“All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.” Romans 3.23
Call to worship:
Lord, we seek to meet you through praise and prayer.
Let our praise be prayer and our prayer be praise.
HYMN: STF 83 – Praise my soul, the king of heaven
Praise my soul, the king of heaven;
To his feet thy tribute bring,
Ransomed, healed, restored, forgiven,
Who like thee his praise should sing?
Praise him! Praise him!
Praise him! Praise him!
Praise the everlasting King!
Praise him for his grace and favour
To his people in distress;
Praise him, still the same for ever,
Slow to chide and swift to bless.
Praise him! Praise him!
Praise him! Praise him!
Glorious in his faithfulness.
Father-like he tends and spares us;
Well our feeble frame he knows;
In his hands he gently bears us,
Rescues us from all our foes.
Praise him! Praise him!
Praise him! Praise him!
Widely as his mercy flows.
Angels in the height adore him;
Ye behold him face to face;
Sun and moon, bow down before him
Dwellers all in time and space.
Praise him! Praise him!
Praise him! Praise him!
Praise with us the God of grace!
Henry Francis Lyte (1793-1847)
Prayers of praise and thanksgiving
Loving, awesome, almighty, inspiring, comforting, parent God, we praise you.
We praise you with songs of praise, let us make music from our hearts in adoration of you.
We praise you for your awesomeness. You are our sustainer. Direct our paths so that your will may be done, through the power of your inclusive and all-encompassing love. Strengthen us and sustain us to follow that path, to seek justice and to defend the oppressed. Guide us, O God, to engage with our communities and tune into the needs of your global family. Walk with us on the path of justice that we may protest against the wrongs of this world and live our your love for all to see. Amen
Thank you, Lord, for giving us the gift of prayer.
Thank you for the comfort and joy it brings;
for the loneliness it fights,
and for the courage and determination it gives us.
Thank you, Lord, for answered prayer.
Thank you for the times we have been granted our heart’s desire,
and for the times we have not,
when we have had to learn that our ways are not yours.
Thank you, Lord, for giving us the gift of prayer.
Amen.
Reading: Psalm 124 (NIVUK)
A song of ascents. Of David.
If the Lord had not been on our side—
let Israel say—
if the Lord had not been on our side
when people attacked us,
they would have swallowed us alive
when their anger flared against us;
the flood would have engulfed us,
the torrent would have swept over us,
the raging waters
would have swept us away.
Praise be to the Lord,
who has not let us be torn by their teeth.
We have escaped like a bird
from the fowler’s snare;
the snare has been broken,
and we have escaped.
Our help is in the name of the Lord,
the Maker of heaven and earth.
Hymn: STF 523 – It’s me (it’s me) it’s me, O Lord
Prayer of confession:
God of mercy and forgiveness,
we confess that we have been proud and arrogant,
selfish and greedy, hateful and violent.
We have neglected your will,
ignored your truth and resisted your Spirit.
We have harmed ourselves, hurt others, and dishonoured you.
Forgive us, O God, and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
Restore to us the joy of your salvation
and renew a right spirit within us.
[silence]
God of grace and love,
your forgiveness is freely given to us through the cross of Christ.
Thank you that you do not reject us in our weakness but welcome us;
you do not leave us in our bondage but set us free by your power.
Help us to receive your forgiveness with gratitude and humility,
and to share it with others with generosity and kindness.
Amen.
Reading: James 5.13-20 (NIVUK)
The prayer of faith
Is anyone among you in trouble? Let them pray. Is anyone happy? Let them sing songs of praise. Is anyone among you ill? Let them call the elders of the church to pray over them and anoint them with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise them up. If they have sinned, they will be forgiven. Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.
Elijah was a human being, even as we are. He prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the land for three and a half years. Again he prayed, and the heavens gave rain, and the earth produced its crops.
My brothers and sisters, if one of you should wander from the truth and someone should bring that person back, remember this: whoever turns a sinner from the error of their way will save them from death and cover over a multitude of sins.
REFLECTION
Hands up – who wants to be like Elijah? Who wants to be able to pray with that much power and fervour that even the weather does what we ask? As one commentary I read said, “Good luck convincing the congregation that Elijah was ‘a human being like us’”![1]
Yet in so many ways we long to have prayer with that level of effectiveness. We pray that there will be peace – Ukraine, Gaza, now Lebanon… and countless other conflicts across the world … and yet war rages, lives are needlessly lost and disputes go unresolved. We pray that there will be an end to the destruction of the world through climate change, but still there is money to be made and convenience to be had in using fossil fuels. We pray that friends and family will recover from sickness and ill health, and yet some live with chronic conditions and, sadly, some die.
How, then, can we approach a passage like this?
The overarching theme of James in this passage is to encourage prayer. Pray when in trouble. Pray when happy. Pray when someone is sick. And the purpose of all these prayers is to combat sin – that state of being in opposition to the will of God.
I think that purpose is obvious if ‘in trouble’: pray that you will not fall into sin, or that you will be rescued from the sinful state in which you find yourself.
It is also not so difficult to understand when offering prayers of praise: we have been rescued from sin by Christ on the cross – there is much to praise God for!
And sickness? How does praying for someone who is sick combat sin?
In our modern age we do struggle with the biblical linking of sickness and sin. We can dismiss it as a naive understanding of illness at the time – that belief that you are only ill because you have sinned. Over the centuries this has led to much abuse of power from the church. The story of Jesus healing the blind man in John 9 is worth re-reading in this light: the man was thought to have been a sinner from birth because of his blindness, and even his parents would not stand up for him for fear of being cast out from the synagogue by association. Ultimately the man declares, ‘All I know is that I was blind and now I can see.’ Jesus healed regardless of the man’s faith.
So we can disassociate sin from causing sickness… but both are isolating, and both expose vulnerabilities.
Think of the people you know – or know of – who have become ill or housebound and then no-one visits. Particularly as time passes they can feel cut off from the communities they have known and loved, and thus more and more isolated. It is sometimes said that when you are ill you know who your friends are. This may even be you today: you are in my prayers as I write, and I encourage you to call out (as James suggests) for the elders of the church to visit, pray over you and anoint you with oil.
But similarly, sin – wrongdoing – can isolate people socially. Guilt builds distance from those seen as ‘perfect’. “Why would they want to associate with me?” Worse still, again and again churches (or, perhaps more accurately, members of churches) have ostracised people for their perceived sins – from unmarried mothers to the LGBTQ+ community; from fraudsters to prisoners and offenders; from those who don’t cover their heads in church to those related to suicide victims. Loving our neighbour as ourselves has proven very difficult. The church needs to strive to be better at mercy and forgiveness than judgement and banishment.
Sin and sickness can both be isolating, but they also expose vulnerabilities. In both cases people fail to live up to the human ideal. Such failure can be embarrassing, debilitating and often causes further distance and isolation.
James’ solution revolves around prayer and community. If you are sick, invite the elders for prayer and anointing. If you have sinned, confess to one another and pray for healing. None of us want to be sinful beings, separated from God by our refusal (through ignorance, weakness or our own deliberate fault) to do God’s will. The whole purpose of Jesus life, death and resurrection was to cross that gaping void and restore our relationship with God.
‘The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective,’ James says. None of us is pure and righteous. Elijah, maybe – perhaps that is why his earnest prayer was so effective. But while we may not achieve the righteousness of Elijah, we do have the grace of God in our lives. Prayer combats sin by drawing us closer to God. We are forgiven, we are welcomed, we are given the chance to start afresh. In that we can rejoice.
Taize chant: O Lord hear my prayer
O Lord, hear my prayer; O Lord, hear my prayer;
When I call, answer me.
O Lord, hear my prayer; O Lord, hear my prayer;
Come and listen to me.
A prayer of petition for prayer
Ever-present God,
we live in a world which makes us anxious;
please help us to respond in prayer.
Often, we try to suppress our fears:
We live in a world that makes us angry;
help us to release our wrath in prayer.
We are choked when we try to speak of it:
give us the words to pray.
We live in a world which tempts us to do wrong:
help us to bring our desires to you, in prayer.
We try to justify doing what we want:
lead us to pray to you first.
Help us to raise our hands in prayer.
Our minds move in bitter circles:
Our world denies the power of prayer:
let our prayers test it, and see.
Our world denies your power, Lord:
we offer you our trust.
Amen.
Intercessory prayer
Lord God, for the world we pray:
let there be peace where there is warfare.
Jesus, for the world we pray:
let there be healing where there is sickness.
Holy Spirit, for the world we pray:
let there be joy where there is sadness.
Where there are situations that cannot be changed:
then change us, O Lord, to deal with them.
When we have asked for the wrong things:
change us, O Lord, to see things your way.
When we have asked in the wrong way:
forgive us, and teach us how to pray.
Amen.
3Generate
Next weekend is the 3Generate gathering of young people from across the Methodist Connexion. We are encouraged to pray for all who will attend – children, leaders and volunteers. During baptism services we promise to support children and young people in their discipleship journey and even if we do not personally know children who will attend 3Generate we can still hold all of them in our prayers.
God of many names, you give each of us special gifts and skills, whether we are a child, a young person or an adult, and today we celebrate your call on all of us as disciples.
We thank you God that you will give us all we need, and that we can always trust in you to lead us in our faith discovery.
We thank you that through our wondering and exploring of the stories of faith, we can grow in your love together as church.
May our prayers and your blessing be felt and upon those journeying to 3Generate and we pray that they tune in to God, learn, pray and respond together.
Amen.
As Jesus taught us, so we pray:
Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.
Thy kingdom come, thy will be done
On earth, as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread
And forgive us our trespasses
As we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory,
For ever and ever. Amen.
HYMN: STF 526 – Lord of all hopefulness
Blessing:
May the wonder of God fill our praise,
the love of Christ fill our longing,
and the power of the Spirit fill our prayers,
this day, and forevermore.
Amen
Prayers are taken from the Methodist Prayer Handbook 2024/2025, Roots on the web and 3Generate Worship Resource for Churches (https://media.methodist.org.uk/media/documents/3Gen_Worship_Resource_2024.pdf)
[1] Barbara Brown Taylor in Feasting on the Word, Year B Vol 4 (Kentucky: Westminster John Knox, 2009) p115
