Some prayers here come word for word from Scripture and church books, and I wrote the rest for kitchens at two in the morning and long drives to appointments.
List Of 20 Prayers For Health And Healing For Family:
#1 Heal Me, O LORD (Jeremiah 17:14)
Jeremiah prayed this while people in Judah mocked him and asked where God’s word was. “Heal me, O LORD, and I shall be healed; save me, and I shall be saved: for thou art my praise.”
#2 A Prayer for a Sick Child
A fever at two in the morning feels longer than a whole week. I like prayers for kids short, since a scared child with a hot forehead and a parent pacing the hallway with a thermometer in one hand and a phone in the other has no patience for long ones.
Father, You know this little one better than we do. Cool the fever in her body and calm her breathing tonight. Guide the hands of whoever treats her, and grant us patience while we wait. Let her wake up hungry and asking for her toys. Guard her brothers and sisters from it. Amen.
#3 The Five-Word Prayer of Moses (Numbers 12:13)
When Miriam became leprous, “white as snow,” Moses answer with five words in Hebrew: El na refa na lah. Short is fine when fear has emptied your head.
“And Moses cried unto the LORD, saying, Heal her now, O God, I beseech thee.”
Family version: God, please, heal him now. Amen.
#4 A Prayer Before Surgery
Psalm 4:8 is for the minutes before anesthesia: “I will both lay me down in peace, and sleep: for thou, LORD, only makest me dwell in safety.”
Lord Jesus, tomorrow my husband goes into surgery. Steady the surgeon’s hands and keep the nurses alert through the whole shift. Guard his heart and his breathing while he sleeps. When he wakes, let the first face he sees be one of ours. Amen.
#5 Hezekiah’s Prayer for Bad News (2 Kings 20:5)
Isaiah told King Hezekiah to set his house in order and Hezekiah faced the wall and wept. God sent Isaiah back with an answer, and fifteen years were added to the king’s life. I save this one for days when a doctor’s news is bad.
“I have heard thy prayer, I have seen thy tears: behold, I will heal thee.”
Lord, You heard Hezekiah through the wall he was facing. Hear us in this waiting room. Add days to my father’s life, and add good ones. Amen.
#6 A Prayer for Aging Parents
Psalm 71:9 asks God to stay close in late life: “Cast me not off in the time of old age; forsake me not when my strength faileth.”
Father, my parents raised us on long shifts and short sleep. Now their knees ache and the pill box has seven compartments. Keep their minds clear and their steps steady on the stairs. Give them good days with their grandchildren, and make us patient when they repeat a story for the fourth time. Amen.
#7 Keep Watch, Dear Lord
This night prayer comes from the Compline service in the Episcopal Book of Common Prayer (page 134), and some people attribute it to Augustine of Hippo (354-430). “Shield the joyous” felt like a strange line on a sick list until I pictured a maternity ward one floor up from oncology.
“Keep watch, dear Lord, with those who work, or watch, or weep this night, and give your angels charge over those who sleep. Tend the sick, Lord Christ; give rest to the weary, bless the dying, soothe the suffering, pity the afflicted, shield the joyous; and all for your love’s sake. Amen.”
#8 A Prayer for Doctors and Nurses
Paul call Luke “the beloved physician” in Colossians 4:14. Sirach 38 tells readers to give a physician his due, because the Lord created him.
God of all healing, bless the people in scrubs tonight. Make the nurse on her third double shift sharp and calm. Clear the doctor’s head when the chart is confusing. Send them home to their families with enough strength left for a smile. Amen.
#9 Forget Not His Benefits (Psalm 103:2-3)
David lists what God does in this psalm, and healing comes second, right after forgiveness. It’s a thank-you prayer for the day a test comes back clean.
“Bless the LORD, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits: Who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases;”
Thank You for the clear scan, Lord. I almost forgot to say it. Amen.
#10 A Prayer for a Spouse in Recovery
Wedding vows say “in sickness and in health,” and the sickness part is harder. Ecclesiastes 4:10 has two people on a road: “For if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow.” Lord, my wife is relearning the stairs after her knee surgery. Strengthen the muscles that were cut and the patience that is wearing thin in both of us. Let me help without hovering. When she makes it to the top step, let us laugh about how slow it was. Amen.
#11 A Prayer to Saint Peregrine for Cancer Treatment
Saint Peregrine Laziosi (1260-1345) is the patron saint of cancer patients. At sixty, a infection in his right leg got so bad that a surgeon planned to cut it off. The night before he prayed in front of a fresco of the Crucifixion and dreamed that Jesus came down and touched his leg. In the morning the doctor found nothing left to remove. Pope Benedict XIII made him a saint in 1726.
Saint Peregrine, pray for my sister as she starts chemotherapy. Lord Jesus, You touched his leg in a dream. Touch the cells in her body that have gone wrong, and spare the healthy ones. Settle her stomach on infusion days. Save her hair if You are willing, and her sense of humor in any case. Amen.
#12 Newman’s Evening Prayer
John Henry Newman (1801-1890) closed his sermon “Wisdom and Innocence” with these lines. Caregivers like “the fever of life,” and so do I (I first filed it with prayers for grief, but it is about rest).
“May the Lord support us all the day long, till the shades lengthen and the evening comes, and the busy world is hushed, and the fever of life is over, and our work is done. Then in his mercy may he give us a safe lodging, and holy rest, and peace at the last. Amen.”
#13 A Prayer for a Baby in the NICU
Psalm 139:13 says: “thou hast covered me in my mother’s womb.” A baby born early left that covering before it was finished.
Maker of tiny lungs, finish what You started. Grow this little one ounce by ounce under the warm lights. Chase infection away from her incubator. Steady the nurses’ hands on the IV lines, and let us sleep a little in the chair by her side. Amen.
14. A Prayer for Anxiety and Depression in the Family
Mental illness is a health problem. I’d put it on any list about healing. Psalm 147:3 says it in one line: “He healeth the broken in heart, and bindeth up their wounds.” Lord, my son has not left his room in three days. Reach him where we cannot. Quiet the voice that lies to him at night, and bring the right counselor to his door. Give us words that open it. Amen.
#15 The Prayer of Faith (James 5:14-15)
Is your church still anointing the sick with olive oil? Catholic and many Protestant churches do, because of these two verses.
“Is any sick among you? let him call for the elders of the church; and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord: And the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up; and if he have committed sins, they shall be forgiven him.”
Father, our elders are coming over tonight with a little bottle of oil. Hear what they pray over Mom, and raise her up as James wrote. Amen.
#16 For the Caregiver
During a battle with Amalek, Aaron and Hur propped up Moses’ tired arms on a stone until sunset (Exodus 17:12). Caregivers do that job for months, and somebody have to pray for them. Lord, I am the one who drives to appointments and counts the pills. I am tired in my bones. Send me an Aaron and a Hur this week. Give me one full night of sleep and a friend who brings soup without asking. Amen.
#17 For the Household in Flu Season
Psalm 91:6 names “the pestilence that walketh in darkness.” In a house with kids, one bug in October can go around until spring, and it’s season always seems to start the week of a birthday party.
God, guard this house from the cough going around school. Wash what our hands miss. Keep Grandpa clear of it, and send whoever does get sick a short fever and a quick bounce back. Amen.
#18 A Prayer Shaped by the Mi Sheberach
Mi Sheberach is Hebrew for “He who blessed,” and on Shabbat many synagogues go through a list of sick people for this blessing. Tradition calls the patient son or daughter of his or her mother. Debbie Friedman and Drorah Setel wrote a sung version in 1987, and the lines below are mine, shaped like the traditional prayer.
May the One who blessed our mothers and fathers bless and heal Daniel, son of Ruth. Renew his body and his spirit, quickly and soon. Amen.
#19 For Chronic Illness (2 Corinthians 12:9)
Paul begged three times for his thorn in the flesh to go away, and this is the answer he got: “My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness.” With lupus or diabetes, healing may look like a good week.
Lord, this illness is staying. Give me more good days than bad ones this month. Let me use the good ones well and forgive myself for the bad ones. Be strong where I am weak. Amen.
#20 A Blessing for Family Far Away (3 John 1:2)
John opened his letter to Gaius with a wish for good health. I send this verse by text to relatives in other cities, and it works better than a get-well emoji.
“Beloved, I wish above all things that thou mayest prosper and be in health, even as thy soul prospereth.”
Father, I cannot drive over with soup. Go where I can’t, stay by his bed, and let him feel us praying from three hundred miles off. Amen.
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