God Doesn’t Always Heal Us This Side of Heaven

I remember telling people that God would heal them if they just had enough faith. And I remember telling them that because that was what was told to me.

And it was what shamed me when I wasn’t healed. When it led to medical interventions to save my life because “God didn’t miraculously heal me”.

Well-meaning believers telling me I just needed more faith. And it was my own fault that I wasn’t healed.

But you see God did something through my own pain and suffering. While I don’t believe He caused it, I believe He allowed it to shape me and build character in me that I just couldn’t build if everything was “perfect”.

My tears make me more compassionate to others weeping.

My pain makes me more kind and grace-filled towards those in pain.

My neurodivergence allows me to see people that are never seen.

And my current ailments in my physical body give me empathy to a whole new world (to me) of those that suffer with pain chronically.

I have shared in the past that I deal with a lot of pain in my body. Often I have attributed that to gluten, but the truth is that I’ve been hiding this pain all my life. Since I was a child I was always in pain. Joints dislocating, and dealing with hyper mobility issues, which I didn’t understand until recently. (Gluten definitely makes things worse though, that’s for sure!)

All I knew is I had to quit sports because I was jamming my fingers, rolling ankles, or just couldn’t quite keep up because running was really hard on my body. I was tired all the time. I never slept in one position and still to this day I don’t sleep because of the pain. I just thought I was not good at sports. (Also, I was not always this weight. I was much smaller most of my life. The weight has piled on because of my disordered eating—aka not eating due to texture and sensory issues, and because every single time I try to exercise I forget my limits because it feels so good to move that I roll an ankle or pull something. And because of my pain, my feet have been struggling for years. Even walking hurts.)

Through the years I would share a pain I was dealing with and I would hear, “That happens to me too.” So I assumed I was just like everyone else. That what I dealt with was just a “normal part of life”.

But years later I am discovering that there’s nothing “normal” about my level of pain. In fact, the more I deny it or try to “pray it away” the more it is slowly crushing me and these issues are causing more issues and I’m now over my head.

There’s a very real chance I may have Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, and my next step is to see a rheumatologist.

For years I refused to go to a doctor about any of this because I just kept praying that God would heal me. And I lived in shame for not having enough faith. I have denied my reality in hopes of a new reality coming soon. And while there’s nothing wrong with believing in faith that God can heal us, we have to be careful to not deny reality and deal with the experience we are having.

I believe that God can heal me! I don’t have any faith issues, and my going to a doctor to get to the root of the pain doesn’t make my faith weak.

I have been a Christian most of my life, but even I still have lies I need to smash and roads less traveled I need to walk.

Sometimes God heals us through a miracle, and sometimes He heals us through medical intervention and a healing journey.

I am not broken. But I will be slowing down to honor my body and give it the rest it has been begging me to give it. And I will still be believing God for healing, no matter what avenue He chooses to use to heal me.

God is still good whether He heals me here or not. 💕

Blessings,

-Nikki