This post is one that is hugely personal to me and is on a topic that I have spent a long time looking at and learning about. If you have ever prayed for healing – whether that’s mental health, physical health, or emotional wounds – you will know how hard it is when healing doesn’t come in the way you expect.

Perhaps you’ve cried out to God, but your depression still lingers. Maybe you’ve begged for relief from physical pain, but the symptoms persist. Maybe you’ve asked God to heal the wounds of trauma, but you still wake up feeling broken. When healing doesn’t come – or when it comes slowly – it’s easy to feel forgotten, discouraged, or even angry at God.

If you’ve asked God, Why haven’t you healed me? I want you to know that you are not alone. You only have to look through the Bible to see this. Some of the people we most associate with faith wrestled with this question.

Paul, for example, had what he called a ‘thorn in the flesh’. Whilst we don’t know what it was exactly – some people believe that it was a chronic illness, others think it was emotional suffering – but what we do know is that Paul pleaded with God three times to take it away. And God’s response?

“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” (2 Corinthians 12:9)

That wasn’t the answer that Paul was looking for. He wanted healing. But instead, God gave him grace. And that’s hard to accept, isn’t it? Because when we pray for healing, we don’t just want grace to endure – we want relief. And when it doesn’t come, it becomes easy to wonder if God is even listening.

I think that one of the hardest things about faith is that we often expect healing to come in a specific way, but God sees the bigger picture.

Does that mean we shouldn’t pray for healing? Not at all. Jesus himself healed people throughout the Gospels. God is a healer, and we should absolutely bring our needs to Him. But sometimes, it doesn’t happen in the way we expect.

Maybe healing is happening slowly, in a process instead of a miracle. Maybe healing isn’t just physical, but emotional or spiritual. Maybe healing comes in the form of endurance and peace in the middle of suffering, rather than the removal of the suffering itself.

One of my favourite reminders of this comes from Isaiah 43:2

“When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned.”

God doesn’t promise we won’t walk through deep waters or fire. But He does promise to be with us in it.

Holding Onto Faith in the Waiting

So, what do we do when healing feels out of reach? How do we hold onto faith when we’re still in the middle of pain?

1. Be honest with God – God isn’t afraid of your frustration, your disappointment, or your doubt. If you feel angry, tell Him. If you feel weary, cry out to Him. The Psalms are full of raw, unfiltered prayers – God invites that kind of honesty.
2. Remember that suffering is not a sign of abandonment – one of the biggest lies we believe is that if we’re still suffering, it must mean God has forgotten us. But the cross tells a different story. Jesus Himself suffered, not because He lacked faith, but because suffering is part of life in a broken world. God’s presence is not proven by the absence of pain – He is with us in the pain.
3. Look for small signs of grace – sometimes, healing comes in unexpected ways. Maybe you’re not free from illness, but you’ve found a deeper sense of peace. Maybe you still struggle, but you’ve built a community that walks with you. Healing isn’t always about the absence of pain – it’s also about the presence of God’s grace in the middle of it.
4. Keep hoping, even in the unknown – it’s okay to wrestle with God’s timing. It’s okay to not understand. But don’t lose sight of this: the story isn’t over yet. We may not see full healing in this life, but as Revelation 21:4 reminds us, there is a day coming when:

“He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”

And that is the ultimate hope we cling to. One day, all suffering will end. Until then, God walks with us through it.

I recently read Ruth Chou Simons book ‘Now and Not Yet’ and it changed my perspective completely. I highly encourage reading it if you have struggled with trusting God in the waiting. The book touches on seasons of waiting and when life isn’t what we have hoped or planned.

“I truly believe your current season is not wasted,” writes Simons. “God is purposeful about what happens between today and tomorrow, between right now and someday. My prayer is that we stop hiding behind simple platitudes and quick fixes to our unwanted right nows and bravely step into the ways God wants to change us… instead of staying busy trying to change our circumstances.”

All my love,

Anna x