Well, there are two one-another texts tonight in the reading from James chapter 5 earlier on. It's in verse 16, which says, 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. We can notice that this text contains three parts, a direction to confess our faults, a direction to pray for one another, and a statement of the effect of doing both of these things. But because the first two parts have to do with the one-anothering aspect, we'll spend our time tonight looking at these. That is, the directions to us as believers, first of all, to confess our faults one to another and to pray for one another. And the two are linked. not merely because they appear in the same text of scripture in the 16th verse, as consecutive phrases in the same sentence, but because confession and prayer go together. First of all then, a direction to confess our faults. Confess your faults one to another. Confession is a kind of prayer. Prayer often contains, and perhaps should contain, confession of some kind, especially of confession to God. We have heard it in the public prayer this evening, of confession to Almighty God of our sins and our iniquities, the things that we know are wrong. and for God to pardon us and forgive. The expression is, confession is good for the soul, and indeed it is. There's a humorous story about a confession of one's faults told about the Prussian King Frederick the Great. He was once touring a Berlin prison. And as the king came in, recognized by the inmates, all of them, well most of them, all of them except one, fell down on their knees in front of the king to proclaim their innocence. We shouldn't be here, your majesty, except one man. One man who remained silent. And Frederick the Great called to him and he said, why are you here? He said, armed robbery, your majesty. and are you guilty? yes I am your majesty I deserve my punishment and then Frederick summoned the jailer and he ordered him release this guilty wretch at once I will not have him kept in this prison where he will corrupt all these fine innocent people who occupy it confession was going on there and it may be on the humorous side, but there was that confession, a true confession of a man who knew that he was guilty. There are biblical examples of confession that we can look at now together. And I think of a confession that we find in Genesis and chapter 41. I invite you to turn to it and follow the words with me. Well, there was a confession of a butler there. Chapter 41 and verse 8 of Genesis. It came to pass in the morning that his spirit was troubled, and he sent and called for the magicians of Egypt and all the wise men thereof. And Pharaoh told them his dream, but there was none that could interpret them unto Pharaoh. Then spake the chief butler unto Pharaoh, saying, I do remember my faults this day. Pharaoh was wroth with his servants and put me in ward in the captain of the guard's house, both me and the chief baker. And we dreamed a dream in one night, I and he. We dreamed each man according to the interpretation of his dream. And there was there with us a young man, a Hebrew, servant to the captain of the guard. And we told him, and he interpreted to us our dreams. To each man according to his dream he did interpret. And it came to pass as he interpreted to us, so it was. Me he restored unto mine office, and him he hanged." So here was Pharaoh, king of Egypt. Dreaming two dreams, all Egypt heard about it, and no one could interpret the dream. So who could help? And we find the king's butler confessing his faults in verse nine. Confessing that there was an interpreter of dreams in the prison who had told him his dream two years earlier. He had been asked to remember this man, Joseph. And now the butler does. with a sense of remorse, with a sense of confession in his soul, and we know the rest of the story. And then we can look at Numbers chapter 21 for another example of confession. We find the children of Israel in the wilderness. Once again, they were murmuring. They were discouraged once they got near to the land of Edom, began to speak against the Lord God and against his servant Moses. Verse 5 of Numbers 21. The people spake against God and against Moses. Wherefore have ye brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no bread, neither is there any water, and our soul loatheth this light bread. And the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people, and much people of Israel died. Therefore the people came to Moses and said, We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord and against thee. Pray unto the Lord that he might take away the serpents from us. And Moses prayed for the people. A verse of confession, an admission of guilt. We have sinned against the God and against Moses, against the Lord and against Moses. And Moses prayed. And the Lord heard and heard their confession and the provision for them was made. in the brass serpent raised upon a pole in the middle of the camp. A wonderful signpost quality it had, pointing, as it does, to the death of the Lord Jesus Christ. I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto me. Lifted up for his people. Yes, the people there in Numbers 21 confessed. And then we could turn to the book of Daniel, the prophet, and chapter 9. Let's read the verses there. In the first year of Darius, the son of Ahasuerus, of the seed of the Medes, which was made king over the realm of the Chaldeans, in the first year of his reign, I, Daniel, understood by books the number of the years whereof the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah the prophet, that he would accomplish 70 years in the desolation of Jerusalem. And I set my face unto the Lord God. to seek by prayer and supplications with fasting and sackcloth and ashes. And I prayed unto the Lord my God and made my confession and said, O Lord, the great and dreadful God, keeping the covenant and mercy to them that love him and to them that keep his commandments, we have sinned, and have committed iniquity, and have done wickedly, and have rebelled, even by departing from thy precepts and from thy judgments. Neither have we hearkened unto thy servants the prophets, which spake in thy name to our kings, our princes, and our fathers, and to all the people of the land. O Lord, righteousness belongeth unto thee, but unto us confusion of faces, as at this day. to the men of Judah, to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and unto all Israel that are near, and that are afar off, through all the countries whither thou hast driven them, because of their trespass that they have trespassed against thee. O Lord, to us belongeth confusion of face, Our kings, our princes, to our fathers, because we have sinned against thee. And so on in this passage. He starts his prayer to the Lord God with confession. I prayed unto the Lord my God and made my confession. Prayer and confession, or confession in prayer. They are together here in Daniel's intercession for his people. And then at the end of that passage, verse 20, And whilst I was speaking and praying and confessing my sin and the sin of my people Israel, and presenting my supplication before the Lord my God for the holy mountain of my God, yea, while I was speaking in prayer, even the man Gabriel, whom I had seen in the vision at the beginning, being caused to fly swiftly, touched me about the time of the evening. Now it is not strictly confessing one to another, as the James text says, but it is important as a scripture confession. We must take note that confession is certainly a worthy exercise of the soul. And we sang a moment together from Psalm 32. When I kept silence, my bones waxed old through my roaring all the day long. Unconfessed sin can have an effect on the soul which can be paralyzing. There's nothing that so takes the joy out of life like unconfessed sin on the conscience. There is an account of a pastor who was preaching on the question of confession and urging his hearers in the congregation the importance of confession of sin and, wherever possible, of restitution of the wrong done to other people. And at the close of the service, a young man, a member of the church, came up to him with a really troubled countenance. Pastor, he explained. you have given me a real problem. I have wronged another man and I am ashamed to confess it or to try to put it right to this man.' And he explained, you see I'm a boat builder and the man I work for is an unbeliever. I've talked to him about the Lord. I've sought to invite him to the services, but he only scoffs at the Christian faith. I urged him to come to hear you preach, but he will not come. He ridicules it all. But now I have been guilty of something that if I should acknowledge it to him, it will ruin my testimony forever.' And he went on to say to his minister, that sometime before he'd started to build his own boat in the garden, in his home. In this work of boat building, of this particular type of boat, copper nails are used because they do not rust in the water. And these copper nails are very expensive. What the young man had been doing was carrying home small quantities away from his workplace every day for weeks upon end, to use them on his own job in his garden. And he knew it was stealing, but he tried to solve his conscience. He tried to tell himself that it was only a few nails, And then he would say, well, the boss wouldn't miss them. And anyway, the boss is a very wealthy man. And next he would say, and I don't get paid very much anyway. And therefore, I think it's all I deserve. But now this sermon had brought him face to face with the fact that he was just a common thief for whose dishonest actions there was no excuse. And he was a believer in Christ. But he said to the pastor, I cannot go to confess my faults to my boss and tell him what I've done and offer to pay for those things that I've used and return the rest. I just can't do that. If I do, he will think I'm a hypocrite. And yet, he says, those copper nails are digging in to my conscience. They are sharp and they are now pricking hard in my conscience. And I know that I shall never have peace in my soul until the matter has been put right." Well, this young man struggled for weeks after this with the decision to go to his boss. And then one night he came to his minister and he said to him with great joy, I've settled for the copper nails and my conscience is relieved at last. Well, what happened when you confessed to your employer what you had done, asked the minister. Oh, he answered, he looked strangely at me. And then he said this, George, I always did think that you were a hypocrite. But now I begin to feel there is something in this Christianity after all. For any religion that would make a dishonest workman come back and confess that he had been stealing copper nails and offer to settle for them must be worth having." Well, the minister used this story as an illustration in other places, having asked permission for the young man to use it. And sometimes after he told this story in another city. The next day a lady came up and said to him, Sir, I have copper nails on my conscience too. And he says, Why madam, surely you're not a boat builder? Oh no, she said, I'm a book lover. And I have stolen a number of books from a friend of mine who gets far more ever that I can afford. And I decided last night I must get rid of the copper nails. So I took them all back to her today and confessed my sin. And I can't tell you how relieved I am. I'm so thankful that she forgave me and that God has forgiven me. I'm thankful for the copper nails. They're not digging in to my conscience anymore. And the minister told this story many times in various places. And almost invariably people came up to him afterwards and told him of the copper nails in one form or another that they had to get rid of. Then on one occasion he told it at a university chapel service. The next day the principal saw him and said, as a result of your copper nails story, ever so many stolen fountain pens and other things have been returned to their rightful owners. Now, reformation and restitution does not save in themselves. But where one is truly repentant and has come to the Lord God in sincere confession, then that person will want to the best of his ability to put things right with other people. And notice it is to one another. It is not to a priest. And even though the story had the illustration of confessing to a minister, it was to God the young man went, and then to his employer. And Matthew chapter 18 speaks clearly of what happens within the assembly of the Lord's people. And earlier in time of fellowship, we spoke of this, that where there are offences, we must go to one another. We must tell our fellow believer about his or her fault, expect the brother or sister to confess their fault and seek forgiveness, and then the offended one must forgive. We can notice how the Lord Jesus Christ is very clear in that direction. Matthew 18 shows us how clear it is. Remember, these are the words of Christ himself. Moreover, if thy brother shall trespass against thee, go and tell him his fault between thee and him alone. And if he shall hear thee, thou hast gained thy brother. But if he will not hear thee, then take with thee one or two more, that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established. And if he shall neglect to hear them, tell it to the church. But if he neglect to hear the church, let him be unto thee as an heathen man and a publican. First of all then, go to him alone. When he hears, you've gained him. When he has confessed, yes, reconciliation can be established. But it's only when he does not hear you that you have to proceed to the next two stages. Offence is ideally in the first place heard in private. And then when reconciliation and forgiveness is established, then it goes no further. forgiveness that arises from confession. But does this mean that this confession of sin, that we are to be publicly tell everything that we are conscious of being amiss in ourselves or one another? Is that what this means, confess your faults one to another? Is there to be a confessing session? Not at all. Matthew Henry says that this confession is needed for reconciliation with those who are at variance with us or for righting wrongs between believers and for making our consciences and spirits quiet. So far should we be ready to confess our faults one to another. But it is between the offended party and the one who has offended. And the person to whom we confess everything is the Lord Jesus Christ himself, coming to him and telling him everything. Oh, my friend, have we ever gone to the Lord Jesus Christ and done that and told him everything? Have you searched in your conscience and searched, making a list, if necessary, of those things that you know you have committed against him and against others? and gone to the Lord with your confession. My friend, you should, before too many more minutes passed here in your earthly life, seek the Lord, own up to your sins, confess them to Him, and if there is restitution to be made, if there is some confession to be made to a brother or a sister, then go specifically to them in private and seek restitution, seek forgiveness. And when you've done that, see how soon the Lord will forgive you and you'll know it. This then is the direction to confess our faults one to another. But then secondly, and connected with it, there is a direction to pray for one another. For the next phrase says, and pray one for another that ye may be healed. How many scriptural examples we have of one anothering in prayer, praying for one another, both in the Old and the New Testaments. And we think of Abraham. Abraham, a man, an example of praying for others. I turn you back to the book of Genesis again, to chapter 18. We read from verse 23, when Abraham is exercised very deeply in prayer for someone else. Chapter 18 and verse 23. And Abraham drew near and said, this is to God, will thou also destroy the righteous with the wicked? Peradventure there be fifty righteous within the city, that is, the city of Sodom. Wilt thou also destroy and not spare the place for the fifty righteous that are therein? That be far from thee to do after this manner, to slay the righteous with the wicked, and that the righteous should be as the wicked, that be far from thee. Shall not the judge of all the earth do right? And the Lord said, If I find in Sodom fifty righteous within the city, then I will spare all the place for their sakes. And Abraham answered and said, Behold now, I have taken upon me to speak unto the Lord, which am but dust and ashes. Peradventure there lack five of the fifty righteous. Wilt thou destroy all the city for a lack of five? And he said, if I find there forty and five, I will not destroy it. And he spake unto him yet again, and said, peradventure there shall be forty found there. He said, I will not do it for forty's sake. And he said unto him, O let not the Lord be angry, and I will speak. Peradventure there be thirty found there. He said, I will not do it if I find thirty there. He said, Behold, now I have taken upon me to speak unto the Lord. Peradventure there shall be twenty found there. And he that is God said, I will not destroy it for twenty's sake. And he said, Let not the Lord be angry, and I will speak yet but this once. Peradventure ten shall be found there. And he said, I will not destroy it for ten's sake. The Lord went his way. As soon as he had left communing with Abraham, Abraham returned to his place. So concerned was Abraham for his family in that wicked city that he was bold enough to speak to the Lord in this way. Truly, it was a one another prayer, praying for others. I wonder if we pray for our families in the world with this intensity. Abraham knew God. Abraham knew what God was capable of. He knew he was capable of raining down the fire and brimstone on those five wicked cities. And he knew that his family lived in one of them. And he prayed and he prayed. He knew that God could destroy Sodom. We know, we must remember, that the Lord God one day will destroy this unbelieving world. And it's likely that he would destroy this unbelieving world with our relatives and friends in it. Unless they escape from the Sodom of this world by grace through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ alone. So do we pray like Abraham? Do I? Not much, I fear. And yet we should. We should be praying for others. Pray one for another. Yes, it is about praying for each other in church. We come on to that in a moment. But this example of Abraham speaks to my soul and challenges me. And I think of the unconverted in my family, the unconverted in a wider extended family, and in the community in which I live. Oh, there must be much praying to be done. To the Lord God who will hear, It is a direction to pray for others. We can think of Moses. In Numbers chapter 11 we read of him praying. The first three verses of Numbers 11. And the people complained, it displeased the Lord. And the Lord heard it, and his anger was kindled. And the fire of the Lord burnt among them, and consumed them that were in the uttermost parts of the camp. And the people cried unto Moses. And when Moses prayed unto the Lord, the fire was quenched. And he called the name of that place Tibera. because the fire of the Lord burnt among them. So yet another occasion of the children of Israel moaning and murmuring, and fire sent amongst them, but Moses prayed for them. How he cared for the people of Israel, and the fire was quenched. A few chapters further on in Numbers chapter 14, we find the reaction of the people to the spies that had been sent out. And they chose to listen to the unfavorable report of the ten that came back, and they wept. All the congregation lifted up their voice and cried, and the people wept that night. Verse 10, in Numbers 14. And they murmured against Moses and Aaron and threatened to stone them. That's in verse 10. And the glory of the Lord appeared. It must have been awesome. And the Lord said that he would destroy them and make a great nation out of Moses himself. It says that in verse 12. Then we find Moses praying for them in such a tender way. Just notice from verse 13 onwards. If you have the text open there in Numbers 14. From verse 13. Moses said unto the Lord, The Egyptians shall hear it, for thou broughtest up this people in thy might from among them. And they will tell it to the inhabitants of this land, for they have heard that thou, Lord, art among this people. that thou, Lord, art seen face to face, that thy cloud standeth over them, and that thou goest before them by daytime in a pillar of a cloud, and in a pillar of fire by night. Now, if thou shalt kill all this people as one man, then the nations which have heard the fame of thee will speak. saying, Because the Lord was not able to bring this people into the land which he spake unto them, therefore he hath slain them in the wilderness. And now I beseech thee, Let the power of my Lord be great, according as thou hast spoken, saying, The Lord is long-suffering, and of great mercy, forgiving iniquity and transgression, by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation. Pardon, I beseech thee. the iniquity of this people, according to the greatness of thy mercy, and as thou hast forgiven this people from Egypt even unto now." What a man of God Moses was. What a man of prayer he was. What a concerned man he was for the people whom he was leading through the desert, through the wilderness. The living God had promised to start again with Moses make him the new patriarch and his people would be founded only in Moses' family. That's what the Lord God had said. What a privilege for Moses. What an honour for Moses. How smug and proud he could have been. How he could so easily get rid of this rebellious, murmuring people and let the Lord destroy the lot of them and start again with him. But he did not. He prayed for them. He reasoned with the Lord for them. And God heard. Verse 20, I have pardoned according to thy word. My brothers and sisters, we need to have hearts as large as Moses' heart that are ready to plead with the Lord God as he pleaded to save the lost and to pray for his people. Pray one for another. Pray for each other in the assembly. Pray for those people in our communities, for the people in our land, for the people of the world. Let us pray for them. So we come to the New Testament and we find Paul as an example of praying for others. The Letter to Colossians, he writes in the first chapter, as ye learned also of Epaphras, our dear fellow servant, who is for you a faithful minister of Christ, who also declared unto us your love in the Spirit. For this cause we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to desire that ye might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding. Well, there is an expression, we do not cease to pray for you. How many times can we say that to our brothers and sisters? Sometimes we consider our prayers to be utterly impossible, don't we? There's that situation that seems so unchangeable. That relative, that friend who seems to be so beyond salvation. We have witnessed to them so many times. And yes, we have prayed. And we think, shall we pray anymore? Is it any use to pray for them? And we get discouraged and we cease to pray. And we stop praying and we shouldn't stop praying. And Paul says that in all honesty, he does not cease to pray for those believers at Colossae. My friends, we need to know of this prayer without ceasing. And that doesn't mean to say that we have to be in prayer without ceasing day after day, but we need to have that atmosphere of prayer And when we think of a brother or a sister, let us lift up a thought for them. When we think of someone we've witnessed to even many years ago and perhaps have stopped praying for them, start praying for them again. Lift up a prayer to the Lord for them. Pray one for another. Let us not think that our prayers are impossible. And mentioning impossible prayers, Mr. Spurgeon spoke of a little boy who refused to doubt that God would answer even the simplest of his petitions, a young lad who had learned the value of prayer. Now at the start of the school term, the schoolmaster, the local schoolmaster of just one little village school, he had repeatedly urged the children to be punctual, to be there on time at the beginning of the school day. And he promised to punish any child who was late. Now, unfortunately, this little boy had parents who made no real effort to help the lad in these matters of discipline. And one day, the boy was considerably late for school. Too many chores at home have made him late for leaving. And just as his mother was sending him out through the door, the clock struck the very hour that school was to begin. Now a friend standing nearby saw the young man bursting out of his home door, running as fast as he could, and heard him muttering this simple petition, Dear God, do grant that I might be on time. And yet he was already late. It occurred to that friend that for once this child had offered an impossible prayer. for God to answer and honor. For indeed, we cannot change the clock. We cannot change the time. So he was late. Interestingly, as this friend followed the young man to see what happened, on that very morning, the schoolmaster, as he tried to open the door of the school, put his key into the lock, turned it the wrong way, and jammed the lock. And so he had, with all the children waiting outside there, had to send for the locksmith to free the door so that they could get in. At precisely the moment that the locksmith mended the door and opened it for all to go in, the boy arrived. Even the simplest petition, dear God, grant that I might be on time, uttered in faith opens doors to the miraculous. Paul also prays in 1 Thessalonians 5 and in other places, the very God of peace sanctify you wholly and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. My friends, what we all miss if we do not pray one for another. We need each other's prayers. We cannot prosper in the church without each other's prayers. I'm sure you know the account of George Muller of Bristol who prayed for 42, I think, years for a man that he knew very well. He prayed for him daily on his knees, longing that he might be converted, taking every opportunity to witness for him, but never did this man profess faith until he attended George Muller's funeral, and there he was converted. Answered prayer of a faithful, praying man. So how much Do you make sure that you pray for one another in your own congregation, your own assembly? Do you have aids for that? Do you have prayer lists? A list of the other members so that you can pray one for another? Do you have a list of missionaries? You can pray for them. A list of your own family? Should be well cemented in your minds, but perhaps make a list about them. of friends that you know, of colleagues, of work friends. Whenever you find it difficult to pray, get your list out. Oh, I find it difficult to pray, you say. What am I going to pray for? I seem to get before the Lord and I don't seem to be able to pray. Well, my friend, first of all, use Scripture. Go to the Word of God and pray the words of God. The Psalms are so helpful. But also use a list. Pray for one another. Read the names. Think about their situations. Think about what it was that they just shared with you of that trouble, that difficulty, that hardship, that joy even. Share in prayer with their joys and their gladnesses and share with them in prayer. The thing is, it's so easy to have come from a situation of someone speaking to you and perhaps saying how hard things are. What do you say? Oh brother, I'll pray for you. Oh sister, I'll remember you in prayer. More often than not, we go away and we don't. And that is why this injunction is here in scripture. Pray one for another. Pray one for another. Now pray for another. Confess your faults one to another. Pray one for another that ye may be healed. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man or woman availeth much. Prayer indeed avails much. May the Lord help us to confess our faults one to another and to pray one for another. Amen. Let's pray together.