacity to be the man for the crisis.
He has the capacity to stand in the gap when his nation is about to go under.
That is the supergrace life and a supergrace believer in such time of national
apostasy practically stands alone. Everyone is in reversionism and does
everything from denying the existence of reversionism to denying the very
situation in which they find themselves. So Elijah’s prayer began by asking the
Lord to knock on the door. Knocking is divine discipline as a warning to the
individual believer, a warning of the coming of the sin unto death; to the
nation the warning of the coming of the fifth cycle of discipline.
“Elijah kept on being a man similar
in feelings, circumstances, and pressures to us, and he began to pray” — he
knew what it was to hurt; he knew what it was to be prosperous. His was the
prayer of the supergrace prophet, a believer who has the gift of communication
of doctrine, it was a prayer concerning national reversionism. Not only is it
an ingressive aorist for the initiation of that prayer for awakening discipline
to a reversionistic nation but the middle voice is an indirect middle, it
emphasises the agent producing the action — a righteous man, a supergrace
believer; Elijah with the gift of prophecy, a man who was prophet by office, a
man who had the power of communication, a man who had grown into supergrace.
The indicative mood is the reality of redeeming time in prayer when the nation
is disintegrating from reversionism.
The word “earnestly” is translated
as an adverb. It is thus totally incorrectly translated. This is the
instrumental singular of the noun proseuxh which means “by means of
prayer” .The word “that” is not found in the original, it is used to translated
an aorist infinitive. “That it might not rain” is actually an aorist active
infinitive of brexw which means to rain and to
bring prosperity, plus the negative. So, “by means of prayer he began to pray
not to send rain.” The aorist tense is constative. Then at the end of three and
a half years, a second proseuxomai, this time in the
culminative aorist. In answer to the first half of this prayer, “it rained not”
— aorist active indicative of brexw. And, again, the aorist
tense is a constative aorist. For a period of three and a half years every day
was alike; it didn’t rain.
Two doctrines are about to emerge.
James writes five chapters in order to make two points. One of the power of
prayer based on doctrine, and the second is the power of knowing doctrine and
communicating it so that someone can recover from reversionism.
“and it rained on the land by space
of.” There is no ‘by space of’ in the original. This is used as a device to
translate an accusative of the extent of time.
So we have: “Elijah was a human
being similar in feelings, circumstances and pressures to us, and by means of
prayer he began to pray not to send rain: and it did not rain on the land for
three and a half years.”
Verse 18 — “And he prayed,” aorist
active indicative of proseuxomai, but it is the same
morphology as the last one in the previous verse. But there is one difference —
the exegesis. They are both aorist active indicatives. The difference is in the
type of aorist. In verse 17 we had an ingressive aorist; in verse 18 we have a
culminative aorist. This is an interrupted prayer. It was begun in Ahab’s
palace in Samaria. Three and a half years later it was concluded on the top of
Mount Carmel. So in verse 18, “And he prayed” means the elapse of three and a
half years.
The word “again” is the adverb palin. “Again,” kai plus
palin means resumption. The active
voice indicates a supergrace believer redeeming time in prayer, as Job did — a
supergrace believer under pressure offering prayer for his nation. The
indicative mood is the reality of national deliverance through the prayer of
this supergrace believer.
“and the heaven gave rain” — we go
back to see it from 1 Kings 18.
Verse 40 — the people have repented.
Elijah immediately takes charge, not Ahab. Ahab never did take charge of
anything. Two people really ran the thing: either Jezebel his wife or Elijah
took charge. When things were going right, Elijah was in charge. When things
were going wrong, Jezebel was in charge. Now Elijah is in charge and, note that
when a supergrace believer who understands the principle of loving everyone, he
understands that love is first of all directed toward God — love of God under
category one, and that love toward the human race is a relaxed mental attitude,
not going around saying nice things about people. Under the principle of love
he loves the human race so much that he recognises under the laws of divine
establishment that there comes a time when certain members of the human race
must be eliminated to protect the spreading of spiritual rabies. A mad dog has
to be eliminated, and in the land for the last three and a half years there
have been a group of mad dogs. Now Elijah gives the command, and to show that
these people have repented and they do recognise Jesus Christ, the God of
Israel, please not: “Elijah said unto them, Take the prophets of Baal” — the
word ‘take’ is a qal perfect of tapas which
does not mean to take. It means to seize violently, capture; “let not one of
them escape.” He didn’t say that. This is the niphal perfect of malat, and it means “none are to be
spared.” It means no quarter. “And they took them” — qal imperfect of tapas and it means this time, “they were
seized violently.” “And Elijah brought them down to the brook, Kishon, and slew
them there.” The word for “slay” is the qal imperfect of shachat which means to cut the throat, to slaughter as you would an
animal. So we have the cutting of throats following the repentance of the
nation.
People who are bleeding heart do-gooders
always have a line called “loving everyone.” What we have here is Elijah
destroying traitors. There are several things that must be destroyed for the
preservation of the people, and as a demonstration for the love of the people
traitors ought to be executed and murderers ought to be executed.
They were executed, and that is
going to have repercussions for a long time to come. For one thing Jezebel
cannot preach sermons and her prophets could. And they have just been executed.
That means a lot of false teaching has gone down the drain.
Verse 41 — “And Elijah said unto
Ahab, Get thee up,” a qal imperative of alah
and it doesn’t mean to ‘get thee up’ at all, it means ‘Go up.’ Ahab hasn’t
said a thing so far and he is dumbfounded. Elijah is suggesting it is all over
his head and that he go up into the picnic grounds and have himself a ball,
because it is going to rain. Ahab hasn’t repented, he is absolutely no good. So
get him out of the way, he has no capacity, he is a reversionist. “Go up” is a
qal imperative. He did not give imperatives to the people. He gave instructions
but not imperatives. But to the king he says, Get up and go up. Then he tells
him what to do — two more qal imperatives: “eat and drink” .it means to eat and
banquet, have a party. That is all Ahab is capable of doing and God the Holy
Spirit has recorded what mediocrity really is — a man in a position of
leadership and authority and rulership who does not have the capability for
anything in life but something he can taste and something he can feel.
“for there is the sound of abundance
of rain”.
Verse 42 — “Ahab went up to eat and
to drink.” He did exactly as he was told. What did Elijah do? “But Elijah” —
this is an adversative waw — “went to
the top of Carmel; he cast himself down upon the earth, and put his face
between his knees.” The Hebrew doesn’t say that he cast himself down. We have
the qal imperfect of gahar which
doesn’t even mean to kneel down, it means to crouch down. He crouched down and
put his face between his knees.
Verse 43 — “And he said to his
servant,” the qal imperfect of amar means
he kept saying to his servant. But he didn’t say it to his servant because he
doesn’t have a servant. Naar is the
word and it means a young man, the son of the forsaken woman. “Go up now, look
toward the sea. And he went up, and he looked, and said, Nothing. And he said,
God again seven times” — these are all qal imperatives of shubh. The boy. of course, cannot enter into this type of prayer.
This follows the principle at the end of James 5:16 — “A prayer of a righteous
one has much power when it is operational.” This boy ran up to the top and down
seven times.
There is a principle here: You can
run up and down hills until you are out of breath, until you are exhausted. It
never gets the job done. God doesn’t need a bunch of people running around
hustling, God need believers with Bible doctrine in the soul. Elijah opens his
mouth as a supergrace believer and offers prayer, and the nation is saved.
People running up and down hills don’t save any nation.
Finally, on the seventh time up the
boy spotted the first cloud that had been seen in three and a half years.
Verse 44 — “Behold, there ariseth a
little cloud [little black cloud in the Hebrew] out from the sea, like a man’s
hand.” And he Elijah told him to get up and tell Ahab to get back in his
chariot and get out, otherwise he would never get off this hill for awhile.
Verse 45 — “… and there was a great
rain. And Ahab rode, and went to Jezreel.” The nation was delivered. That is the
whole story of this particular passage. But notice who couldn’t deliver:
Obadiah, probably still out looking for fodder for the horses and mules — a
reversionistic believer; Ahab, another reversionistic believer who reports to
his “boss,” Jezebel, when he gets back from the mountain. He is no man. A
person who is ruled by a woman is never a man. Male mouse is the best he can
do!
James 5:18 — “And he prayed — aorist active indicative of proseuxomai. The aorist tense is culminative, he finished his prayer.
Active voice: the supergrace believer stands in the gap, fulfilling the
principle of James 5:16 which is erroneously translated in the King James
version. It should read, “And the prayer of a righteous one [a supergrace type]
has much power when it is operational.” Here is the completion of an
operational prayer.
“he prayed again” — concluded his
prayer. The indicative mood means the prayer is going to be operational and has
much power; “and the heaven gave,” aorist active indicative of didomi. This is a second culminative aorist to show the
result. With it we have an accusative singular of u(etoj,
“rain,” the source of the prosperity of that land; “and the earth” — kai h( gh, literally, “and the land”; “brought forth” —
aorist active indicative of blastanw, “and the land germinated,
sprouted and produced,” referring to economic prosperity under and agricultural
economy; “and her fruit,” accusative singular of karpoj,
for production of the economy.
Translation: “And he offered prayer
again, and the heaven gave rain, and the land germinated, sprouted, produced
its production.”
Summary
1. here is an operational prayer of
a supergrace believer eliciting a grace response from God.
2. This prayer fulfills the
principle at the end of James 5:16 — “A prayer of a righteous one has much
power when it is operational.
3. The reversionistic nation on the
verge of catastrophe is delivered.
4. In place of the fifth cycle of
discipline and slavery God in grace provides national prosperity in which the
people of the nation have the opportunity of being evangelised — where that is
necessary — taking in the Word daily, recovering from reversionism, moving into
the area of the ECS and finally into the
supergrace life.
5. It was necessary for
reversionistic repentance before this prayer could become operational — 1 Kings
18:39.
I think that we have discovered how
different is the meaning of the passage we have been studying as to what it is
in the English. That holds out for the next two verses, the last of James
chapter five.
Verse 19 — “Brethren” refers to the
members of the family of God. This is a vocative plural from the noun a)delfoj. While it does mean “brother” it should be
translated “members of the family of God” .We as believers in the Lord Jesus
Christ have entered a new family at the point of salvation. We have believed in
Christ and this entire passage is for those who are born into His family. The
cross is the point of eternal salvation. The moment we believe in Jesus Christ
we receive immediately 36 things from God. One of these is the fact that we are
born into His family. God the first person of the Trinity, the Father, is from
then on responsible for us, and everything that is provided is provided by one
of the three members of the Trinity — the Father, the Son, or the Holy Spirit.
It is the objective of God in keeping us in time to bring us to the point of
supergrace, the point where He can share his happiness with us, the point where
He can pour out all the wonderful things He has for us. The only problem with
giving these things to us immediately is that we lack capacity. We simply do
not have the capacity for happiness, for blessing as God has provided it. But
in supergrace we will have capacity for freedom, capacity for life, capacity
for love, capacity for happiness, capacity for grace, capacity for prosperity
and capacity for adversity. There is no thing in life for which we do not have
perfect happiness, or capacity in happiness, or blessing for God. And every
believer has a choice to make. He can choose to go the supergrace route. All he
has to do is to be positive to doctrine every day — all kinds of doctrine, for
doctrine certainly varies in every situation. At the same time he can go
negative toward doctrine, and that is the beginning of the end, for this leads
into reversionism. Reversionism starts out in a very simple way: negative
volition toward Bible doctrine. This can be neglect of doctrine or antagonism
toward doctrine, or something in between. And it produces scar tissue on the left
bank of the soul. That opens up the vacuum and through the vacuum comes an
attack on Bible doctrine which in the heart — doctrine in the frame of
reference, doctrine in the vocabulary and categories, doctrine in norms and
standards, doctrine on the launching pad — and Satanic doctrine [doctrine of
demons] comes through and changes one’s standards, changes the frame of reference,
changes the vocabulary and the categories, and puts something else on the
launching pad — human viewpoint. This leads to a frantic search for happiness
that puts scar tissue on the right bank of the soul. What type of a frantic
search for happiness depends upon the trends at the time in the old sin nature.
If the trends are toward asceticism it will be one of self-denial. If the trend
is toward lasciviousness it will be one of living it up. There are many
different types of reversionism but there will be a frantic search for
happiness which puts scar tissue on the right bank of the soul. Then, in
addition to that, the emotion will revolt against the right lobe. This is why
people go Pentecostal or into the holy-roller movement, because they have a
trend toward asceticism, toward legalism, and their reversionism and neglect of
doctrine takes them into the realm of so-called divine healing, the tongues
crowd. In addition to that, other people choose the other way, depending upon
their trends. We have anything from monetary reversionism, phallic
reversionism, verbal reversionism, many different types of reversionism, but
they all are categories on the basis of the frantic search for happiness which
puts scar tissue on the right lobe. Then there is the beginning of the practice
of reverse process reversionism. As we have seen it at the beginning of our
chapter reverse process reversionism was rejecting the love for the Lord Jesus
Christ in category one and choosing again instead to serve mammon. It was
therefore the rejection of doctrine as taught by right pastor and choosing
instead an all-out go for money. Many times God wants to give the business man
money, and lots of money. There is nothing evil about money, nothing wrong with
money, nothing wrong with making money or having money, as long as the person
has the capacity for it. God has yet to find a businessman that He can treat in
the same manner that He treated the apostle Paul. He can trust him and give him
millions of dollars, and that person has the capacity for money. The principle
is that in business, in every facet of life, there are believers, and it is the
objective of God during the Church Age to pour out to the maximum to express
His total capacity for giving to someone who has the capacity. There is no
limitation on God but there is a limitation on capacity of the believer. So
this chapter is the climax of James, designed to pick up the mantle where James
started in chapter one. Remember the principle: Be not a hearer of the word
only, but be a doer of the word. To be a hearer of the word merely means to
have doctrine in the left lobe and it never goes any further, and therefore you
have an objective academic understanding of doctrine without the ability to
utilise it. But to be a doer of the word is to transfer that doctrine to the
human spirit as e)pignwsij
and then to
cycle it into the heart of the right lobe, into the frame of reference, into
the vocabulary and categories, into the norms and standards, into the launching
pad. And when this is accomplished doctrine in the launching pad makes you a
doer. Doctrine building the ECS makes you a doer; doctrine
as +H on the top floor of the ECS makes you a doer of the
word; and entrance into supergrace makes you a doer of the word. A doer of the
word isn’t someone who witnesses to a few people a day, hustles around a church
and spends time in prayer — the usual fundamentalist nonsense. These are all
important but they are all based upon capacity and the real issue of your life
is the very breath of your life which is Bible doctrine. Doctrine is more
important than the air you breath, doctrine is more important than anything you
do in life, doctrine is more important than any function in life. And when you
have doctrine, strangely enough, life isn’t all that bad, it becomes fantastic
because you have, then, a relationship with God in phase two whereby He is able
to pour out upon you everything He desires for you. God’s capacity is
unlimited; the believer’s capacity is limited by his lack of doctrine. When a
person chooses to neglect doctrine — not necessarily to reject, just neglect it
— then he takes the road to reversionism, and we begin now with this road to
reversionism which destroys capacity and makes it impossible for God to pour
out blessings designed for you in eternity past.
The road to reversionism is a tragic
road because it leads into several types of discipline. When you enter
reversionism there is divine discipline with the areas of carnality and the
other things that you do that are connected with your entrance into reversionism.
For example, the divine discipline in the field of drug addiction not only
makes the individual miserable but it also destroys his ability to recover, and
if you become a vegetable in this area you will depart from this life under the
sin unto death sooner or later, but you have no recovery possibilities unless
God works a miracle and restores some of the neurons of the brain.
In addition to divine discipline
there is illness and the sin unto death. The sin unto death is not dying grace,
it is miserable and horrible and monstrous. Once you are dying rebound no
longer becomes the answer but repentance, as we have seen.
“Brethren” is a reference to
believers in the Lord Jesus Christ. However, there is added in the Greek text a
pronoun, mou, and it should be
translated “my brethren” .This book is addressed to those who are members of
the family of God. Next we have the word “if,” and that is the conjunction e)an which introduces a third class condition. A third
class condition often means maybe yes, maybe no. The third class condition
always stresses your personal volition. There are several kinds of third class
conditions in the Greek, and in this case the third class condition represents
the more probable future. Because of the subjunctive in the protasis
uncertainty is implied, and this conditional clause anticipates many believers
of the Church Age entering into reversionism. In other words, the third class
condition “if” here says in effect that there will be a large number of
born-again believers, children of God, beneficiaries of grace, who will enter
into reversionism. And all you have to do is to neglect Bible doctrine and step
by step you will be in it. Eventually all reversionists who stay there die the
sin unto death, and it simply is not worth it to die that way because the sin
unto death is the exception to dying grace. You end up in the same place by the
manner of death is a part of the punishment.
“if any of you” — we now have a
little phrase which indicates only a certain category — tij e)n u(min, “any among you” or “any of you.” First of all we
have tij which is an enclitic
indefinite pronoun used to express a substantive idea in the general sense of a
category. In other words, we have a categorical use of this pronoun. Then we
have e)n plus the locative, and here
it should be translated “among you.” “My brethren, if any one among you.” This
“if” is the probabilities of the future as the Church Age continues. There will
be born again individuals in every generation and certain of those individuals
will neglect their spiritual food, they will reject Bible doctrine from the
start in some cases, they will be negative toward doctrine. As a result they
will enter into reversionism.
“do err” — this is an old English
word and we no longer use it. It is the aorist passive subjunctive of planaw. Planaw means to delude, to seduce or to wander from.
It has three legitimate meanings and all of them are pertinent here. In the
active voice it often means to cause to wander, but we have the passive voice
here. In the passive voice planaw means to go astray, to be
deluded, to be deceived, to be seduced, or to wander from the right way. This
is a constative aorist. That means it gathers into one ball of wax everything
involved in going from a normal Christian experience to reversionism. That
includes negative volition toward doctrine. Every time you are indifferent to
or neglect the daily intake of Bible doctrine. It also includes the frantic
search for happiness, it includes the changing of the heart or the right lobe,
substituting what doctrine you have for false teaching. It also includes the
emotion revolt of the soul. It includes every act of reverse process
reversionism that leads to divine discipline and ultimately the sin unto death.
This passage in conclusion is dealing with the sin unto death and how all of
that can be changed.
So we have, “My brethren, if anyone
among you has been deluded.” The passive voice indicates that the believer
receives delusion from reversionism. The subjunctive mood goes with the third
class condition.
“from the truth” — the preposition a)po plus the ablative of a)lhqeia. This means “from the source of the doctrine” — Bible teaching.
“and one convert” — the aorist
active subjunctive of e)pistrefw
does not
mean to convert. E)pi means “around” in this
case; strefw means to turn. It means to
turn back or to turn around, but it is used generally for changing someone’s
mind. The subject is the enclitic indefinite pronoun tij and it refers to the fact that a reversionist is
involved.
“someone” — a second enclitic
particle tij. It is an indefinite
pronoun to indicate a category. “Someone” refers to a pastor-teacher or some
supergrace believer where there is no pastor-teacher, some supergrace believer
who has contact with a reversionist. And if anything this is just as important
as witnessing, but as almost any believer priest can witness only a supergrace
believer can actually fulfill this passage. “Anyone” refers to a pastor-elder
communicating doctrine from the pulpit; “anyone refers to a supergrace believer
who is hanging around with reversionists and they give him the opportunity of
saying something that turns around the whole thing. The subject, then, is the
pastor elder or any supergrace or growing believer.
“him” — the accusative singular of a)utoj, a very intensive pronoun. In its intensity it
emphasises someone who is in reversionism and is suffering in reversionism.
Translation: “My brethren, if anyone
among you has been seduced, has wandered from the doctrine, and someone turns
him around.”
Turning around here is simply saying
something, communicating something; it refers to communication. You communicate
something that turns him from negative to positive — in any of the three
categories: the general divine discipline category, illness, or dying. In all
of these categories there is the importance of the changing of the attitude.
Verse 20 — “Let him know.” There is
no pronoun here for “him.” All we have is the present active imperative of the
verb ginwskw, and it should be
translated “Keep on knowing.” It is a second person plural, not a third person
singular, and therefore it should be translated that way. After this verb we
have a conjunction o(ti, generally translated
“that.” The content of what we should know follows — “he which converts,”
aorist active participle of e)pistrefw, “the one restoring,” “the
one having turned back.” This refers to the supergrace believer or the pastor
who turns around the reversionistic believer, called here “the sinner” .The
word which is used is in the accusative singular, a(martwloj which refers to one who deviates from the path designed by God, the
path of virtue. Therefore it refers to a reversionist. A reversionist wallows
in sin, therefore it becomes a perfect description. So he is turning back a
believer who is called the sinner, the one who deviates from the path of
virtue. And he restores him “from the error of his way” — e)k plus planh which means delusion or
deceit or error — “from the error of his way [reversionism].”
“shall save” — future active
indicative of swzw. Swzw
in the
future tense always means a deliverance, and in this case it is not a future
tense in the sense we have it in the English, this is a gnomic future. A gnomic
future is used to state a fact which can be expected under conditions specified
— restoration. So the gnomic future indicates it is always possible for a
believer who is under the sin unto death to recover, provided he repents and
goes back to his original authority. The gnomic future is used to state the
fact then under which the person can be delivered. The active voice: the supergrace
believer or a pastor-elder produces the action — can actually pray the prayer
or communicate the information that causes the reversionist to turn around.
This is necessary for national recovery. The indicative mood is the reality of
deliverance.
“he shall deliver a soul” — the
accusative singular indicates the importance of the soul in phase two. The soul
is what makes us alive — yuxh. Here is the individual
involved. This indicates that your soul was saved at salvation, your soul has
the capacity for great things from God; but you will never know the great
things from God that He has for you if you go into reversionism. reversionism
maligns God in several ways. First of all, it rejects His food. Spiritual food
is Bible doctrine on a daily basis; reversionism is blasphemy. Secondly, God
has for every believer without exception the most fantastic blessings, but if
there is no capacity these things have to be held up. God wants to give. God
wants to pour out in an unrestrained way blessing upon blessing of every kind,
but He cannot, pour out the various categories of blessing because the
individual believer cannot receive it, he has absolutely no capacity. It is
neglect of Bible doctrine that destroys everything. Then there is the tragedy
is that here are souls who have been saved, souls that will live with God
forever, and the soul is the battle ground for the angelic conflict in phase
two. And here, in effect, is an individual who rejects all the blessing that
God has for him — rejection because he has no capacity. You say in effect, I
don’t want your stinking blessings God, I don’t care for them at all. I’ll do
it all my way.
Everyone wants to be happy, but the
believer has to face the issue: Who is going to declare the way in which he
will reach happiness? The supergrace life and the road to supergrace, daily
intake of the Word, is God’s way. Then you can choose your own way: I’ll do it
my way. And you always wind up in reversionism, and even when God permits you
to have certain things associated with happiness they are never a blessing to
you because they are always linked to divine discipline and misery and lack of
capacity.
“from death” — preposition e)k plus the ablative of qanatoj. Qanatoj is used here for physical
death; discipline, maximum discipline for the believer.
God offers you one or the other. He
offers you the greatest happiness — sharing His happiness — or He offers you a
death of disgrace. The moment that you are born again and you enter the family
of God you have to decide which way you are going to go. Are you going to die
the death of disgrace or are you going to have the happiness that God can give
you from His perfect character.
To be the recipient of all the
things that God has for you it requires doctrine today, tomorrow, the next day,
the next, and so on; doctrine filling the right lobe, doctrine in the ECS, doctrine leading to supergrace. Under supergrace God has the
opportunity He wants with every member of His family — the ability to give on
the basis of His character, the ability to give unlimited, the ability to give
and have it appreciated because of a capacity. Here is the sad thing, that
believers in the Lord Jesus Christ have a choice of one of two things: to live
a miserable life which is generally divine discipline, or to go the road to
supergrace which is the road of doctrine.
The doctrine of the sin unto death
1. The sin unto death is the maximum
punitive discipline for the reversionistic believer. This discipline is the
only exception to the dying grace for the believer. The object of this
discipline is the reversionist and the objective of this discipline is to get
the reversionist to change his mind. The sin unto death includes maximum
misery, maximum pressure, terminating in physical death. In the sin unto death
the believer always dies before his time, and he dies apart from dying grace —
Psalm 118:17,18; 1 John 5:16.
2. However, the sin unto death does
not mean loss of salvation. 2 Timothy 2:12,13.
3. Reversionism is the cause for the
sin unto death, always — Jeremiah 9:16; 44:12; Philippians 3:18,19; Revelation
3:16.
4. There are four reason why
Christians die physically.
a) Their work is
finished. This is the normal death, and this has great dying grace. You have
filled the purpose for which you remain in this life;
b) Some special case,
like martyrdom; something that turns the tide. There is a special type of death under God’s plan where an individual
dies and as a result of this there is a change in history, a change in trends;
c) The superimposition
of human over divine volition — suicide;
d) The sin unto death in
which a believer dies horribly and miserably apart from dying grace. In other
words, this is the greatest discipline that can come to any believer.
Reversionism is the cause.
5. Case histories of the sin unto
death — selected as a variety. It isn’t a certain kind of sin that puts you
under the sin unto death but reversionism.
a) A case of monetary
reversionism — Acts 5:1-10.
b) The case of phallic
reversionism — 1 Corinthians 5:1-5, a case of incest which was a manifestation
of reversionism. Not everyone that commits incest dies the sin unto death.
c) Ritual reversionism:
participation in the communion service without rebound — 1 Corinthians
11:30,31. A lot of people may forget to rebound before a communion service
somewhere but if they are in reversionism and do it, they’ve had it.
d) Mental attitude
reversionism, which in this case is a sub part of it: bleeding heart reversionism. This is a person who has
misconstrued the doctrine of love everyone and fails to kill an enemy. This is
the case of king Saul — 1 Samuel 13:9-14; 1 Chronicles 10:13,14. He rejected Bible
doctrine and refused to kill the enemy.
e) A case of national
reversionism in foreign policy. This is the reversionistic foreign policy on
the part of king Hezekiah — Isaiah 30:1-3; 31:1-3. And in Isaiah 38 we have the
result of reversionistic foreign
policy. Hezekiah was dying with his face to the wall, and he called in Isaiah
who prayed for him and turned around and walked out. And when Isaiah walked by
the sun dial
God said to go on back and tell him he has recovered and will have the
opportunity of GAPing it back to supergrace. That is antiestablishment
reversionism.
f) Verbal reversionism.
We have some reversionistic believers maligning their right pastor, the apostle
Paul — judging him, gossiping about him, criticising him under verbal
reversionism. The result was that they died the sin unto death — 1 Timothy
1:19,20.
6. Reversion recovery eliminates the
discipline and removes all sins involved to that point — 2 Corinthians 2:5-10;
James 5:15, 20.
7. The cancellation of the sin unto
death involves at least four factors.
a) When you are in the
brackets of maximum discipline, repentance — James 5:14,16. That means a change
of mental attitude.
b) Rebound for those
sins not under the bracket of dying or illness — 1 Corinthians 11:31.
c) Whichever way you go
to get to the point of being forgiven — rebound or repentance — you finally
arrive at the place where you are ready to start GAPing it. Back to the daily
function of GAP, as per Hebrews 6:1-6.
d) The erection of the ECS — Ephesians 4:24 — and entrance into the supergrace life — James
4:5-8.
“and shall hide a multitude of sins”
— the future active indicative of kaluptw.
Kaluptw
means to cover. It is a gnomic future used to state the fact of the forgiveness
of sins if you are under these two categories: if you are seriously ill in
which you are totally miserable, or if you are dying the sin unto death, which
is also total misery.
“a multitude” indicates the
accumulation of sin under reversionism — plhqoj,
which means many, many, a large number “of sins” — the genitive plural of hamartia indicates that all of these sins have taken you away
from the road to blessing. it is in the plural and it refers to unconfessed
sins, accumulated sins in the last
stages of reversionism.
Translation: “Keep knowing that the
one having turned back, or having restored the reversionist from the delusion
of his way, shall deliver a soul from death [sin unto death], and cover a large
number of sins.”
In other words, there is no greater
manifestation of God’s grace than when you are in the last stages of this life,
and you are dying before God’s plan says that you should die, and you repent,
then you recover total healing, total forgiveness, and you are free once more
to start choosing Bible doctrine every day. If you choose Bible doctrine every
day you will move into a place of great blessing. If you do not, the same thing
again, and eventually check out — the sin unto death. You have choice to make.