--- title: "Bible Verses for Grief and Healing: What the Word Healing Means Here" description: "Months into a loss and wondering if grief heals? What Cruse and the NHS say, Psalm 147:3 in its setting, Psalm 34:18 for tonight, and grief Scripture never hurries." url: "https://biblenudge.com/blog/bible-verses-for-grief-and-healing" lang: "en" published: "2026-01-10" modified: "2026-01-10" author: "Cal Hewitt" tags: ["grief","grief and healing","psalm 147","psalm 34","time heals","bereavement"] image: "https://biblenudge.com/og/blog-bible-verses-for-grief-and-healing.jpg" alternates: es: "https://biblenudge.com/es/blog/versiculos-para-el-duelo-y-la-sanacion.md" --- # Bible Verses for Grief and Healing: What the Word Healing Means Here [Cal Hewitt](https://biblenudge.com/about/cal-hewitt)Published January 10, 2026 - grief - grief and healing - psalm 147 - psalm 34 - time heals - bereavement ![Bible Verses for Grief and Healing: What the Word Healing Means Here](https://biblenudge.com/blog/bible-verses-for-grief-and-healing/featured.jpg) On one thread in Reddit's r/GriefSupport, somebody wrote, ["I'm 5 months in and it really doesn't get easier."](https://www.reddit.com/r/GriefSupport/comments/10hls82/) Another wrote, ["This concept of ‘closure’ feels like false advertising."](https://www.reddit.com/r/GriefSupport/comments/10hls82/) A third put it in seven words: ["It doesn't get better, just a little softer."](https://www.reddit.com/r/GriefSupport/comments/10hls82/) If you were told time heals and it has not, the honest answer from the people who support the bereaved is that grief usually changes rather than ends, and that time makes room for healing rather than doing it on its own. ## If you only have a minute ### Does grief heal? Cruse and the NHS say it usually becomes less intense and comes less often, without ever fully going away, and it has no timetable. ### To read tonight [Psalm 34:18](https://biblenudge.com/context/psalm-34-18), "Yahweh is near to those who have a broken heart." ### The healing verse [Psalm 147:3](https://biblenudge.com/context/psalm-147-3), a praise psalm about a city rebuilt, which sets no time scale. ### Grief left unhurried Jacob, David, Rachel and Jesus all grieve in Scripture, and none is told to stop. ### If it is getting harder The crisis lines at the end name their countries. ## What bereavement organizations say healing looks like Cruse Bereavement Support, a UK charity, answers the question directly. In its booklet [After the death of someone very close](https://www.cruse.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/94149-After-the-death-of-someone-very-close.pdf) it says, "It is not so much that time heals; it is more that the passing of time allows you to do the work of grief and allows healing to follow." Its current page, [How long does grief last?](https://www.cruse.org.uk/understanding-grief/effects-of-grief/how-long-does-grief-last/), describes an idea from the grief counselor Lois Tonkin called growing around grief. The grief does not shrink. Life grows around it instead. In Cruse's words, "The grief doesn’t ever completely go away," but in time "the painful feelings come less often and your life starts to be filled with other things." A song or a date can still bring it back at full strength. The [NHS](https://www.nhs.uk/mental-health/feelings-symptoms-behaviours/feelings-and-symptoms/grief-bereavement-loss/) says much the same in fewer words: "For most people grief after the death of a loved one becomes less intense over time. But for some people, grief after a death lasts many months or years." It also says there is "no right or wrong way to feel." So, if you are asking whether it heals, the fair answer is: it usually softens and comes less often, it rarely disappears, and nobody who works with the bereaved puts a date on it. Five months, or two years, is not late. ## A passage to read tonight The passage Bible Nudge offers for grief is a single verse from Psalm 34: > Yahweh is near to those who have a broken heart, and saves those who have a crushed spirit. The verse before it says, "The righteous cry, and Yahweh hears, and delivers them out of all their troubles." The verse after says, "Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but Yahweh delivers him out of them all." The psalm holds rescue and nearness together, and verse 18 is in the present tense: near while the heart is still broken, not once it has mended. One way to use it is to read the three verses, 17 to 19, once through, and then read verse 18 on its own. The [page on losing a parent](https://biblenudge.com/blog/bible-verses-for-the-loss-of-a-parent) sets the verse in its psalm and explains why it was chosen, and you can [read Psalm 34:18 with the verses around it](https://biblenudge.com/context/psalm-34-18). ![A cup of tea going cold beside a closed book on a kitchen table at night](https://biblenudge.com/blog/bible-verses-for-grief-and-healing/tonight.jpg) *One verse, read slowly, is enough for a first night.* ## Psalm 147:3, the verse most people are sent If someone has sent you a verse about healing, it was most likely this one: > He heals the broken in heart, and binds up their wounds. Its setting is a song of praise. The line before it reads, "Yahweh builds up Jerusalem. He gathers together the outcasts of Israel." The line after it turns straight to the sky: "He counts the number of the stars. He calls them all by their names." The psalm then moves on to rain, grass and young ravens. The healing of broken hearts sits in the same breath as a city rebuilt, scattered people brought home, and the stars. Commentators read it differently. Keil and Delitzsch tie it to the rebuilding of Jerusalem and the return of dispersed Israel, while Matthew Henry reads the healing as "the consolations of his Spirit" and forgiveness ([both at Bible Hub](https://biblehub.com/commentaries/psalms/147-3.htm)). What none of them finds in [Psalm 147:3, read in its setting](https://biblenudge.com/context/psalm-147-3), is a time scale. It praises a God who binds up wounds, and it does not say how long binding takes. ## Grief the Bible does not hurry It may matter to you that the Bible records grief that is not quickly healed, without rebuke. When Jacob believed his son Joseph was dead, he "mourned for his son many days." His sons and daughters came to comfort him, "but he refused to be comforted" (Genesis 37:34-35). When King David heard that his son Absalom had been killed, he went up to the room over the city gate and wept, saying, "My son Absalom! My son, my son Absalom! I wish I had died for you, Absalom, my son, my son!" (2 Samuel 18:33). A chapter later he is still crying it aloud with his face covered (2 Samuel 19:4). The prophet Jeremiah gives a mother's grief a verse of its own, [Jeremiah 31:15](https://biblenudge.com/context/jeremiah-31-15): > Yahweh says: “A voice is heard in Ramah, lamentation and bitter weeping, Rachel weeping for her children. She refuses to be comforted for her children, because they are no more.” And at the tomb of his friend Lazarus, with Lazarus's sisters and neighbors weeping around him, "Jesus wept" ([John 11:35](https://biblenudge.com/context/john-11-35)). The chapter goes on to Lazarus being called out of the tomb, and that later moment does not cancel the tears. None of these accounts sets a length for mourning, and none tells the mourner to be finished. ## "Do not grieve" and "no more tears" Two other verses are often heard as instructions. 1 Thessalonians 4:13 is sometimes passed on as "do not grieve." The whole sentence reads: "But we don’t want you to be ignorant, brothers, concerning those who have fallen asleep, so that you don’t grieve like the rest, who have no hope." Paul is writing to a church worried about its members who had died, and the verses that follow speak of resurrection. It says how Christians grieve, with hope, and not that they should not grieve. The second is [Revelation 21:4](https://biblenudge.com/context/revelation-21-4): > He will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; neither will there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain, any more. The first things have passed away. It comes inside John's vision of a new heaven and a new earth. It is a future hope, not a report that your grief should already be over. ## If you have been told you are doing it wrong The five stages of grief came from the psychiatrist Elisabeth Kübler-Ross's 1969 work with people who were themselves dying, not with the bereaved. Cruse notes that the stages are ["often thought to be a 'roadmap'"](https://www.cruse.org.uk/understanding-grief/effects-of-grief/how-long-does-grief-last/) and asks whether they are accurate. Humber Teaching NHS Foundation Trust says the stages are ["not fixed but flexible"](https://www.humber.nhs.uk/news/grief-awareness-week/) and "not bound by order or length of time they last." If you skipped one, or keep going back to one, nothing has gone wrong. What people say can land hard. On the same [r/GriefSupport thread](https://www.reddit.com/r/GriefSupport/comments/10hls82/) on Reddit, one person wrote, "I have been told time and time again that she is no longer suffering and that should bring me peace. It does not." In [another Reddit thread](https://www.reddit.com/r/GriefSupport/comments/1lvgpag/), someone asked people never to tell a grieving person to stop being sad, listing "‘don't cry’, ‘remember the good times’, ‘get over’, ‘move on’." The page on [what not to say to someone grieving](https://biblenudge.com/blog/what-not-to-say-to-someone-grieving) says why, and [grief that comes back months later](https://biblenudge.com/blog/grief-that-comes-back-months-later) is for grief that eased and returned. ![A potted plant on a windowsill with new leaves growing around a smooth stone](https://biblenudge.com/blog/bible-verses-for-grief-and-healing/growing-around.jpg) *Cruse describes life growing around grief rather than grief getting smaller.* ## If you were looking for healing for someone who is ill If the person you love is alive and seriously ill, you are looking for something different, and that is fine. The passages about physical healing, such as James 5, where elders pray over someone sick, and Mark 5, where a woman ill for twelve years is healed, belong to that search. The page of [Bible verses for cancer caregivers](https://biblenudge.com/blog/bible-verses-for-cancer-caregivers) is written for the person at the bedside, alongside [Bible verses for hope in hard times](https://biblenudge.com/blog/bible-verses-for-hope-in-hard-times). For a line to write in a card, [short Bible verses for grief](https://biblenudge.com/blog/short-bible-verses-for-grief) keeps each one brief. ## When grief stays very intense The World Health Organization's [ICD-11](https://www.icd11-code.com/6b42/) describes prolonged grief disorder as lasting more than six months at a minimum, clearly beyond the person's social, cultural or religious norms, and causing significant impairment. It adds that reactions which last longer but stay within those norms "are viewed as normal bereavement responses and are not assigned a diagnosis." The American Psychiatric Association's [DSM-5-TR](https://www.psychiatry.org/patients-families/prolonged-grief-disorder) uses at least twelve months for adults. Long grief is not, by itself, a disorder. If ordinary days have become unmanageable, a doctor is a good person to tell. ## Questions people ask **Does time heal grief?** Cruse says it is "not so much that time heals" as that time allows the work of grief and lets healing follow, and most people find the pain comes less often. **Is there a Bible verse that promises grief will end by a certain time?** No. Psalm 147:3 and Psalm 34:18 speak of God healing and being near, and neither gives a time scale. **Is it wrong for a Christian to grieve for a long time?** Nothing in 1 Thessalonians 4:13 says so; it speaks of grieving with hope rather than not grieving. ## Where to go next If what you are carrying is not quite this, [Bible Nudge](https://biblenudge.com/) can take a line about it in your own words and come back with one passage and what surrounds it. [Find a passage](https://biblenudge.com/nudge). If grief has turned into thoughts of ending your life, please reach a person tonight. In the United States, call or text 988 for the [988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline](https://988lifeline.org/contact-us/). In Canada, call or text 9-8-8. In the UK and Republic of Ireland, [Samaritans](https://www.samaritans.org/how-we-can-help/contact-samaritan/) is on 116 123, and [Cruse](https://www.cruse.org.uk/) offers bereavement support in the UK. In Australia, [Lifeline](https://www.lifeline.org.au/get-help/national-services/lifeline-crisis-support) is 13 11 14. Anywhere else, [Find A Helpline](https://findahelpline.com/) and [Befrienders Worldwide](https://www.befrienders.org/) list services by country. ## Words that come up here Tap a term to see what it means. **Growing around grief.** Lois Tonkin's description of grief staying much the same size while life grows larger around it. **Absalom.** King David's son, killed in a rebellion against his father. David's cry for him is in 2 Samuel 18 and 19. **Prolonged grief disorder.** A clinical term for grief that stays intense and disabling well beyond the usual time. It is not a label for ordinary grief. ## Share this page If somebody you know is carrying this, the link goes straight to the passage and what surrounds it. Nothing here asks them to sign up for anything. [Facebook](https://www.facebook.com/sharer/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fbiblenudge.com%2Fblog%2Fbible-verses-for-grief-and-healing)[Pinterest](https://pinterest.com/pin/create/button/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fbiblenudge.com%2Fblog%2Fbible-verses-for-grief-and-healing&media=https%3A%2F%2Fbiblenudge.com%2Fblog%2Fbible-verses-for-grief-and-healing%2Ffeatured.jpg&description=Bible%20Verses%20for%20Grief%20and%20Healing%3A%20What%20the%20Word%20Healing%20Means%20Here) ## Related Articles - [How to Forgive Someone Who Hurt You: What the Bible Says, What Psychologists Separate, and Psalm 34:18 for the Hurt](https://biblenudge.com/blog/how-to-forgive-someone-who-hurt-you): Forgiving, trusting and going back are separate decisions. What psychologists and traditions say, and Psalm 34:18 for a night the hurt returns. - [When Your Teenager Was at a Shooting: What to Do in the First Days, What to Say, and Psalm 34:18 for a Broken Heart](https://biblenudge.com/blog/when-your-teenager-was-at-a-shooting): A teenager who was at the birthday party in a Macon, Georgia park, or who knows someone who was? What to do in the first days, where to call, and Psalm 34:18 to read. - [Bible Verses After a Mass Shooting: Psalm 34:18 for the First Nights, Words for Children, and a Prayer for KwaMakhutha](https://biblenudge.com/blog/bible-verses-after-a-mass-shooting): Psalm 34:18 for the first nights after a mass shooting, where to call, words for children, and prayers for KwaMakhutha.