Objection: If You Were Already Healed (Past Tense), It Would Make No Sense to Call for the Elders to GET Healing

On the contrary, if you were NOT already healed (past tense) in the legal sense, it would make no sense to call for the elders to GET healing because they would not be able to pray the prayer of FAITH!  If the elders could not be SURE that healing was the legal right of the person being anointed, they could not prayer the prayer of FAITH – they would have to pray a prayer of PETITION to ask God to do it, which is emphatically not what James commanded!  If it were a prayer of petition, James would have to have said, “And the prayer of petition will save the sick if it be God’s will, and the Lord will raise him up, if it be His will.”  There is NO WAY you can construe James’s words to mean that!

The objector is confusing the legal status of your healing (past tense – it belongs to you NOW as far as God is concerned) and seeing that played out in your body, which is the point of calling for the elders.

To cite a parallel example, Jesus is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world (John 1:29).  EVERYONE’s sins have been legally punished, so EVERYONE has the right to be forgiven, be born again, and go to heaven.  LEGALLY the whole matter is past tense.  But not everyone will EXPERIENCE what is legally theirs and available through faith in Jesus.  Sadly, many will perish in the flames even though they could have received the paid-for gift of righteousness and been saved.

The objector, to be consistent with his logic, would have to say, “If Jesus really WAS the propitiation for the sins of the entire world (1 John 2:2), it would make no sense to answer an altar call or call on Jesus in the privacy of your home to be saved.”  You can see the error when you frame it in terms of salvation, yet healing works the same way.  It’s paid for legally but it has to be received.