What is a righteous man?
The prayer of a righteous man avails much per James 5:16.
Elijah our example of a righteous man.
Elijah challenged Israel to decide whether Jehovah or Baal was God. He gathered 450 prophets of Baal on a Mt. Carmel, built an altar, placed the sacrifice, and asked the prophets of Baal to pray. Nothing happened.
Elijah then prayed and God sent a fire that consumed the sacrifice and everything around it. Israel cried, “The Lord, He is God!” I Kings 18:20-40
Yet in the very next chapter Elijah was found hiding in a cave. When God asked him what he was doing here, he said I am the only one left and now Jezebel seeks to kill me.
God informed him that He had 7000 in Israel who had not bowed their knees to Baal. God always has a remnant who serves Him throughout history. Will you be a part of it in these last days?
Can you relate to Elijah?
There are times when we are so full of faith that we can recall in detail miraculous interventions and visitations from God. Yet there are other times when our prayers seem to hit the ceiling and bounce back at us, as if God is angry with us and doesn’t have time to hear us.
Elijah was a man of like passions as we are. He was not perfect. He made mistakes. He sinned in disobedience to God. He felt fear for his life. He did not want to die by the sword of Jezebel. He hid in a cave. He despaired of life. Ravens had to feed him. God had to re-demonstrate His power with the wind, an earthquake, a fire, and then a still small voice. “Elijah, what are you doing here?”
- Righteousness is not about being sinless.
- Righteousness is not about making mistakes.
- Righteousness is not about being without faults.
- Righteousness is about the covering of God’s Mercy and Love.
Elijah’s prayers availed much because of his faith in God’s anointing on his life.
When a man is accused of committing a crime, he is arrested, placed in jail until his trial. At the trial, he has his attorney plead his innocence before the Judge, while the prosecuting attorney lays out all of the reasons why he should be jailed and fined. After hearing from both sides, the judge can declare the man guilty or not guilty. If he is found guilty, then he is not in good standing with the Judge and the laws of society. If he is found not guilty, he is in good standing and all charges are erased from his record.
God gave us His Law in the Ten Commandments. Israel proved that they could not be kept. The Apostle Paul said the Law was only good to show us how sinful we really are before a Holy God. The Law was a schoolmaster leading us to Christ.
Jesus Christ was the only one who kept the Laws of God. He became our sinless sacrifice on the cross paying the penalty for all of our sins. He nailed our sins to the cross per Colossians 2:13-14. “And you being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, has He quickened together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses. Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to His cross.”
The handwriting of ordinances is a legal document listing each and every one of our sins. It is drawn up by our accuser the devil. Jesus took the accusations against you and me and nailed them to His cross. He covered each one of them with His Blood of Atonement. He paid the penalty for our sins. He redeemed us from our slave master, Satan. Then He humiliated the devil before all of his demons and before all of God’s Holy angels. (verse 15)
Our righteousness is the righteousness of Christ. II Corinthians 5:21, “For our sakes He made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.”
Just like Elijah, we have failures, we have faults, we have sin, and we feel like hiding in a cave some days, cutting off all communications including those prayers to God.
Just like the anointing covered Elijah’s failures, faults and sins, the righteousness of Christ covers ours, past, present and future. Elijah was able to pray boldly before and after hiding in his cave. You and I can also pray boldly the prayer of a righteous man because of the covering of Christ righteousness bought with His Blood.
Jesus gave us the Holy Spirit to convict us of sin and of righteousness. The Holy Spirit will witness with our conscience what is pleasing or not pleasing to God. As we listen to His still small voice within our spirit, we will know if we need to ask for forgiveness, or to rejoice before Him. The Holy Spirit helps us to examine our own hearts to see if we are pleasing God or not. II Corinthians 13:5
Christ as our High Priest makes intercession for us, so that when we sin, when we fail, we can come boldly before Him with confession on our lips and remorse in our hearts and He will forgive us and cover everything in His Blood.
Christians need to get back to acknowledging that we are sinners saved by Grace. We still sin, but we know how to confess those sins and have them forgiven. This is the beauty of believing on Christ as our Lord and our God.
