Healing Starts in Your Heart

Be merciful to me, Lord, for I am faint; Ο Lord, heal me, for my bones are in agony.

Psalm 6:2

This is the first of the penitential psalms.

It’s a prayer born out of desperate circumstances. We don’t know the precise circumstances behind David’s prayer, but that doesn’t matter because they speak to a universal need for forgiveness and healing of the mind, body, and soul.

Doctors have long known that there is a close relationship between the physical and spiritual sides of life. Although the precise relationship is difficult to define or quantify, every doctor has seen the principle in action. Ask any doctor and they will tell stories about patients who should have died but didn’t—the only possible explanation was their positive, hope-filled outlook on life. Ask that same doctor, and they will give you other stories of people who came into treatment in a negative or angry or hostile mode and who stayed sick longer than they should have.

When you approach life positively and with an optimistic outlook, you are much more likely to stay healthy. A negative attitude often leads to poor health. Solomon reflected this truth when he wrote that “a cheerful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones” (Prov. 17:22).

It is fascinating that James connected prayer for healing with confession of sin (James 5:14–16). He seems to imply that when the elders pray over the sick, they are to inquire as to the spiritual status of the sick person, which suggests the sickness might be connected with unresolved issues in the soul.

Over the decades of my ministry, I have seen this principle repeatedly. As the church leaders gather to pray for the sick, we always ask, “Are you aware of anything in your life that might be causing your current sickness?” Usually, the answer is negative, but occasionally, the person will respond with a confession that involves bitterness, unforgiveness, or other debilitating sins that can block God’s healing power.

This is not to suggest all sickness is connected to personal sin. But sometimes it is, and when that happens, thoughtful Christians will encourage the person to take steps of confession, repentance, and where appropriate, restitution. In other cases, sickness exists not because of any particular sin but simply as a result of living in a sin-cursed world.

When Jesus comes back, sin and sickness will finally be banished from the earth forever. Until that day, we believers can demonstrate our faith amid sickness, and we also have the privilege of bringing our cases to the Great Physician and asking for the healing we need.

Lord Jesus, create in me a clean heart that I might be healed from the inside out. Amen.

1. Do you agree that a person’s spiritual state plays a crucial role in the healing process?

2. Have you ever seen anyone get better (or worse) because of this principle?

3. Why does healing almost always begin in the heart?