8.1.2018 CONFESS YOUR FAULTS TO ONE ANOTHER - Comment by Matthew Henry

*999 ...Christians are directed to confess their faults (note - 'sin' is the actual Greek word used here) one to another and so to join in their prayers with and for one another, v.16. some expositors connect this with v14.  as if when sick people send for ministers to pray over them they should then confess their faults to them. indeed, where any are conscious that their sickness is a vindictive punishment of some particular sin and they cannot look for the removal of their sickness without particular applications to God for the

*1000 pardon of such a sin, there it may be proper to acknowledge and tell his case,  that those who pray over him may know how to plead rightly for him. but the confession here required is that of Christians to one another, and not, as the papists would have it, to a priest. where persons have injured one another, acts of injustice must be confessed to those against whom  they have been committed.  where persons have tempted one another to sin or have consented in the  same evil actions, there they ought mutually to blame themselves and excite each other to repentance.  where crimes are of a public nature and have done any public mischief, there they ought to be more publicly confessed, so as may best reach to all  who are concerned.  and sometimes it may be well to confess our faults to some prudent minister or praying friend, that he  may help us to plead with God for mercy and pardon. but then we are not to think that James puts us upon telling every thing that we are conscious is amiss in ourselves or in one another;  but so far as confession is necessary to our reconciliation with such as are at variance with us, or for reparation of wrongs done to any, or for gaining information in any point of conscience and making our own spirits quiet and easy, so far we should be ready to confess our faults. and sometimes also it may be of good use to christians to disclose their peculiar weaknesses and infirmities  to one another, where there are great intimacies and friendships and where they  may help each other by their prayers to obtain pardon of their sins and power against them. those who make confession of their faults one to another should thereupon pry with and for one another. the 13th verse directs persons to pray for themselves: Is any afflicted let him pay; the 14th directs to seek for the prayers of ministers and the 16th directs private Christians to pay one for another; so that here we have all sorts of prayer (ministerial, social and secret) recommended.