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.
James 5:16 NIV
Healing
Emily Howard Stowe was a Canadian physician who was the first female physician to practice in Canada, the second licensed female physician in Canada and an activist for women’s rights and suffrage. Stowe helped found the women’s suffrage movement in Canada and campaigned for the country’s first medical college for women. Her mother raised her in a Quaker community that encouraged women to receive an education, and home-schooled Stowe and her five sisters, teaching them skills in herbal healing.
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The history of Canada is that when the Gospel came to this country, not only were churches planted, but schools were opened and hospitals were established. Tommy Douglas, the father of our current medical system, was a Baptist pastor who was concerned during the Great Depression that so many people in his church could not afford health care. Healing has always been a part of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. So many of the stories of Jesus in the Gospels were of Him touching and healing people – physically, spiritually and emotionally. So it shouldn’t surprise us that James, the half-brother of Jesus, says this in James 5:16: “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.” Confession of sin has a powerful influence on the life of a follower of Jesus. When sin is confessed, it comes into the light, and loses its power. No wonder the Bible teaches that it is necessary for healing. Unconfessed sin negatively impacts our psyche, our soul and our body. Don’t allow unconfessed sin to eat away at you. Bring it to light, and healing will begin.
These have been words from the heart.
Bob Beasley