Read James 5:1-6:

1  Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you.

He is not here speaking to rich Christians, of whom there were a bound to be a few in the congregation, but not many.  He speaks of judgment to come, and we know that judgment that produces howling and weeping and misery is certain for the lost.  So here James is speaking to a class of people that oppress the poor.  These are the sort of people who might think that the Christian religion is a “religion of the poor,” and unworthy of their regard.

2   Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are motheaten.

One of the first things mentioned are garments.  Why so?  In the ancient world, your garments were considered part of your riches.   Wealthy people still feel that way today.  That’s why rich women will pay $5,000 for a Vera Wang designer dress and rich mean will pay thousands of dollars for a silk Armani suit.  In ancient days, more so than today, people were judged by the clothes they wore and wealthy people prided themselves in owning expensive furs and purple silks and garments of fine cloth; they were as good as money back then.

Examples:  When kings brought gifts to Solomon, they brought gold, silver, and garments, among other things.  In II Kings 5, the king of Syria gave to King Jehoram of Israel ten changes of raiment.  Naaman attempted to bribe Elisha the prophet with gold and changes of raiment.  Changes of fine raiment were also considered a kingly gift to subjects.  In Genesis, upon revealing his identity to his brothers, Joseph gives all of them changes of raiment.  Clothing was clearly a commodity, and so to say to rich people, “Your garments are motheaten,” was a great insult, and a disheartening things to say.

3   Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days.

Most of what separated the rich from the poor was in fact their gold and silver.  These things they lorded over poor people.  But the Lord says these things are vain.  And so, James is condemning the rich for the very things they pride in, the things they trust in, are vain things, destined for corruption and destruction.  Those who put their trust in such things are likewise destined for corruption and destruction.

The scripture says, “…and the rust of them shall be a witness against you…”  Matthew Henry says, “All idolized treasures will soon perish, except as they will rise up in judgment against their possessors.”  When the day of judgment comes, the rich will have only their gold and silver and raiment, and behold, that which they put their trust in will be found to be corrupted, rusted, cankered.  In such a foundation there can be no salvation.  The decay is a witness against those who held false hope.  If your foundation is rotting, all that you built upon it will be destroyed, all of your efforts, your gifts, your achievements.  The only incorruptible basis for salvation in to trust in the shed blood of Jesus Christ.

4   Behold, the hire of the labourers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth: and the cries of them which have reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of sabaoth.

It has long been believed that the rich made their living on the backs of the poor.  And this was undoubtedly true most of the time.  This was not a capitalistic economy in a democracy, such as we have today.  For one thing, money wasn’t used the way it is today and most poor people had very little of it.  There were no labor laws, no minimum wage, no Bureau of Labor.  Poor people were taken advantage of and landowners could maximize their profits by withholding wages any arbitrary reason.  But the scripture says that the money that they withheld, cries out from their purses and the Lord hears it, meaning the Lord is well aware of who is paying fairly and who is not.  The Lord also hears the cries of the oppressed.  When you wrong someone, and their soul cries, the Lord hears it, especially the cries of His children.

5   Ye have lived in pleasure on the earth, and been wanton; ye have nourished your hearts, as in a day of slaughter.

There are two meanings here.  “Ye have nourished your hearts, as in a day of slaughter” refers to a day of feasting, meaning these people feasted every day.  Remember the rich man who was described as faring sumptuously every day?  That was no compliment.  James is declaring that the rich have oppressed the poor and thrown parties with the money and riches that they made off the backs of the poor.

It also refers to a continual fattening up; the rich go on feasting and drinking and reveling right up to the day of judgment, unaware of the fate that awaits them, just a cow will go on eating grains even to the moment of its being slaughtered.  It refers to the seemingly blissful unawareness the rich have that the Lord is angry with them, angry with their sin, that condemnation awaits them.

6   Ye have condemned and killed the just; and he doth not resist you.

Matthew Henry: “The just may be condemned and killed; but when such suffer by oppressors, this is marked by God. Above all their other crimes, the Jews had condemned and crucified that Just One who had come among them, even Jesus Christ the righteous.”

It was common in those times for the rich to view the poor as less than human, less than deserving of life and liberty, and so whenever it was expedient to do so, the rich could also oppress the poor by leveling charges against them, accusing them, having them imprisoned, or even executed.

In Jesus day, the leaders of the Jews, who were undoubtedly well to do, found the ministry of Jesus, calling them to repentance and challenging their legalistic traditions, to be troublesome.  Rather than engage in a real debate with such a man, they plotted to kill him and succeeded, so they thought, in silencing him by having him crucified.  But just as this scripture describes, Jesus did not resist them.  He let them crucify him.  This is to be a lesson in meekness to the Christian as well.  In the face of such wanton oppression, what is a Christian to do?

Now read verses 7 –  12:

7   Be patient therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and latter rain.  8   Be ye also patient; stablish your hearts: for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh.

Now James addresses the poor.  Matthew Henry: “Consider him that waits for a crop of corn; and will not you wait for a crown of glory? If you should be called to wait longer than the husbandman, is not there something more worth waiting for? In every sense the coming of the Lord drew nigh, and all his people’s losses, hardships, and sufferings, would be repaid.”

James here is making a comparison.  Look how long the farmer has to wait for this crops, a whole season long, toiling all the way.  In the end he received the precious fruit of the earth.  The Lord tarries a while, and if it seems to take a long time, then it must by reason be something far, far more precious than fruit.  Indeed, he says the coming of the Lord draweth nigh.  That means it’s coming soon, so be patient.   Soon the Lord will set all to right, and avenge His children the wrongs done to them, all toil repaid many times over.  But why does it seem to take so long?

Again, Matthew Henry: “Men count time long, because they measure it by their own lives; but all time is as nothing to God; it is as a moment. To short-lived creatures a few years seem an age; but Scripture, measuring all things by the existence of God, reckons thousands of years but so many days.” Our minds are locked in temporal thoughts.  Everything is measured by years, by months, by seasons, because that is how our lives are measured.  But God, and the things of God, and the actions of God, are not to be measured so.  All the drama and action and history of men is but a moment to Him; He exist quite outside of time.  He is just as conscious of every waking moment of Adam, the first man, as He is presently conscious of the last moment of every life that is, was, or ever will be.  He exists not just everywhere, but at every time, all the time, always the same.

9   Grudge not one against another, brethren, lest ye be condemned: behold, the judge standeth before the door.

Here he is not speaking of holding grudges against one another, although certainly we shouldn’t do that either.  Rather, staying in the context of the scripture, being patient, he means don’t trouble yourself and trouble each other like those who are condemned.  Think about it: when you are lost, every wrong demands immediate action!  There is no patience for redemption or revenge in the heart of the lost.  There is no looking forward to a day when all will be set aright.  Christians will have their quarrels, but we must always remember that the Lord is coming soon and He will set everything the way it should be.  James says, “Behold, the judge standeth before the door.”  Jesus is just waiting for the Father to tell him to go, go collect His bride, go collect the church.  So rather than be preoccupied with earthly concerns and earthly justice, be patient for the coming of the Lord and endure those hardships in faith.  God is our judge, and to Him we must make our plea, and then wait patiently.

As Christians, in other words, we ought to have a different view of our troubles.  This is a book of practical advice to Christians, to believers.  One of the overarching themes, then, in all of New Testament scripture as well as in this particular epistle, is that we develop the eternal viewpoint.  This is the opposite of the temporal viewpoint, which is the viewpoint of the world.  To the world, all things are measured in units of time, seasons, years, lives of men.  Needs are immediate, and immediate things we find needful.  In the temporal view, we object to patience, insisting that wrongs must be righted now or repelled with all vigor.  But in the eternal view, all that we have today will one day crumble to dust, and what will really matter then?  In the eternal view, what will count about our trials and troubles is not how we were able to figure them out or how we were able to avenge them, but rather did we endure them with godly patience.  The writer gives an example now:

10   Take, my brethren, the prophets, who have spoken in the name of the Lord, for an example of suffering affliction, and of patience. 11   Behold, we count them happy which endure. Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord; that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy.

Matthew Henry: “God brought about things in Job’s case, so as plainly to prove that he is very pitiful and of tender mercy. This did not appear during his troubles, but was seen in the event, and believers now will find a happy end to their trials. Let us serve our God, and bear our trials, as those who believe that the end will crown all.”

Job suffered a lifetime of trouble in only a short time.  The Lord allowed this to happen to test him, and also to demonstrate that for those who trust in the Lord, the end is a happy one.  We are to trust in the Lord for our happiness.  It may not come in this life, and for that we are not to complain.  Justice may have to wait, and for that would should not murmur.  Only in the eternal view of life is this possible.  Matthew Henry says, “Our eternal happiness is safe if we trust to him: all else is mere vanity, which soon will be done with for ever.”

Demonstrating this kind of godly patience pleases the Lord, else He would not ask us to do it.  And the scripture tells us that without faith it is impossible to please God.  Let’s face it.  This optimistic everything-will-be-alright philosophy is exactly what the world ridicules.  This is what, to them, makes us look ridiculous and incredible.  Put yourself in Job’s shoes.  How, with everything crashing in around you and all that you hold dear being ripped and torn away, can you endure with patience, remaining true to God?  It’s simple.  With faith.  If you’re having trouble being patient in the Lord, your faith is lagging.  And there’s a simple remedy for that, too: prayer.  We shall see.

12   But above all things, my brethren, swear not, neither by heaven, neither by the earth, neither by any other oath: but let your yea be yea; and your nay, nay; lest ye fall into condemnation.

Today, using cuss words and making solemn oaths seem to be very much and altogether two different things.  But in ancient times, this was not so.  What we call swear words are corruptions and deviations of what used to be the time honored practice of swearing oaths.  People would say, “By God!”  Or the more reverent or fearful would say, “By George!” Have you ever heard someone say, “I’ll be damned if such and such….”  That’s an oath.  Most of the time, people who use them aren’t really serious about what they are saying.  That goes back to our earlier discussion about saying things out of habit and not meaning them.  But with God, there is no such thing as, “I didn’t mean it.”  That’s not to say God doesn’t make allowance for figures of speech, but rather that God takes words seriously.  Words are serious things.  This world we live in tries to undermine and obscure the meaning of words like love, marriage, sin, etc.  But if words were arbitrary things, the bible would have no meaning, the scriptures would have no authority.  God wants us to pay attention to the words that are coming out of our mouths.  Remember, this was much discussed in Chapter 3.

Firstly, it is vanity to swear oaths for every little thing that happens to us.  We are not master of our own destinies, let alone that of others.  We have little power to enforce oaths to begin with.  Then to apply them to the mundane things of life, our temporal struggles, our trials and tribulations; it is useless and in fact offensive to the Lord.  Swearing is more often a sign of impatience.  It’s easier in the heat of the moment to say, “Blast it!” than to solemnly reflect on God’s goodness and eternal purposes.

Secondly, it is sinful.  Matthew Henry says this: “The sin of swearing is condemned; but how many make light of common profane swearing! Such swearing expressly throws contempt upon God’s name and authority. This sin brings neither gain, nor pleasure, nor reputation, but is showing enmity to God without occasion and without advantage It shows a man to be an enemy to God, however he pretends to call himself by his name, or sometimes joins in acts of worship. But the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.”   See that he notes, “[it] brings neither gain, nor pleasure, nor reputation…without occasion and without advantage.”  What does this describe?  Vanity.  Sinful vanity.

Thirdly, there is no need for it whatsoever.  Be slow to speak, says the Bible.  And when you do speak, let your speech be plain and true.  Your conversation and testimony should be such that there is no need to back up your words with additional oaths and such.  The force of your measured words should carry their own weight, through honesty and earnest.  Oaths are usually not the blessing of great men, but the desperate and ignorant murmurs of vain men.

Now read verses 13 – 18:

13   Is any among you afflicted? let him pray. Is any merry? let him sing psalms.

Matthew Henry: “In a day of affliction nothing is more seasonable than prayer. The spirit is then most humble, and the heart is broken and tender. It is necessary to exercise faith and hope under afflictions; and prayer is the appointed means for obtaining and increasing these graces.”

The Lord means for us to turn to Him in times of trouble and affliction.  But likewise are we to pray to Him in times of merriment and joy.  Psalms were, in their form, prayers.  If you’ll notice, many of the hymns we sing are prayers.  “Pass me not, O gentle Savior.”  “Blessed be the name of the Lord.”  “You’re the Best Thing.”

So the scriptures are stating here that prayer is the appointed means by which to commune with God and receive His graces and submit one’s petitions, in sickness and in health, in good times and in bad.

14   Is any sick among you? let him call for the elders of the church; and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord: 15   And the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up; and if he have committed sins, they shall be forgiven him.

Matthew Henry: “Observe, that the saving of the sick is not ascribed to the anointing with oil, but to prayer. In a time of sickness it is not cold and formal prayer that is effectual, but the prayer of faith.”

Once again, it is prayer by which we turn to the Lord in time of sickness.  Some even teach that the anointing to oil was an outward sign of the gift of healing, which was still in force at the time; and that since the gift of healing is no longer in force, neither is the anointing with oil.  Whether you believe that or not, the oil has nothing to do with it.  We petition the Lord for healing, one for another, through faith.  But also included in this holy prescription is the matter of sin, which is the source of all suffering.

Matthew Henry says this: “The great thing we should beg of God for ourselves and others in the time of sickness is, the pardon of sin. Let nothing be done to encourage any to delay, under the mistaken fancy that a confession, a prayer, a minister’s absolution and exhortation, or the sacrament, will set all right at last, where the duties of a godly life have been disregarded.”

The forgiveness of inward sin goes hand in hand with the curing of outward illness.  Imagine if you were steeped in a certain sin and were also suffering from an illness.  If God heals you without you repenting of your sin, without you begging forgiveness of your sin, then to what avail has this comfort been afforded you?  Indeed, the vanity of mind to which we are so predisposed might lead us to believe that God has merely winked at our sin and let it by.  But the time of such ignorance is passed, the scriptures teach us!  Ask not favors of the Lord, when you are bent on consuming His blessings upon your own lust.  We just spoke of this in the last chapter.  Furthermore, when praying for healing for someone, we should pray that the Lord deal with that individual about their sin.  This is borne out in the next verse.

16   Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.

Notice that the two phrases go together:  confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another; and that they are linked for a common purpose, that ye may be healed.  So the prescription for healing goes further.  This matter of confessing one’s faults to one another, however, is a much abused notion in certain circles.

In the Roman Catholic system, for example, it is believed that one must confess one’s sins to a priest in order to receive absolution of one’s sins.  But there is no basis in scripture for this.  Quite plainly, it says to confess you “faults one to another”, denoting two things: 1) a peer to peer level of communication, not a division between clergy and laity; and 2) it is not talking about individual sins.  Only God should hear your sins.  He already knows them.

It’s one thing to tell a brother, “I’ve been having trouble with my prayer life, lately.  Will you pray for me?”  “I haven’t been guarding my thought life, lately; would you pray for me, brother?”  “My faith is feeling weak, lately, sister; would you pray for me?”  But it’s quite another things to say: “Brother, I have something awful to confess; the other night I was at the movies and I saw such an such and it made me have thoughts of such and such….etc.”   We don’t need to hear that!  Your pastor doesn’t need to hear that.  Going to a person to confess your individual sins only circumvents you taking them to the Lord.  Rather, we are to share the faults and idle habits that burden us, that weaken our faith and compromise our obedience, in a general sense, that the person might have a little more direction in praying for you.  To go into detail can be a hindrance and invite judgment, contempt, and discord.  So be very careful about applying this scripture.

Whatever the case, when you pray for healing, whether for yourself or the brethren, pray also for them to overcome the faults and failings in their walk with the Lord.

17   Elias was a man subject to like passions as we are, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain: and it rained not on the earth by the space of three years and six months. 18   And he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain, and the earth brought forth her fruit.

This is one of the more extreme examples of the power of prayer.  One might think that Elijah was an extraordinary human being, unlike us.  But the bible says he was just like you and me, faced the same uncertainties, had the same worries and concerns.  But look how God used him.  Looked how God honored his fervent prayer.  The point?  Prayer will avail much, if done in faith, and when accompanied by a self searching that seeks to root out sin in our life as fervently as we desire the object of our prayer itself.

For example, everyone wants to stop having cancer.  But does everyone want to stop sinning?  Do you have as fervent and urgent desire to please God as you do to be healed of a sickness?

Now read verses 19 – 20:

19   Brethren, if any of you do err from the truth, and one convert him;  20   Let him know, that he which converteth the sinner from the error of his way shall save a soul from death, and shall hide a multitude of sins.

Now there is a place for intervention in the case of open sin.  No longer is James talking about secret sin, sin that needs to be confessed to be known.  If a brother is in open sin, and one converts that brother back to the righteous path, that person may even save that brother from death.  Again, James is talking to believers, so there’s no reason to believe he is talking specifically of salvation.  However, he may be including the possibility of a falsely professing Christian.  Sometimes, a body must be spoken to and admonished to search one’s self and see whether one is truly in the faith.  And if that person realizes that they’ve been living a lie, that they had heretofore only been pretending to be a Christian, and that person becomes saved; then in this case the concerned brother will have been saved him from ultimate death, the second death.   While we should not assume or pronounce that someone is unsaved based on their actions (see Chapter 4), when we see someone err from the faith we must be diligent and careful in treating with that brother, for they may be in a most precarious state spiritually, maybe even eternally.  Love and patience and kindness and much prayer must accompany such an intervention.  In ministering to an erring brother or sister, there is no room for belligerence, for hot words, for arguments, for judgments.  We should how remember how merciful God is, and how merciful He has been to us.

Matthew Henry: “For six thousand years He has been multiplying pardons, and yet his free grace is not tired nor grown weary. Certainly Divine mercy is an ocean that is ever full and ever flowing. May the Lord give us a part in this abundant mercy, through the blood of Christ, and the sanctification of the Spirit.”