Bible verses about healing

Praise the LORD, my soul, and don’t forget all his benefits, who forgives all your sins, who heals all your diseases

Psalm 103:2–3

David is counting God’s gifts, not promising a cure for every illness in this life; he is saying that every healing, whenever it comes, comes from God.

A leper came to him, begging him, kneeling down to him, and saying to him, “If you want to, you can make me clean.” Being moved with compassion, he stretched out his hand, and touched him, and said to him, “I want to. Be made clean.”

Mark 1:40–41

A man with leprosy, kept at a distance by everyone, asked whether Jesus was willing, and Jesus touched him before healing him; he is not reluctant to come near the sick.

Jesus went about all the cities and the villages, teaching in their synagogues and preaching the Good News of the Kingdom, and healing every disease and every sickness among the people. But when he saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion for them because they were harassed and scattered, like sheep without a shepherd.

Matthew 9:35–36

Matthew sums up Jesus’ work in Galilee and shows where his healing came from: compassion for worn-out, scattered people, which is still how he looks at you.

But he was pierced for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. The punishment that brought our peace was on him; and by his wounds we are healed.

Isaiah 53:5

Isaiah foresaw a Servant suffering for others, fulfilled in Jesus’ death; the healing is first from sin (1 Peter 2:24), with full healing of the body still to come at the resurrection.

Have mercy on me, LORD, for I am faint. LORD, heal me, for my bones are troubled. My soul is also in great anguish. But you, LORD—how long?

Psalm 6:2–3

David prayed this while worn out in body and soul, and his unfinished question at the end shows you can bring God your frustration, not only your requests.

My flesh and my heart fails, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.

Psalm 73:26

The psalmist Asaph admits that body and heart give out; he doesn’t deny the weakness, but finds beneath it a God who remains his strength forever.

He gives power to the weak. He increases the strength of him who has no might. Even the youths faint and get weary, and the young men utterly fall; but those who wait for the LORD will renew their strength. They will mount up with wings like eagles. They will run, and not be weary. They will walk, and not faint.

Isaiah 40:29–31

Isaiah addressed God’s weary people who felt forgotten; the promise is renewed strength for those who wait on the LORD, which may be strength to endure rather than a quick recovery.

In the same way, the Spirit also helps our weaknesses, for we don’t know how to pray as we ought. But the Spirit himself makes intercession for us with groanings which can’t be uttered.

Romans 8:26

Writing about believers who groan while waiting for the body’s redemption, Paul says the Spirit intercedes for them when they don’t know how to pray, so you aren’t alone when words run out.

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; and the prayer of faith will heal him who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up.

James 5:14–15

James tells sick believers to ask the church to pray over them; it is an invitation, not a formula, and when healing doesn’t come, it never means someone’s faith was too weak.

Four people came, carrying a paralytic to him. When they could not come near to him for the crowd, they removed the roof where he was. When they had broken it up, they let down the mat that the paralytic was lying on. Jesus, seeing their faith, said to the paralytic, “Son, your sins are forgiven you.”

Mark 2:3–5

Four friends carried a paralyzed man to Jesus, who noticed their faith, forgave the man and then healed him (Mark 2:11); praying for someone is a way of carrying them.

For indeed he was sick nearly to death, but God had mercy on him, and not on him only, but on me also, that I might not have sorrow on sorrow.

Philippians 2:27

Paul’s friend Epaphroditus nearly died while serving him; Paul openly admits how much he dreaded the grief and calls the recovery God’s mercy, not something he could command.

I was sick and you visited me.

Matthew 25:36

Describing the final judgment, Jesus counts care for the sick as care for him; a visit, a meal or a phone call belongs alongside your prayers.

Therefore we don’t faint, but though our outward person is decaying, yet our inward person is renewed day by day. For our light affliction, which is for the moment, works for us more and more exceedingly an eternal weight of glory

2 Corinthians 4:16–17

Paul, who knew beatings, hunger and hardship firsthand (2 Corinthians 11:27), admits the body is wearing out; he isn’t minimizing pain, only weighing it against a glory that lasts forever.

For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which will be revealed toward us.

Romans 8:18

Paul wrote this in a chapter about creation groaning and believers waiting; he doesn’t pretend suffering is small, but says what is coming will far outweigh it.

So also is the resurrection of the dead. The body is sown perishable; it is raised imperishable. It is sown in dishonor; it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness; it is raised in power.

1 Corinthians 15:42–43

Answering questions about the resurrection, Paul says the bodies that weaken and die now will be raised whole and glorious, the healing every believer will finally receive.

He will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; neither will there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain any more. The first things have passed away.

Revelation 21:4

In John’s vision of the new heaven and earth, God himself ends pain and death; for anyone whose prayers for healing were not answered as they hoped, this is the last word.