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James 5:16
16 Confess [exomologeo] your faults [paraptoma] one to another [allelon], and [kai] pray [euchomai] one [allelon] for [huper] another [allelon], that [hopos] ye may be healed [iaomai]. The effectual fervent [energeo] prayer [deesis] of a righteous man [dikaios] availeth [ischuo] much [polus]. KJV-Interlinear
16 Therefore, confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another, so that you may be healed. The effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much. NASB
The word for confession used in 1 Jn. is ‘homologeo,’ which means to list our sins in confession to God.
But here, the word for confess is ‘exomologeo,’ which means to acknowledge or to agree. And this refers to your acceptance of the fact that you are indeed a sinner, that everyone who is alive or has ever lived, is a sinner, that all of humanity is a sinner.
So, James tells us to all agree on one important fact of life, and that is that we are all sinners. There is none among us that is perfect, pure, or some type of messiah substitute, that we should look to for redemption, sanctification, purification, forgiveness, etc.
This rules out all priests, pastors, and so forth. They are sinners just as you and I are. And therefore, they cannot hear your prayers of confession, just as angels cannot hear your prayers, just as ancestors cannot hear your prayers of confession, just as stars, bears, whales, or cockroaches cannot hear your prayers of confession.
There is no one under heaven who is authorized to hear your prayers, other than God the Father Himself.
This verse does not direct you to tell people of your faults. They probably already know of them anyway, but feeding the gossip pipeline is not an answer to reducing sins, but rather tends to promote even more sins in others.
The whole direction of these verses is getting yourself into fellowship, so that you can function effectively within your spiritual life.
Unless you enter into a daily, or hourly, or whatever it takes, confession routine within your own personal life, then you cannot be effective in your spiritual life, especially in your prayer life. You cannot pray for yourself, and certainly not for others, when you are habitually out of fellowship.
In fact you do not have an effective spiritual life at all, when you are out of fellowship.
Therefore, become interested in doctrine, study regularly, obey Gods mandates for getting into and remaining in fellowship, learn doctrine, and grow up spiritually.
You are not a spiritually mature believer, if you do not grow up in your spiritual life.
Of all of the people on this planet earth, of some seven billion folks now, only the mature believers, which number quite possibly in the very few millions or perhaps thousands (only God knows this number), but only the mature believers on the planet have effective prayers and spiritual lives. No one else does.
To ‘accomplish much,’ means to possess the power to achieve abundance. When there are wars, economic difficulties, sicknesses, and great events that make the news headlines, or when there are events that are small and never known but to a few folks in some private inner circle, such as a family, the mature believer is on the front lines of the spiritual battle. Firing off their barrage of prayers to God, and God answers them.
This does not mean that prayers for healing sick individuals will not work. But, when God provides us with surgeons, medications, hospitals, bandaids, etc., then those prayers have in effect already been answered. Go see your doctor. Don’t be stupid and pray for something you already have.
Prayer is the most powerful weapon that has ever existed. But it must be used properly, and it must be consistent with Gods plan.
When you get to heaven, you will probably be dumbfounded as to just how effective prayer has been in human history, and how useless, mans plans have been.
