Nothing can describe the horror when you hear doctors say, “You will never walk again or use your hands.” I spent many sleepless nights in the hospital, praying, “Oh God, may it not be so!” Visitors brightened the otherwise dreary days. One afternoon, a man I had frequently seen in the hospital hallways entered my four-bed ward. He came directly to my bed where I lay, paralyzed.
I liked his friendly manner. He talked freely about God and asked about my life before the accident. He told me about his ministry in our hospital, and I felt privileged that he had time for me. “Joni,” he said, “today is the day you’re going to begin your healing.” I was stunned by his confident tone of voice. He prayed, anointed me with oil, and we believed together that God was going to heal me. No wheelchair for me!
I waited all day, but nothing happened. I continued to pray for healing. When a month passed, I wondered, Maybe my healing will happen gradually. But my fingers and feet refused to respond to the command that my mind was saying—move, in Jesus’s name, move!
When I was released from the hospital, friends took me to healing crusades. But still, nothing happened. The way I saw it, God was either playing a cruel joke on me, or my view of Scripture was wrong.
That was more than 55 years ago. I have spent decades reading and researching what the Bible has to say on this subject. And here is the conclusion I’ve come to: God certainly can, and sometimes does, heal people in miraculous ways today. But the Bible does not teach that He will always heal those who come to Him in faith. God sovereignly reserves the right to heal or not to heal as He sees fit. So let me share what I’ve learned from the Bible in hopes it might answer a few of your questions about healing.
Praying for healing
Does God want us to pray for healing? Yes! When there is disease, accident, or injury, the Bible tells us to pray for healing (James 5:14).
Should we fully expect God to heal? All healing from every sort of affliction always comes from God’s hand (Psalm 103:3). But in view of the fact that Christ’s kingdom has not yet come in its fullness, we are not to automatically expect complete healing. Why should we arbitrarily single out physical disease—which is just one of sin’s many results—and treat it in a special way as something that Christians shouldn’t have to put up with? We are living in “this present age” and the emphasis on earthly problems in the New Testament tells us we’re going to have to put up with plenty (Mark 10:30)!
Praying without healing
Does it show a lack of faith if people are not healed? Jesus himself did not heal everyone He encountered. In John 5, Jesus healed one man at the pool of Bethesda while others continued in their suffering. The focus of our faith should always be on Jesus himself, not what He can do for us. And although Jesus wants what’s best for His followers, it does not mean an easy life with no head colds or back pain; God’s idea of “best” may be physical hardships that drive us closer to Him.
Why does God heal some people and not others? God may occasionally grant miraculous healing as a gracious “sneak preview” of the future kingdom, when His purposes for this age will be completed. So, when some people are healed miraculously, we find the courage to look forward to the time when God will extend complete healing to all His children (Isaiah 35:4-6).
What should be our response when God does not heal us? When bedsores afflict me as boils did Job, I will say with him, “Shall we indeed accept good from God and not accept adversity?” (Job 2:10). And when I feel bound to my wheelchair as Paul was to his chains, I will say with him, “For it has been granted to you on behalf of Christ to not only believe on him, but also to suffer for him” (Philippians 1:29).
Looking forward to certain healing
In every age God does His perfect work to accomplish His highest purposes. When we face adversity of any kind, we can trust the God who understands and cares about our pain.
Yes, it’s been hard to live this many decades paralyzed in my wheelchair. But it will not always be this way. I have hope. Christ is coming back. Of that day, Malachi 4:2 says, “The sun of righteousness will rise with healing in its rays. And you will go out and frolic like well-fed calves.” I wait eagerly and excitedly for the redemption of my body—and I don’t mind waiting patiently for it (Romans 8:23-25). Until such time, God is going to use my wheelchair as a convincing proof of the deeper healing He has given me—a settled soul, a hopeful spirit, and a confidence in grace that sustains me through every weakness.