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By Hayley Louisa Mark
There is a particular way the body stands when it has decided not to be moved.
I know it because I have felt the opposite for so long. For weeks the sickness had me curled — shoulders rolled forward over the chest as if to guard a wound, chin tucked, the whole frame folded small around the ache. That is the posture of a body that has been receiving blows. And then one grey afternoon something in me refused it. I stood up from the bed — slowly, my hand flat against the wall — and I put my shoulders back. I set my feet under my hips. I lifted my chin until my throat was open. Nothing in the diagnosis had changed. But my spine had changed its mind. The body braced not to absorb the next blow but to hold ground. There is a verse for exactly that stance, and the body finds it before the mind does: “having done all, to stand.”
This page is not the comfort page. I have written those, and you may need one tonight, and there is no shame in it. But sometimes you are not looking to be soothed. You are looking to take a posture. You have heard the report, you have wept over it, and now something in you wants to plant its feet and declare what is true about the One you belong to — His power, His authority, His finished work over your body. That is a different need, and it deserves different verses.
So below are sickness and disease scriptures arranged not by how they comfort but by the kind of authority they put under your feet. Each is the King James text exactly as it reads. Each carries a short, honest reflection, one thing to do with your body as you speak it, and a brief prayer you can declare. A word of care before we start: to stand on God’s power is not to manufacture a guarantee that this illness ends the way you choose. It is to stand on Him — His goodness, His might, His promise that He is at work — even when the body has not yet caught up to the word. Faith that can declare boldly and still trust if the answer is mysterious is the kind that actually holds weight.
The short answer. When you want a sickness and disease scripture to declare God’s power rather than only ask for relief, root the declaration in His character, not in your own certainty. Speak Psalm 103:2–3 aloud — “Bless the LORD… who healeth all thy diseases” — set your shoulders back, open your throat, and say one true sentence of your own: This body belongs to You, and so does this disease. That is standing ground. It claims the One with power, and leaves the outcome in His hands.
A note before we begin. I quote these from the King James Version, exactly as written — the old “thee” and “thou” and all — partly because the cadence steadies the breath, and partly because a declaration spoken in deliberate words lands in the body differently than a worried thought. Where a phrase people search for is not actually a verse, I will say so plainly. I would rather hand you something you can stand on than something that merely sounds strong.
How to use these sickness and disease scriptures
Find your posture, not just your situation. Jump to the section that matches what you need to declare tonight:
- If you need to stand under God’s sheer power — Jeremiah 32:27 · Job 42:2 · Luke 1:37
- If you need to declare His authority over the sickness — Luke 10:19 · Matthew 8:2–3 · Psalm 107:20
- If you need to stand on the finished work of the cross — 1 Peter 2:24 · Acts 10:38 · Psalm 103:2–3
- If you need armour to keep standing when nothing has changed yet — Ephesians 6:13 · 2 Corinthians 10:4 · Isaiah 54:17
Take one. You are not declaring all twelve into the dark at once. You are planting your feet on the next true thing.
If you need to stand under God’s sheer power
Before authority, before any claim, the ground has to hold. These verses are not about what you can do to the sickness. They are about the size of the God you are standing on.
Jeremiah 32:27
“Behold, I am the LORD, the God of all flesh: is there any thing too hard for me?”
He calls Himself “the God of all flesh” — which means the God of this flesh, the very tissue the disease has invaded. The question He asks is not rhetorical decoration; it is meant to be answered, and the answer empties the threat of its final word. Notice He does not say nothing is hard. He says nothing is too hard for Him. Your standing does not depend on the sickness being small. It depends on Him being larger.
Body: Lay one open hand flat over the place that hurts — chest, abdomen, the joint. Feel its warmth and weight. Then say the verse with your hand still there: this flesh, His flesh.
Declare: God of all flesh, this flesh is Yours. Nothing here is too hard for You. I stand on that and not on the report.
Job 42:2
“I know that thou canst do every thing, and that no thought can be withholden from thee.”
This is not a man at the start of his suffering speaking. This is Job, after — after the loss, after the ash heap, after the boils, after God answered him out of the whirlwind. Which makes it the sturdiest kind of declaration there is: not the optimism of someone untouched, but the settled conviction of someone who has been through the fire and come out saying Thou canst do every thing. If he can stand there, the ground will hold you too.
Body: Press both feet firmly into the floor, heel and toe, and feel them held. This is the verse of a man who got back up. Stand the way he stood.
Declare: Lord, I know that Thou canst do every thing. I have been low and I am saying it anyway. You can.
Luke 1:37
“For with God nothing shall be impossible.”
The angel says this to a frightened young woman about a body doing what bodies do not do. I love that the promise is given inside a question about flesh — about a womb, about the impossible made physical. “Nothing” is a complete word. It does not have a footnote that excludes your diagnosis. Stand on the totality of it.
Body: Take one slow breath in through the nose, and as you let it go, drop your shoulders down from your ears. Say “nothing” on the empty lungs. Let the word be the last thing in the breath.
Declare: With You, nothing shall be impossible — not this, not even this. I will not shrink the word “nothing” to fit my fear.
If you need to declare His authority over the sickness
Power is what God is. Authority is power with the right to command. These verses are where Scripture shows that authority touching disease directly — and where, in Christ, some of it is handed to those who follow Him.
Luke 10:19
“Behold, I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy: and nothing shall by any means hurt you.”
Handle this verse with both reverence and care. Jesus is speaking to the seventy returning from ministry, and the “power” is genuine, delegated authority — yet He immediately redirects their joy away from the power itself and toward their names being written in heaven (v. 20). So stand on this, but stand humbly: the authority is real and it is His, lent not owned. To “tread” is an active verb. It is the foot that comes down, not the hand that begs. Some sickness is just a broken world; some has a darker edge to it; this verse arms you for either without requiring you to diagnose which.
Body: Stand if you can, and press one foot down deliberately — a slow, firm tread into the ground. Let the gesture be the prayer.
Declare: In the name of Jesus and under His authority, not my own, I tread. This fear does not get the last word over me.
Matthew 8:2–3
“And, behold, there came a leper and worshipped him, saying, Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean. And Jesus put forth his hand, and touched him, saying, I will; be thou clean. And immediately his leprosy was cleansed.”
Hold the leper’s exact words in your mouth: if thou wilt, thou canst. He does not doubt the power for a second — “thou canst” is rock. He simply submits the will to the One who has it. And the answer comes faster than the request finishes: “I will.” This is the posture I am asking you to take. Declare the “thou canst” with your whole chest. Lay the “if thou wilt” gently at His feet. That is not weak faith. That is the only honest kind.
Body: Cup both hands open in front of you, the way you would to receive water. Speak “thou canst” into your open palms; then turn the palms up and loose for “if thou wilt.”
Declare: Lord, I know Thou canst make me clean. If Thou wilt — and I trust Your will more than I trust my own — be it unto me.
Psalm 107:20
“He sent his word, and healed them, and delivered them from their destructions.”
The whole psalm is a refrain of people in trouble who cried unto the LORD and were brought out. Here the deliverance comes by a sent word — God speaks and the thing turns. When you declare a verse over your body, you are not casting a spell; you are agreeing with a word He has already sent. The authority is in the word’s Sender, never in your volume. Speak it as agreement, not as leverage.
Body: Read the verse once silently, then once aloud, low and steady. Notice the difference in your chest between the silent read and the spoken one. The spoken word is the one you are agreeing with.
Declare: You have sent Your word. I receive it over this body, and I agree with what You have already said.
If you need to stand on the finished work of the cross
This is the deepest ground of all — not what you do, not even what you declare, but what He has already done. You are not standing on your faith. You are standing on His finished act.
A note on the science
When you draw your shoulders back, lift your chin, and let out one slow, complete exhale before speaking, you are doing something measurable to your nervous system. A long, unhurried out-breath gently engages the vagus nerve and shifts you toward the parasympathetic “rest” branch — heart rate eases on the exhale, the jaw and shoulder muscles you have been clenching get permission to release, and the body moves out of the braced, fight-or-flight posture that chronic illness keeps it locked in. An upright, open posture and a slow exhale together tell the oldest part of the brain that you are safe enough to stand. This is physiology, and it is worth knowing on its own terms. It is a separate room from the faith you bring to these verses — the breath calms the body; the Scripture is doing something else entirely, and I will not pretend one proves the other. Use both. Honour the difference.
The body-science here reflects established neuroscience of the nervous system. What the science actually says about a settled body → · the research behind these pages.
1 Peter 2:24
“Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed.”
“Ye were healed” — past tense, already accomplished at the cross. Peter quotes Isaiah and applies it first to the healing of the soul from sin, which is its weightiest meaning; I will not flatten it into a guarantee of physical cure on your timetable, because that is not honest and you deserve honesty. But neither will I shrink it. The same finished work that reaches your sin reaches toward your whole self, body included, and what is “already” in heaven’s accounting becomes “not yet fully” only in time. Stand on the were. It is done; the body is catching up to a verdict already passed.
Body: Let your full weight settle down onto your feet, or back into the chair if you are sitting — the way you lean on something you already trust to hold. You are not bracing to make this true; it was made true at the cross. Rest your weight on the word “were,” and say the verse from there.
Declare: By Your stripes I was healed. It is finished work, not future hope. I stand on what You have already done and not on what I can feel.
Acts 10:38
“How God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power: who went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil; for God was with him.”
Peter’s summary of the entire ministry of Jesus, distilled to a single line: He “went about doing good, and healing.” That is the character of the One you stand on — not a reluctant healer to be wrestled, but a God who went about it, whose nature it was to do good and lift oppression. When you declare His power, you are not trying to talk Him into something against His grain. You are agreeing with what He loves to do.
Body: Unclench your jaw. Let the back teeth come apart and the tongue fall soft from the roof of your mouth. Speak “doing good” through a loosened jaw — His goodness needs no clenching to receive.
Declare: You went about doing good and healing. That is who You are. I stand with the grain of Your goodness, not against it.
Psalm 103:2–3
“Bless the LORD, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits: who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases.”
David is preaching to his own soul here — forget not — because the soul does forget, especially when the body is loud. He binds two things in one breath that we are forever prying apart: He “forgiveth all thine iniquities” and “healeth all thy diseases.” The same hand does both. To bless the LORD over your sickness is not denial of the sickness; it is the deliberate act of reminding a forgetful soul all his benefits in the very hour it is tempted to remember only the disease.
Body: Place one hand on your chest and one on your stomach. Feel both rise on the in-breath. One hand for “forgiveth,” one for “healeth” — the same breath, the same Lord, holding both.
Declare: Bless the LORD, O my soul. You who forgive all, You heal all. I will not forget Your benefits in the hour I most want to.
If you need armour to keep standing when nothing has changed yet
This is the hardest section, and the truest. You have declared, and the report is the same. The fever has not broken. This is where most teaching on “power” abandons you — and where Scripture does not. The goal here is not victory you can photograph. It is the refusal to fall.
Ephesians 6:13
“Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.”
Read the end of it slowly: “having done all, to stand.” Not having done all, to win. Not having done all, to feel better. To stand. Paul knew there are evil days when the only available victory is that you are still on your feet at the end of them, armour on, ground unceded. If you have prayed and declared and wept and you are still sick and still here — you have not failed. You have done the harder thing. You have stood.
Body: This is the whole-body verse. Shoulders back. Feet set under your hips. Chin level, throat open. Take the stance with your spine and then say the words. Let the body preach to the mind for once.
Declare: I have done all. So I stand. Not because the day is over, but because You are my ground and I will not be moved off it.
2 Corinthians 10:4
“(For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds;)”
The weapons are “not carnal” — not of the flesh, not the things the world reaches for. Mark that, because illness tempts you to fight with the wrong arsenal: with panic, with grim research at 3am, with the sheer force of your own will. Paul says the weapons that actually pull down strongholds are mighty through God, not through you. The relief in that is enormous. You were never meant to overpower this with your own strength. The might is on loan, and the loan is generous.
Body: Open your hands and let them hang loose at your sides for a moment — empty. You are setting down the carnal weapons. The fight was never going to be won by your grip.
Declare: I lay down the weapons that were never going to work. The ones that pull down strongholds are mighty through You, and those are the ones I take up.
Isaiah 54:17
“No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper; and every tongue that shall rise against thee in judgment thou shalt condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the LORD, and their righteousness is of me, saith the LORD.”
A verse people love to declare, and rightly — but let me be honest about its shape so you stand on it and not on a slogan. It does not promise that no weapon is formed; the weapons are real and they form. It promises they will not finally prosper — will not have the ultimate word over a servant of the LORD whose righteousness is of Him. Held that way, it is sturdier than the bumper-sticker version, because it does not collapse the first time the weapon hurts. The disease may strike. It will not reign. The last word is His.
Body: Stand tall, then make one small, slow shake of the head — no — on the words “shall prosper.” A quiet, deliberate refusal. Not denial of the weapon. Refusal of its reign.
Declare: The weapon is formed, but it shall not prosper. My righteousness is of You, and the last word over this body is Yours and not the sickness’s.
A word on the phrases that get declared but aren’t in the Book
When believers gather to declare power over sickness, certain lines get repeated as if they were chapter and verse. Some are true Scripture; some are faith-summaries; one or two are not in the Bible at all. I would rather you stand on solid ground than loud ground.
- “By His stripes I am healed.” Very close, and a fair declaration of faith — but the actual KJV reads “by whose stripes ye were healed” (1 Peter 2:24), past tense, and Isaiah 53:5 likewise. The tense matters: it points you back to the finished cross, not forward to a result you are summoning. Declare the real one; it is stronger.
- “God won’t put more on you than you can bear.” Not in the Bible. The verse people mean is 1 Corinthians 10:13, and it is specifically about temptation — that God provides a way of escape from sin’s enticement — not a promise that suffering will stay within your tolerance. Sickness can absolutely exceed what you can bear alone. That is why you stand on His strength and not your capacity.
- “What God has done for one, He will do for all.” A warm sentiment, often declared over healing testimonies, but not a Scripture, and it can quietly wound the one whose body is not yet healed. Stand instead on God’s character (Acts 10:38) rather than on a guaranteed transfer of someone else’s outcome.
- “Speak it into existence.” This belongs to a different stream of teaching, not to the verses above. Biblical declaration is agreement with a word God has already spoken (Psalm 107:20), not a power your own words hold over reality. The authority is always the Sender’s.
If a phrase steadies you and it is genuinely Scripture, declare it with your whole chest. If it merely sounds powerful, let it go. You can afford to. The real ones are enough.
When standing is not the only thing you need
Standing your ground is one posture, and a good one — but it is not the only one Scripture gives you, and a wise believer learns to change stance as the illness changes.
If your declaration is becoming a rebuke — if you sense you are not only standing but actively coming against the sickness in Jesus’ name — there is a careful, biblical way to do that without slipping into formula or fear, and I have laid it out in How to Pray Against Sickness: A Scriptural Way to Rebuke Illness in Faith.
If the disease now has a name and a long horizon — if “power over” has to coexist with a chart, a specialist, a chronic word — then the standing changes shape, and When the Disease Has a Name: Scriptures for Facing a Chronic Diagnosis meets you in that exact ground, where authority and acceptance have to share a room.
And if the worst has passed and you are on the mend but afraid of the next blow — when standing turns into the quieter work of staying standing — On the Mend but Still Afraid: Scriptures for Recovery and Staying Well walks you through it.
Standing ground tonight
You came here not to be comforted but to take a posture, and I hope these verses gave you ground to set your feet on. Let me leave you with the truest thing I know about declaring God’s power over sickness: the strength was never in the volume of your voice or the certainty of your feeling. It was in the One you were agreeing with. Stand on Him. Shoulders back, throat open, the finished work under your feet — and then leave the outcome where it has always safely belonged, in His hands.
If you want to keep these verses where you can speak them out loud — taped to the bathroom mirror, by the bed, in the bag for the next appointment — I made you a free printable for exactly that.
→ Get the free Standing-Ground Card — 7 KJV power verses to speak when you need to declare, not just receive. No cost; it is yours.
And if you want something to stand with you for the long haul — a daily place to bring this posture, with room to declare, to wrestle, and to record what God is doing in your body over time — our Stilling Waves devotional journal was built for exactly this kind of faith. See the journal here.
Frequently asked questions
What does the Bible say about God’s power over sickness and disease?
Scripture presents God as “the God of all flesh,” for whom nothing is too hard (Jeremiah 32:27), and shows Jesus “healing all that were oppressed” as the very pattern of His ministry (Acts 10:38). It pairs the forgiveness of sins and the healing of diseases in one breath as works of the same hand (Psalm 103:3). The Bible affirms His real power and authority over illness — while never reducing it to a formula that guarantees a particular outcome on a human timetable.
Is “by His stripes I am healed” an accurate Bible verse?
It is a faith-declaration built on a real verse, but not the exact wording. The KJV reads “by whose stripes ye were healed” (1 Peter 2:24), past tense, drawing on Isaiah 53:5. The tense matters: it roots the healing in the finished work of the cross rather than presenting it as a result you summon. Its first and weightiest meaning is the healing of the soul from sin, with the body included in the “already / not yet” of redemption.
Can I declare or claim healing over my own sickness?
Yes, when “declaring” means agreeing out loud with what God has already said in His word (Psalm 107:20), rather than treating your own words as a power that bends reality. Speak the verse, take an upright posture, and submit the will the way the leper did — “Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst” (Matthew 8:2). Bold faith and surrendered trust are not opposites; the sturdiest faith holds both.
What if I declare God’s power and I’m still sick?
You have not failed, and your faith was not too small. Scripture’s own picture of victory in an “evil day” is that “having done all,” you stand (Ephesians 6:13) — sometimes the available triumph is simply that you are still on your feet, still trusting, ground unceded. Healing is real and good to ask for; not every body is healed on this side of heaven. A faith that asks boldly and trusts if the answer is mysterious is the strongest kind.
Which scripture is best for standing against sickness?
There is no single best verse; it depends on the posture you need. For the sheer size of God, Jeremiah 32:27. For His delegated authority, Luke 10:19 (held humbly). For the finished work, 1 Peter 2:24. For the day nothing has changed yet, Ephesians 6:13. Choose the one that matches the ground you need under your feet tonight, set your stance, and speak it aloud.