< James 5 >
1 Come, now, you rich men, weep, howl, on account of your miseries, which are coming upon you.
2 Your riches are putrefied, and your garments are motheaten.
3 Your gold and silver are eaten with rust, and the rust of them will be a witness against you, and will eat your flesh as fire. You have heaped up treasure in the last days.
4 Hark! the hire of the laborers who have reaped your field, which is fraudulently kept back by you, cries; and the cries of the reapers have entered into the ears of the Lord of hosts.
5 You have lived luxuriously on the earth, and been wanton; you have nourished your hearts as in a day of festivity.
6 You have condemned--you have killed the Just One--he did not resist you.
7 Behold the husbandman, who expects the valuable fruit of the earth, waits patiently for it, till it receive the early and later rain.
8 Be you also patient--strengthen your hearts: for the coming of the Lord draws nigh.
9 Repine not against one another, brethren, lest you be condemned: behold, the Judge stands before the door.
10 Take, my brethren, the prophets, who have spoken in the name of the Lord: for an example of suffering evil, and of patience.
11 Behold, we call them happy, who are patient. You have heard of the patience of Job, and you have seen the end of the Lord, that the Lord is very compassionate and merciful.
12 But, above all things, my brethren, swear not; neither by the heaven, or by the earth, nor by any other oath: but let your yes, be Yes, and your no, No; that you may not fall under condemnation.
13 Does any one among you suffer evil? let him pray: is any one cheerful? let him sing psalms.
14 Is any one sick, among you? let him send for the seniors of the congregation, and let them pray over him, having anointed him with oil, in the name of the Lord.
15 And the prayer of faith will save the sick person, and so the Lord will raise him up; and if he have committed sins, they shall be forgiven him.
16 Confess your faults, one to another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The inwrought prayer of the righteous man avails much.
17 Elias was a man frail and mortal like us, and he prayed fervently that it might not rain, and it did not rain on the land for three years and six months.
18 And again he prayed, and the heaven gave rain, and the land brought forth its fruit.
19 Brethren, if any one among you be seduced from the truth, and any one turn him back;
20 let him know what he who converts a sinner from the error of his way, shall save a soul from death, and shall cover a multitude of sins.
