If someone we love is not healed, what happens to our faith?

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star

Senior Member
Nov 8, 2017
1,582
2,046
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North Carolina
#1
I believe in the power of God to heal any disease, addiction or whatever but sometimes no matter how much we pray, that just does not happen.

What happens to our faith? Do we fold, lose, get weaker or stronger?
 

trofimus

Senior Member
Aug 17, 2015
10,684
794
113
#2
I believe in the power of God to heal any disease, addiction or whatever but sometimes no matter how much we pray, that just does not happen.

What happens to our faith? Do we fold, lose, get weaker or stronger?
The faith in charismatic movement is probably getting weaker.

The faith in God no matter what the circumstances are is probably getting stronger.
 

Noose

Senior Member
Apr 18, 2016
5,096
932
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#3
A famous man once said "..Anything you shall ask in my name, that shall i do.."

Asking in the name of Jesus doesn't mean what many think it means. First of all, the name here means authority and the authority that Jesus meant was the authority of the son- which means the Holy spirit asks what is within the will of the Father, not what we want or desire. God's will happens nevertheless- so when you pray, always start with: if it be your will...
 

Joidevivre

Senior Member
Jul 15, 2014
3,838
271
83
#4
We always look for the manifestation of healing according to our own framework. And when it does not happen the way we picture it, we forget that God has been working behind the scenes to bring healing in so many other areas. He is using the sickness in ways we do not comprehend. It could be the healing of relationships, the healing of our need to be always in control, the healing of our pride, the healing of our soul in facing up to the sins we hold such as bitterness, unforgiveness, anger and addictions (which are idols in our lives). The question we need to ask of Him is "What are you doing with this?" Then listen for new insights.

There is also the ways in which sickness brings us new revelations of God - how He can comfort - how He can bring help to face suffering - how He can enable us to take joy in little moments we often took for granted (a tasty bite of food), etc. But we need to keep our eyes on Him and watch. Always anticipate His working.

Whether our faith grows weaker or stronger depends on what our faith was in. And suffering/trials often show us.
I have learned not to place my faith in "healing", but in The Healer - who heals what needs to be healed at the right time. My faith is in Him as being sufficient for me.

Whether our faith grows weaker or stronger also depends on whether we have totally given ourselves to Him for His use and purposes, or if we are expecting Him to bend to our wills and desires for ourselves.

Suffering will reveal much about ourselves and about God if we let it.
 

joaniemarie

Senior Member
Jan 4, 2017
3,198
303
83
#5
Seeing is not believing.... Believing is seeing. It's not trusting in ourselves it's trusting and believing Jesus accomplished what He and the Bible say He accomplished. We persist in believing regardless of the world., the flesh or the devil. Those 3 things will always fight to get our eyes off of Jesus and onto other things. Our flesh has to be out of the loop when it comes to walking in the spirit. Can't have supernatural faith while walking in the natural flesh.

Just as we believe for everything else in our salvation., by grace through faith., we do the same for healing... by grace through faith. He supplies all our needs. Healing is one of many. That is how I've learned to think in the new covenant.

Just read this devotional this morning....
While waiting for the manifestation of their healing, some people find it hard to believe that Jesus really took their sicknesses and pains, just as He took their sin and shame. If you are one of them, don’t feel condemned. Your Father in heaven understands. That is why He put the word “surely” there when He said, “Surely, My Son has borne your sicknesses and carried your pains.”
Once, my daughter Jessica was crying all night because she was not feeling well. She had been sick for a few days. In my study, I took out my Bible and the Lord led me to Isaiah 53:4 where it says, “Surely He has borne…” Now, I know the original Hebrew here and it says, “Surely He has borne our sicknesses and carried our pains.” So I said, “Surely, He has borne Jessica’s sickness…”
But it was like the verse was just not real to me. Her cries seemed more real. Then, all of a sudden, the Holy Spirit opened my eyes to a word in the verse that really revolutionized the way I saw the whole passage.
Notice the first word in the verse? It says, “Surely…” Surely, He has borne our sicknesses and carried our pains. Now, look at the next verse: “He was wounded for our transgressions...” Every Christian knows and believes that Jesus was wounded for our sins, yet the word “surely” is not put here but in the earlier verse. I think God knew that we would find it hard to believe that Jesus also bore our sicknesses and carried our pains, so He put the word “surely” there to help us believe!
When I saw that, I put my Bible on the floor, stood on it and said, “Father, you know I don’t mean any irreverence, but I am standing on Your Word. Surely, Jesus bore Jessica’s sickness and carried her pain! I don’t care if I can still hear her crying. Surely, Your Son, Your beloved Son, bore her sickness and carried her pain! Hallelujah!” That night, the breakthrough came. That night, little Jessica was healed.
Are you or your loved ones suffering some sickness or pain right now?
Surely our Lord Jesus has borne your sicknesses and carried your pains. And as you believe this truth, surely, your healing and breakthrough will come!
 

star

Senior Member
Nov 8, 2017
1,582
2,046
113
North Carolina
#6
We always look for the manifestation of healing according to our own framework. And when it does not happen the way we picture it, we forget that God has been working behind the scenes to bring healing in so many other areas. He is using the sickness in ways we do not comprehend. It could be the healing of relationships, the healing of our need to be always in control, the healing of our pride, the healing of our soul in facing up to the sins we hold such as bitterness, unforgiveness, anger and addictions (which are idols in our lives). The question we need to ask of Him is "What are you doing with this?" Then listen for new insights.

There is also the ways in which sickness brings us new revelations of God - how He can comfort - how He can bring help to face suffering - how He can enable us to take joy in little moments we often took for granted (a tasty bite of food), etc. But we need to keep our eyes on Him and watch. Always anticipate His working.

Whether our faith grows weaker or stronger depends on what our faith was in. And suffering/trials often show us.
I have learned not to place my faith in "healing", but in The Healer - who heals what needs to be healed at the right time. My faith is in Him as being sufficient for me.

Whether our faith grows weaker or stronger also depends on whether we have totally given ourselves to Him for His use and purposes, or if we are expecting Him to bend to our wills and desires for ourselves.

Suffering will reveal much about ourselves and about God if we let it.

Awesome response. Absolute truth.
 

star

Senior Member
Nov 8, 2017
1,582
2,046
113
North Carolina
#7
An atheist will always use the fact that some are healed and some are not to further their agenda. Just saying
 

trofimus

Senior Member
Aug 17, 2015
10,684
794
113
#8
An atheist will always use the fact that some are healed and some are not to further their agenda. Just saying
But that does not support atheism.

The fact that God sometimes answers prayers and sometimes not does not imply his nonexistence. Such atheists are not clever ones.
 

Noose

Senior Member
Apr 18, 2016
5,096
932
113
#9
But that does not support atheism.

The fact that God sometimes answers prayers and sometimes not does not imply his nonexistence. Such atheists are not clever ones.
There are no clever atheists
 

MarcR

Senior Member
Feb 12, 2015
5,486
183
63
#11
I believe in the power of God to heal any disease, addiction or whatever but sometimes no matter how much we pray, that just does not happen.

What happens to our faith? Do we fold, lose, get weaker or stronger?

True faith should be unaffected!

God uses illness in believers' lives in several ways:

1) to get a person's attention when that person is resisting His will

2) using the way a person responds to the illness as a witness in another person's life

3) to encourage dependence on Himself and to encourage or deepen a person's prayer life

4) to glorify Himself when, in His time, prayer is answered

5) to call home a believer who is compromising his/her testimony [sometimes in ways we don't recognize]

6) to get the attention of a person other than the one who is sick

7) as with Job, to demonstrate the sick person's faithfulness.
 

LaurieB

Senior Member
Mar 12, 2018
177
10
18
#12
True faith should be unaffected!

God uses illness in believers' lives in several ways:

1) to get a person's attention when that person is resisting His will

2) using the way a person responds to the illness as a witness in another person's life

3) to encourage dependence on Himself and to encourage or deepen a person's prayer life

4) to glorify Himself when, in His time, prayer is answered

5) to call home a believer who is compromising his/her testimony [sometimes in ways we don't recognize]

6) to get the attention of a person other than the one who is sick

7) as with Job, to demonstrate the sick person's faithfulness.
How does this apply to babies and young children whose parents pray and pray and still the child dies? How is God trying to get their attention? the parents' attention? There is just no answer. Sometimes prayer is answered; sometimes it is not. But is God trying to punish certain people and not others who are equally sinful or are in the positions you describe above? why are some sick and others well. Some evil people enjoy great health while good people suffer horribly.
I dont know if God answers prayer.

Some people say ... sometimes the answer is no, but that is playing mind games with oneself. No is the same as a non-answer unless God literally talks to you and tells you.

"faith should be unaffected" ... BUT very often faith takes a strong hit, especially when a parent loses a child.
 

stonesoffire

Poetic Member
Nov 24, 2013
10,665
1,829
113
#13
If anything that happens in this earthly realm affects our faith? Then we have taken our eyes off of Jesus and His Word.

It's always a personal faith...a personal walk with the Lord. What is He saying to me personally about whatever situation?

What is from Him will always be confirmed to us. Then the battle of holding faith against lies, no matter who they come from, and how...is what determines the outcome.
 

stonesoffire

Poetic Member
Nov 24, 2013
10,665
1,829
113
#14
How does this apply to babies and young children whose parents pray and pray and still the child dies? How is God trying to get their attention? the parents' attention? There is just no answer. Sometimes prayer is answered; sometimes it is not. But is God trying to punish certain people and not others who are equally sinful or are in the positions you describe above? why are some sick and others well. Some evil people enjoy great health while good people suffer horribly.
I dont know if God answers prayer.

Some people say ... sometimes the answer is no, but that is playing mind games with oneself. No is the same as a non-answer unless God literally talks to you and tells you.

"faith should be unaffected" ... BUT very often faith takes a strong hit, especially when a parent loses a child.
Praying and praying is just asking over and over. There comes a time of receiving. When we know that He hears us, we know that we have the thing we are asking for.

I don't have all the answers to all problems. Just what I have learned so far.
 

MarcR

Senior Member
Feb 12, 2015
5,486
183
63
#15
How does this apply to babies and young children whose parents pray and pray and still the child dies? How is God trying to get their attention? the parents' attention? There is just no answer. Sometimes prayer is answered; sometimes it is not. But is God trying to punish certain people and not others who are equally sinful or are in the positions you describe above? why are some sick and others well. Some evil people enjoy great health while good people suffer horribly.
I dont know if God answers prayer.

Some people say ... sometimes the answer is no, but that is playing mind games with oneself. No is the same as a non-answer unless God literally talks to you and tells you.

"faith should be unaffected" ... BUT very often faith takes a strong hit, especially when a parent loses a child.
It is NEVER our responsibility to critique God's decisions. If you were not one of the parents you have NO IDEA what was happening in their relationship with God, or whether God was trying to work in another person's life through the way they handled it.

If you are one of the parents, you would do well to ask God what He is trying to tell you.
 

LaurieB

Senior Member
Mar 12, 2018
177
10
18
#16
Praying and praying is just asking over and over. There comes a time of receiving. When we know that He hears us, we know that we have the thing we are asking for.

I don't have all the answers to all problems. Just what I have learned so far.
Of course. God has his reasons. Of that I am sure. We just need to have enough faith to accept what happens. God is love.
 

RickyZ

Senior Member
Sep 20, 2012
9,635
787
113
#17
I believe in the power of God to heal any disease, addiction or whatever but sometimes no matter how much we pray, that just does not happen.

What happens to our faith? Do we fold, lose, get weaker or stronger?
Miracle healings were NEVER intended to be a healthcare plan. It is an instrument to show the power of God and bolster faith. If you expect a prayer to take the place of a doctor you WILL be disappointed.
 

LaurieB

Senior Member
Mar 12, 2018
177
10
18
#18
It is NEVER our responsibility to critique God's decisions. If you were not one of the parents you have NO IDEA what was happening in their relationship with God, or whether God was trying to work in another person's life through the way they handled it.

??? I dont understand what you are trying to tell me. I would imagine the pain of losing a child is UNIMAGINABLY HORRIFIC and that parents who have prayed and prayed would be very shaken up. We are not saints.
 

LaurieB

Senior Member
Mar 12, 2018
177
10
18
#19
Your picture of the hand reaching out from the fire ... what is that supposed to mean?
 

MarcR

Senior Member
Feb 12, 2015
5,486
183
63
#20
It is NEVER our responsibility to critique God's decisions. If you were not one of the parents you have NO IDEA what was happening in their relationship with God, or whether God was trying to work in another person's life through the way they handled it.

??? I dont understand what you are trying to tell me. I would imagine the pain of losing a child is UNIMAGINABLY HORRIFIC and that parents who have prayed and prayed would be very shaken up. We are not saints.
I know how horrific it is; since I have lost a son.

I know that at least 3 people who I had been witnessing to came to faith as a result of how my wife and I handled the loss.