Living with Chronic Illness: Finding God in My Unfinished Story
Living with chronic illness has forced me into a life I never would have chosen. There are days when simply standing up feels like an accomplishment, days when symptoms flare without warning, and days when I grieve the person I used to be. I used to move through the world quickly and confidently. Now I live with limits that I never asked for—and cannot escape.
In the early years, I prayed constantly for healing. I wanted the miracle stories of Scripture to be my story but as time passed and my body did not change, I found myself wrestling with a far more complicated question: Where is God when healing doesn’t come?
Slowly, I began to see that Scripture isn’t only filled with instant miracles—it’s also filled with people who walked with God in ongoing weakness. Paul’s thorn in the flesh. Elijah’s exhaustion. Job’s bewildering suffering. Even Jesus, who knew what it was to ask for something and still face the harder road. These stories taught me that unanswered prayers does not mean God is absent. Sometimes they mean God is teaching me how to find him in places I never looked before.
Chronic illness has made my life slower, smaller in some ways but in that slowness, I’ve discovered that God often speaks in quieter tones than I used to notice. I’ve learned to pay attention—to the whisper rather than the whirlwind, to the grace that comes in daily “manna” rather than grand interventions. God may not have removed my pain, but he has not left me alone in it.
Over time, I’ve let go of the idea that my worth is tied to my productivity or strength. My value isn’t in what I can accomplish on my best days, nor diminished by what I can’t do on my worst. I am learning—slowly, imperfectly—that God’s love for me has never depended on my energy level or my ability to carry my own weight.
My story is one of unfinished healing, but it is also a story of unexpected nearness. Chronic illness hasn’t made my faith weaker; it has made it quieter, deeper, more honest. I am still waiting, still hoping, still praying—but I am not waiting alone.
And maybe that is its own kind of miracle.
Leonora
