Old Camel Knees

The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.

James 5:16

The writer of the book of James is known in history as “Old Camel Knees.” His knees were reportedly calloused because he spent so much time on them in prayer. His core belief about prayer is summed up in today’s verse, which is rendered in the NIV as “The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.”

Yet James devotes a great deal of time to telling us how not to get our prayers answered. That is, he warns us against hindrances to prayer. In chapter 1, he cautions us not to ask with a doubtful, unbelieving heart. “That person should not think he will receive anything from the Lord” (James 1:7, NIV). In chapter 4, James warns that God will not answer unoffered prayers; “You do not have because you do not ask God,” he writes in verse 2. And the Lord doesn’t answer prayers offered for the wrong reasons: “When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures” (James 4:3, NIV).

God longs to answer our prayers—in fact, He calls them powerful and effective—but it’s important to pray with trusting hearts, specific requests, and godly motives.

Faith in a prayer-hearing God will make a prayer-loving Christian.

ANDREW MURRAY