Why Won't God Heal Me?

What can I do today while I wait for healing?

Prayer and treatment can go together, and the traditions that pray hardest for healing say so. The Assemblies of God bylaws state that the General Council "disapproves of any credentialed minister counseling a believer to exclude medical advice and/or treatment when seeking prayer for physical healing." The Catechism, paragraph 2288, says "Life and physical health are precious gifts entrusted to us by God," and asks for "reasonable care of health."

A few steps you can use today:

• Keep taking what you are prescribed. An NHS patient leaflet says, "Do not stop taking any medicines without asking your doctor first as this could make your condition and symptoms worse." NHS England (2019) says, "Don’t simply stop taking a prescribed medicine if you are worried about side effects."
• If somebody has urged you to stop a treatment for the sake of faith, tell your doctor or prescriber plainly, and decide together.
• Ask a hospital or hospice chaplain, a pastor or a priest, by name, to pray with you, and ask for it on the day of your next appointment.
• For medicine and faith in mental illness, is it a sin to take antidepressants takes that question on its own.

Support for the illness itself is a call or a click away. In the United Kingdom, the NHS and Macmillan Cancer Support are there; in the United States, the American Cancer Society.

What blocks God's healing?

Start here: nothing about a person's faith can be read off their illness. Some Christian teachers name sin, doubt, a spiritual test or a generational curse as blocks to healing, and others deny that any of these can be assigned to a particular sick person. Both views exist, and what follows is the texts in their settings.

In Matthew 17, a father brings his son to Jesus because the disciples could not cure him.

14 When they came to the multitude, a man came to him, kneeling down to him, and saying, 15 “Lord, have mercy on my son, for he is epileptic, and suffers grievously; for he often falls into the fire, and often into the water. 16 So I brought him to your disciples, and they could not cure him.” 17 Jesus answered, “Faithless and perverse generation! How long will I be with you? How long will I bear with you? Bring him here to me.” 18 Jesus rebuked him, the demon went out of him, and the boy was cured from that hour. 19 Then the disciples came to Jesus privately, and said, “Why weren’t we able to cast it out?” 20 He said to them, “Because of your unbelief. For most certainly I tell you, if you have faith as a grain of mustard seed, you will tell this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you. 21 But this kind doesn’t go out except by prayer and fasting.”

Jesus speaks of unbelief to the disciples who had tried. The father who brought his son, and the boy who was ill, are not the ones addressed. Commentators differ over whether the word describes the disciples' trust, the resistance of that generation or the limits of their part.

In his home town, among people who rejected him, Jesus did few mighty works (Mark 6:1-6 and Matthew 13:53-58). Mark records that he still "laid his hands on a few sick people, and healed them." Commentators differ over whether this means inability, refusal, judgment or that few asked, and the text names none of those who stayed ill.

Then there is John 9:1-3. The disciples ask whether a man born blind, or his parents, had sinned, and Jesus answers, "Neither did this man sin, nor his parents." What does the Bible say about suffering reads John 9 at length, and who in the Bible had unanswered prayers reads the verses people quote about blocked prayer.

What these give is the Bible itself refusing to put one man's illness down to his sin, and a story where the faith in question belonged to the healers.

Can God really heal you, and does he heal everyone who asks?

Each tradition answers in its own words.

These churches disagree about whether healing is promised in the atonement, and they do not agree on it.

Paul takes up gifts of healing in 1 Corinthians 12. He describes gifts given by the Spirit to different people, healing among them, and asks whether all have gifts of healing. Sam Storms, a charismatic Reformed writer, says there is no gift of healing (2006) meaning "the God-given ability to heal everyone of every disease on every occasion."

Studies of prayer measured particular things. The STEP trial, led by Benson and published in the American Heart Journal in 2006, randomized 1,802 patients scheduled for coronary bypass surgery at six United States hospitals to receive or not receive intercessory prayer, and reported no significant difference in complications within 30 days (American College of Cardiology summary). Pew Forum's 2006 Spirit and Power survey asked whether people had "experienced or witnessed a divine healing of an illness or injury." In the United States, 29 percent of all respondents said yes, with 62 percent of Pentecostals and 46 percent of Charismatics; the figures were 71 percent in Kenya, 62 percent in Nigeria, 56 percent in Guatemala and 10 percent in South Korea. These describe what people reported, not verified cures. When the answer to a prayer is no or nothing gives a 2009 Cochrane review of intercessory prayer.

Studies like these describe groups of patients. Many believers report healing, and many others pray and stay ill.

Why does God heal some and not others?

Why in your case is something only God knows, and the traditions above leave it with him. What they give is company in the question, and the next section is the clearest example the Bible offers.

Who in the Bible was ill and was not healed?

Faithful people stay sick inside the Bible's own pages. In the gospels and letters, an apostle, his co-workers and his friends are named as ill, kept as loved and useful, and only some of them are recorded as recovering.

Epaphroditus, Paul's co-worker, was "sick nearly to death," and Paul says God had mercy on him. Sam Storms reads his recovery as mercy rather than a right. Paul left Trophimus sick at Miletus, and Storms notes that its cause, length and outcome are unknown. Bible verses for cancer patients reads Trophimus and Timothy together.

At a pool in John 5, where many sick people lay, the text records one man healed.

Then comes Paul's thorn.

In 2 Corinthians 12, Paul asks the Lord three times for the "thorn in the flesh" to leave him. The text records the answer that grace is sufficient, and records no healing.

The Greek words add detail. The word for thorn is skolops, a stake, thorn or sharp object. "Messenger" is angelos. "Is sufficient" is arkei, from arkeō, to be enough. John Chrysostom read the thorn as persecution and opposition, John Calvin as a bodily affliction or lasting weakness, and Martin Luther as temptation and bodily distress. Modern commentators divide among illness, persecution, temptation, a person or a hostile spiritual messenger, and the text leaves it unnamed. When the answer to a prayer is no or nothing reads the thorn as a refused prayer.

What this gives is company. You are not the first person to ask, and the ones who were ill before you are kept in the Bible's pages, with their names.

The daily routine of an illness that stays.

How can I get God to heal me, and how do I ask?

James gives the plainest instruction in the Bible for a sick person.

13 Is any among you suffering? Let him pray. Is any cheerful? Let him sing praises. 14 Is any among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the assembly, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord, 15 and the prayer of faith will heal him who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up. If he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. 16 Confess your offenses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The insistent prayer of a righteous person is powerfully effective.

The sick person calls for the elders of the assembly, who pray over them and anoint them with oil, and the passage ends with confession and prayer for one another. The Greek has four words worth knowing: astheneō, to be weak or sick; kamnō, to be weary or sick; sōzō, to save, rescue or heal; and egeirō, to raise up. Sam Storms reads "the prayer of faith" as a God-given confidence for a particular healing (2017), not a guaranteed method, and the Catechism ties the passage to the Anointing of the Sick. Bible verses for cancer caregivers covers James 5 and being told more faith would heal.

Here is what you can ask for, depending on where you pray:

• The Anointing of the Sick from a Catholic priest, which the Catechism says can be repeated when illness worsens.
• Holy Unction from an Orthodox priest.
• The ministry of wholeness and healing in an Anglican church.
• The Mi Shebeirach, said for you in a synagogue.
• Prayer with the elders or pastor of your own church.

As for the most powerful prayer, our own suggestion is that the strongest prayer is an honest one. A short prayer of our own, in plain words: "God, I am asking for healing. Give me strength for today as well. I am tired, and I am still here."

Some people stop asking. One person wrote on Reddit, in r/Catholicism, in 2026, "I don't ask for a cure anymore, as I am worried that it'll appear as if I'm disrespecting His decision." Every tradition above keeps asking for healing, in its own words, as part of prayer. Asking is not arguing with God.

What are the signs that God is healing me?

The signs of a body healing are read by your doctor and your tests. A sense of peace or strength in prayer is worth talking over with a chaplain, pastor or priest.

On whether an illness that stays means a test, a reply on Reddit in r/Catholicism, posted in 2024, says "not being healed when we think we should be is not necessarily a sign of a lack of faith."

What it is like to live with an illness that stays

This is what people say, believers and people who left alike. On Reddit, in r/Catholicism, one person asked, "Why is that when I pray for healing, nothing happens?" and "Why can't I be healthy and normal like other healthy normal people are?" A person with chronic migraines, also on Reddit in r/Catholicism, wrote, "I prayed for my chronic migraines to be lifted, but only if it's His will. And thus far it hasn't been his will."

On Reddit in r/ChronicPain, somebody wrote, "I literally have a friend who turned away from her faith because she was praying and praying and doing everything doctors said and she just got worse and worse." And on Reddit in r/Catholicism, another person said, "The only thing that keeps me going is my faith in His plan for me."

If you are worn out by waiting

Romans 15:13 is a prayer that hope would be given. Paul closes a call to patient, welcoming community with it.

Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope, in the power of the Holy Spirit.

What it gives is hope described as something God gives and grows, so a person too tired to manufacture hope is not failing. Read it once, and hold this question: "Where do you most need hope to be given rather than generated?" Romans 15:13 with the verses around it is there when you want the whole passage.

Waiting rooms and late evenings both ask a lot.

What lands badly, and what to say instead

If you are the friend, relative, pastor or church member, some lines hurt more than they help. On Reddit, in r/ChronicPain, a person living with a genetic disorder wrote, "I hate when people pray to heal me." and "I absolutely hate pushy pray the disability away people," and objected to being touched without being asked. On Reddit, in r/Catholicism, replies to somebody too ill to get to Mass said, "Being unable to make it to mass because of illness doesn’t make you any less Catholic." and "It’s not a spiritual failure."

You may recognize a line you have said yourself. Most of us have.

Bible verses for chronic pain has a section for the reader who was prayed over and is still in pain.

Where to go next

If the illness has become too heavy tonight, please reach a person. In the United States, call 988, text 988 or chat with the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, with help in Spanish at 988lifeline.org/es. In Canada, call or text 9-8-8. In the United Kingdom and Ireland, Samaritans is on 116 123. In Australia, Lifeline is on 13 11 14.

In Spain, the Línea 024 is on 024. In Mexico, the Línea de la Vida is on 800 911 2000. In Argentina, the Centro de Asistencia al Suicida is on 135 in Buenos Aires and 0800-345-1435. In Colombia, there is the Línea 106. Anywhere else, Find A Helpline lists lines by country.

One step for this week: ask one person, a chaplain, a priest or a pastor, to pray with you on the day of your next appointment, and keep the appointment.

Bible Nudge offers one passage with the verses around it. Find a passage.