The Power of Prayer

James 5:13-18 · 2026-04-26 · Jason Wolin · When We Pray

James 5:13-18 · Prayer. The Power of Prayer — sermon from Cypress Bible Church on BibleSlides.

The Power of Prayer When We Pray Today we enter into a very well-known section of God’s Word that deals with prayer and the reason it’s so well known is it tells us what we are supposed to do when we are physically or spiritually SICK. And since nearly all of us fit into that category, this is of great interest to us this morning. This section comes at the very end of the book of James. The entire book of James is a test for people to assess genuine saving faith. People can say anything. People can claim whatever they want. But just because you say it doesn’t make it true. And that is especially the case when it comes to faith. People can say, “I am Christian.” People can say, “I have saving faith.” But that doesn’t mean they do. How do you know if they have genuine faith? Forget other people, how do YOU know if you have genuine saving faith? You know because genuine faith works. Genuine faith produces genuine fruit. A certain type of root will always produce a certain type of fruit. And though you cannot see the root, you can know what kind of root it is by simply examining the fruit. So James is just systematically working through all these different fruits that are observable in the Christian life. And all of these fruits are kind of micro-tests of saving faith. None of them by themselves are conclusive. But the more of these tests you do, the more clear the pattern becomes. So that’s pretty much James in a nutshell. Prayer as the Main Evidence Now James ends with a final test, a final evidence of true saving faith. There’s one evidence that is kind of like the grand daddy of all evidences. You want to know the STRONGEST evidence saving faith? Prayer. Prayer. Prayer. It’s THE great claim, I have no control. It’s the great claim of helplessness. Only you have control, Lord. It’s placing your vote of confidence in God. It’s hoping in God. It’s great EVIDENCE that you trust and believe in God and God alone. It’s kind of like this. If I say, I love my wife, those are just words. If that were true, how would that be evidenced? One of the greatest evidences of that would be actually choosing to talk with her? I mean, can you get any more basic? How can you say, “I love the Lord; I trust your words; I want your input in my life” How can you really believe that when you NEVER talk to him? So PRAYER is THE MOST BASIC evidence of GENUINE faith. And that’s how James ends his book. By asking us to pray. Now there are really three SITUATIONS in which James is encouraging us to pray. The first situation is suffering. Is Anyone Among you Suffering? Suffering can take all sorts of forms. There’s psychological suffering. There’s financial s…

Cypress Bible Church · Full sermon loading below.