I once had someone pray that I would be healed of hearing loss.
In today’s airbrushed, PhotoShop world, flaws can be erased in just a few keystrokes. My hearing loss was something I wanted to disappear. So when the person of great faith prayed for my healing, tears welled in my eyes. I was overwhelmed at the possibility that I wouldn’t have to wear hearing aids to have a normal conversation, or that my children could ask me a question one time and I would understand them.
Some may be skeptical of the healing-prayer belief. I was. Doctors and medicine contribute to healing, but people who pray?
In the spring of 2007, I attended a worship service with a lifelong friend. She was concerned about my hearing struggles, as I was. She caught the sounds I missed during our time together… The jokes I didn’t laugh at. The conversation I pretended to hear even when I didn’t have a clue. My young boy’s comments from the back seat of the car while we drove; his repeated use of the words “stupid mom.”
“That’s enough,” my friend said to him. “You don’t talk to your mom that way.”
“What did he say?” I was oblivious, and it embarrassed me.
At the worship service, she walked with me to the altar for prayer time. A pastor met us there.
“What can I pray for you?” he said.
Somewhere, the Bible talks about the proper way of praying for a person’s healing. I didn’t know the exact verse, but the pastor did.
“‘Is any one of you sick?'” he read from James in the New Testament. “‘The prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise him up.'”
My flawed ears made me sick at my stomach. How could I be a good mom without the ability to hear my kids’ words clearly? How many times had I been called “stupid mom” from behind my back? How many times had I let my boy say that to my face without realizing it?
I allowed the pastor to pray for my ears to be healed, for the ability to hear my children. Tears welled, then slid down my cheeks. I didn’t wipe them away.
When the prayer ended, the pastor motioned for me to remove my hearing aids. He then asked me to repeat his words without reading his lips. Yeah, right. How can Lipreading Mom do that?
The pastor covered his mouth and spoke to me. The words I heard were, “What state do you live in?”
After I answered him, he and my lifelong friend exchanged hopeful gazes. I’d answered correctly.
A week later, I went to my audiologist for a hearing test. I wanted documented proof that something had changed in my hearing ability. After sitting in the listening booth and responding to beeps and spoken words via headphones, I waited for the test results.
Something had changed with my ears. I could hear the highest frequency sounds to which I had been deaf the week before.
I had been healed. It was a miracle. I wasn’t deaf anymore. Really? WOW.
A year later, I sat in the same hearing booth. Something had changed again with my ears. I wasn’t sure if it was an ear infection or hormonal changes during my third pregnancy or noise exposure, but I couldn’t hear the highest frequency sounds anymore. I thought my brain was playing tricks on my ears. How could I be deaf to sound, healed, and then deaf again?
Regardless, the test indicated what I feared. The hearing gain I had made after being prayed for was gone. Just like that.
I had other people pray for my ears. I prayed for my ears. I pleaded with God, read, and reread verses about prayer in the Bible. I dreamt about not having hearing loss and wrote about it in my journal.
Each year, my hearing tests revealed more hearing loss. Had I imagined someone had prayed for me and I had actually been healed?
In discussing this experience with one of my hard-of-hearing friends, she offered this perspective. “Healed or not, you haven’t changed. You are and will always be you.” Hmmm…
Healed or flawed: which do I prefer? Somedays, I want to be free of hearing loss, particularly when my kids scream to get my attention because I can’t hear them clearly. Sometimes I want to be deaf when they yell!
I’ve had the experience of being both hearing and deaf.
Right now, I prefer the path I am currently on. Born hearing, now hard of hearing. Mom of three healthy children.
I once was hearing, but now am deaf; was lost, but now I’m found.
Lipreading Mom 
Coming to terms with loss is often a difficult journey. I struggle with hearing in a different way–auditory dyslexia. It isn’t severe and I’ve managed to function without it impacting my life in a major way, but as I age I notice I struggle more, no doubt because the problem is now compounded by an advancing loss of hearing. I’ve suffered loss in many other ways and my biggest struggle has always been knowing whether to accept the loss or to continue praying for restoration. Thanks for sharing your journey.
Shanna,
Oddly, since I have only known you since you had hearing loss and have seen what an advocate you are for the deaf and HOH community, I have seen this as God calling you into a ministry. I know it IS a struggle and I do pray for you to work through it. I can also pray for healing.
I would also like to give the quote that I cling to when I deal with the struggles that God has allowed me to have. Hope that I don’t seem conceited by identifying with Paul!
2 Corinthians 12:7-10 (ESV)
So to keep me from becoming conceited because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass me, to keep me from becoming conceited. Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me. But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.
Debra and Michelle – Thank you for stopping by and commenting on this post. It is a touchy subject sometimes to talk about God’s healing when 1) we aren’t familiar with how to receive it or 2) we have been praying a long time for healing that doesn’t happen. You both offer a unique perspective of grasping God’s infinite control over your lives. Sometimes (and oftentimes, I have found), we can help *more* people understand God better by showing them our “flaws.” Many blessings to you both.
Please kindly pray for me to hear properly please man of God.
Andrew – Your comment truly resonated with me. I will say a prayer for you tonight. God bless you.
hi am Jayson Santiago am working here in Dubai I am suffering also in hearing loss and loss smelling for more than 2 years please pray for me, god bless all,,
Praying now, Jayson. God bless you, too.
I’m a chinese from Singapore. My ENT doctor said my hearing loss which began about a year ago in mid 2013, was most probably caused by radiation treatment when i had 1st stage nose cancer 15 years ago. My mouth suffered siliva loss and i need to drink as i eat. Through prayers, i regained almost 85% of my siliva. Now i have no problem with eating. Through prayers by myself & christian friends, i threw off my denture after wearing it for 2 years as my teeth became more in alightment. I went through kidney cancer, stage 5 in year 2000 & had one kidney removed. Now, i need prayer for restoration of my hearing loss. I wore hearing aids now n then, but I need prayer for recovery, so that I can discard my hearing aids.
Praying, Alex!
Hi all Im 53 work as Hospital Orderly (20 years) married with 2 kids and was diagnosed deaf at age 4. Became a christian at age 26. Like you guys have always struggled with my deafness but only when am thinking about it but otherwise it drags me down if I focus too much on it. I recently have lost all my High frequency and have exhausted the area of cure (Genvec with Rob Gerk),TCM, Professor Stefan Heller who personally told me its decades away for successful Hair Cell Regeneration and suggested I go for Cochlear Implant. And prayer form Christian Gentleman gifted in Healing (who counseled I ask the Lord for the same power He used to heal the deaf and mute man Mark 7 #31-37 to fill my ears and body as well as asking for the Lord His blood to transfuse my body to renew my strentgh-worth a try/ keep it simple and leave up to God-have nothing to lose).
I dont have any real answers (will look at Cochlear as an option) and have been on this journey for 27 years since i became interested in healing but I do know this much if I focus too much on my deafness I get depressed and am no good to anyone. So I have to choose to soldier on make the most of life (“Life is 10% what happens to us and 90% how we respond”-Chuck Swindoll) regardless and still count my blessings and this maybe where part of the answer lies for us deaf folks struggling our way through life. At least we have our limbs,smile,sight,minds and Hope in Jesus for the future as we wait His coming again (that really puts things in perspective). God bless and hope you guys find comfort for your daily struggles with deafness. Pat
what excatly is your hearing disease? i have my hearing nerve damaged, but i guess it is something about dnk- my 13 years younger brother has the same problem. somehow, i do believe we will hear without any hearing aids. i am googling, as much as i remember, but i never found out is there anyone who actually healed the hearing loss. if you hear anyrhing… let me know, please… lots of love from Ana, Croatia
Hi Ana – I have sensorineural progressive hearing loss. My doctor believes it is genetic due to a family history of hearing loss/deafness. While I experienced some healing from hearing loss 10 years ago, my hearing loss has continued to progress some since then. However, my hearing has been holding steady for the past couple of years. Something I would encourage you to do is to protect your hearing from loud noises by using ear plugs and avoiding loud noises. This may also help prevent any further hearing loss. Best wishes to you and your brother.
Yes, you can be healed from deafness. I lost my hearing on my left ear when I was 6 years old due to meningitis. I started wearing a hearing aid on my right ear and grew up in a hearing world. Life was a struggle for me at school but I still managed to pass my grades. In 1997, my hearing loss got more severe that I could no longer hear well without it but could hear the clapping of hands a little. I received Jesus Christ as Lord of my life on February, 21 2003. By then I longed to be healed and then in 2004 I studied the Word of God even more and desired to receive healing. Something started to happen to my ears, I felt a little cold wind blowing out of my ears, I didn’t know what it was at first, and I was sitting in my room and then I opened the window to check if there’s wind outside but it was just a sunny day. Later one evening I went to attend an evening service I was looking forward to the whole week, particularly to receive my healing as I had a dream the night before of the prophet blowing in my ears and they unstopped. As I was sitting while the service was on I felt that cold wind again blowing again. When the time came for anyone who wanted healing to go forward I want and the same thing that happened in my dream happed, accept my ears didn’t physically open. Then I had another dream that same day and I felt something pinching me on the side of my abdomen and I thought God said, “I didn’t send my son in the world so that your will can be done but my will”. At that time I thought God didn’t want me to receive my healing and he had his set time for healing me. So I stopped pursuing my healing and the wind altogether stopped. Years later as I grew more in the Word of God I realised that wasn’t God talking but the devil posing as God and wanted me to give up as I was close to receiving my hearing. I also realised that the “wind” is the anointing. Then in 2006, I went to attend a healing school and there I finally got the revelation that will stuck forever with me that I am healed of hearing loss, I accepted that I’m healed and the more I confessed the Word of God regarding who I am in Christ, what I can do, what I have, the more the “wind” in my ears blew. Finally it was no longer cold but so hot that I was so uncomfortable I wanted it to stop. I went to the healing line to receive the manifestation of my healing by having the anointed man of God lay hands on me I was expecting my ears to pop open but they didn’t. I had seen other people in other videos whose ears popped instantly so I expected the same for myself.
I have come to realise that my case requires me to keep declaring the Word of God until my ears open not for someone to lay hands on me – not every case is the same. TIME is what I need but – to spend time in the word and confessing the Word.
Just last week I went to have hearing test, the second time since 2012 and they recommend I get a cochlear implant, same thing was said in 2012. I really don’t want to wear a cochlear implant – I want to hear with my own ears. I know what to do to get my healing. My goal is to teach others how to receive their healing, those who desire to hear without hearing devices even if they’ve already been implanted.
I’ve been looking for people who desired to be healed of hearing loss on the internet but all I found are people “proud to be deaf” accepting deafness and/or are into ‘deaf culture’. I don’t call my self as deaf but as a hearing person. I currently communicate by lip-reading and it’s a struggle in my job. My journey in pursuit of healing continues. I am going to start being serious from now on, it’s now been 14 years since I got saved. Wasted too much time when I should be enjoying my hearing – God’s perfect will.
My daughter is 3 and she is going for a cochlear implant next week, we are praying for a manifestation of healing to happen before her surgery. Please pray with us!
Thinking about your daughter and family and hoping for the very best.
please I am only 16 need prayers.
Please email me jklassak@comcast.net. I have severe hearing loss as well. Id like to pray for you.
Hi 🙂
My name is Jon. I am severly hearing impaired and it keeps getting worse each year. Im only 27 years old and it really started when i was about 17. Its very bad to the point i struggle to have a conversation. Anyway i have also been born again since 17. I feel as though i have never really started living for Christ the way i should be though. Recently i have been feeling such faith and hope that my hearing will be restored but only when i start to be faithful. I can feel Gods spirit leading me to talk with and pray for others that are deaf and hearing impaired. I came across your story and just felt the need for us to talk a bit. Feel free to email me please at jklassak@comcast.net
Am suffering from the same issue.the same as what i just read.please, i need prayers for my hearing to return to nomal.
Paul – Praying for you
Hi!
Please pray for me to I stuffer with tinnitus.
Thank you so much. May God bless you.