Why Are Some Believers Never Healed?
1) Direct Answer
Some believers are not healed because healing works on promised grounds—faith, obedience, and a clear channel—yet God also deals as a Father, correcting, proving, and timing all things. Unbelief, unconfessed wrongs, bitterness, wrong approaches to the Lord’s Table, and the atmosphere around us can hinder. And remember, our bodies are not yet glorified; the full and final healing is guaranteed in the resurrection.
2) Scriptural Explanation
- Healing is provided:
- “By His stripes we are healed” (Isaiah 53:5; 1 Peter 2:24). Jesus bore our sicknesses (Matthew 8:16-17). The Lord is our Healer (Exodus 15:26). The prayer of faith shall save the sick (James 5:14-16).
- Hindrances the Bible names:
- Unbelief shuts the door: In His own country “He could there do no mighty work” because of unbelief (Mark 6:5-6). A double‑minded man “let not that man think that he shall receive” (James 1:6-7).
- Unconfessed faults and broken fellowship: “Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed” (James 5:16). If you’ve got something against your brother, first be reconciled (Matthew 5:23-24). Husbands, dwell rightly with your wives “that your prayers be not hindered” (1 Peter 3:7).
- Dishonoring the Lord’s Table: “For this cause many are weak and sickly among you” for not discerning the Lord’s body (1 Corinthians 11:29-30).
- Some conditions are direct bondage and must be driven out: a “spirit of infirmity” bound a daughter of Abraham (Luke 13:11,16). Some cases “goeth not out but by prayer and fasting” (Mark 9:29).
- God’s fatherly purpose and timing:
- Sometimes it is for the works of God to be revealed (John 9:3).
- Paul’s “thorn” remained so that the Lord’s grace would be magnified (2 Corinthians 12:7-9).
- The Lord chastens sons for our profit (Hebrews 12:6-11).
- Not all saints in Scripture were instantly healed:
- Trophimus was left at Miletum sick (2 Timothy 4:20).
- Timothy had “often infirmities” and stomach trouble (1 Timothy 5:23).
- The finality of healing awaits the resurrection:
- We “groan… waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body” (Romans 8:23). Until this mortal puts on immortality, we still fight corruption and death (1 Corinthians 15:53-54).
3) Simple Clarifying Logic
- The price is paid, but the promise is received by faith. Where unbelief or disobedience remains, the channel is clogged.
- Faith works by love; bitterness and broken relationships short‑circuit prayer.
- God has not withdrawn healing—James 5 still stands—but He reserves the right to prove us and perfect character.
- Not healed today does not mean not saved, and it does not make the promise void. Salvation is the greater gift; bodily healing is a benefit now and total at the resurrection.
4) Short Reinforcing Counsel
- Set the channel right: repent, forgive, make wrongs right (James 5:16; Matthew 5:23-24).
- Ask the elders; be anointed; expect God (James 5:14-15).
- Feed your faith on the Word; keep your confession aligned with the promise (Romans 10:17; Hebrews 10:23; Mark 11:24).
- Remove the atmosphere of unbelief; Jesus put out the scorners (Mark 5:40).
- Resist the devil; don’t watch the symptoms—hold the promise (James 4:7).
- If the answer tarries, don’t accuse God. His grace is sufficient, and the full healing of the body is certain in the resurrection.
Now notice, two errors must be rejected: saying “healing is not for today” contradicts James 5 and Hebrews 13:8; saying “if you’re not healed you lack salvation” contradicts Paul, Timothy, and Trophimus. The Bible keeps it straight: the promise stands, faith receives, sin and unbelief hinder, and God’s timing and fatherly purpose are perfect.
Ask a Follow-up Question
What did the Laodicean Church Age (our age) Angel (- messenger) Say about this?
Ranked passages from the local William Branham sermon and Church Age Book database. Relevance is relative, not a statement of doctrinal certainty.
Jehovah-Jireh
56-0429 §87
..., sister? You're mighty young to have that kind of a condition. It's a female condition, a lady's trouble. That is right, isn't it? You believe He heals you? You're feeling something now you've never had before. Isn't that right? Now, go believing. It'll come to pass. If thou canst believe. Sister, you got one of the worst diseases there is: heart trouble. But God can heal heart trouble, can't He? You believe it? You believe it? All right, then go and receive it, and be made well, with all your heart. How do you do...
God's Eye
58-0225 §34
Lady, don't know whether you're aware of this or not, but you're shadowed with a cancer. You knew it. All right, do you believe that God healed you? Go, never be bothered with it again. Come, lady. You've been nervous for a long time. That started when you was a woman about forty, when there was a change of life come on you, which was called the menopause. Through that, you've had much trouble. And the trouble now has settled to a spastic condition of the stomach in here, which makes you have a stomach trouble. It'...
Faith
61-0813 §13
...areth. He could not heal people against their own faith. He said, "I can, if you believe. If you believe that I'm able to do this, I can do it---if you can believe it." So, some people throws the power of healing into some other evangelist. It's not there; the power of healing's in you. It's in you. They just put the cart before the horse. The evangelist doesn't have power to heal. It's the Holy Spirit that has power to heal, and you have the Holy Spirit. That's the little tree that you are. And all the things that...
The Identified Christ of all ages
64-0409 §2
...And another thing, my message is mostly to the full gospel people. It's on them ... basis, although everybody comes. We pray for the sick. We don't claim to be a healer, or somebody that can heal someone. We believe that there's only one healer---that's God. But we believe that He ordained men to pray for the sick, and we do that. We pray for the sick. And the Lord has been gracious to us, to answer our prayers so many times. And we ... around the world we've seen, well, just multiplied thousand times thousands of...
We would see Jesus
61-0409 §3
And I believe that divine healing is based upon a faith, just like salvation, that we believe that "He was wounded for our transgressions, with his stripes we were healed." You notice the apostle Peter places it in the past tense: "... we were healed." It's a past tense, just like salvation is a past tense. When Jesus died at Calvary, He saved the whole world. Every human being ever would be on the earth, the sin question was settled once for all when Jesus died. But it will never ... you'll never be a beneficiary...