Unrealised Divine Healing Expectations in Australian Pentecostalism

Despite common Pentecostal rhetoric positioning divine healing as normative and imminent, it remains rare, unpredictable, and temporary. This disconnect creates substantial pastoral and psychological challenges for Pentecostals experiencing chronic disease. Drawing on Pentecostal history, theology, and Pargament’s psychology of religion and coping, this paper employs practical theology to investigate contemporary Australian healing praxis. 17 pastoral caregivers and 8 care receivers experiencing chronic diseases were interviewed to contrast expectations and actual experiences of healing ministry. The findings reveal that, even when healing does not manifest, caregivers maintain high healing expectations founded on atonement theology and faith-motivated prayer, and their praxis tends to blame recipients for insufficient faith or unconfessed sin, appeals to God’s mysterious sovereignty, and resists re-evaluation. Using Pargament’s means-and-ends model, the analysis demonstrates that inflexible praxis hindered coping, creating guilt, self-doubt, and religious trauma. While caregivers demonstrated genuine concern and practical support, care receivers felt pressured to hide ongoing struggles and privately developed acceptance strategies. Disconnectedly, caregivers remain confused by the expectation-experience gap while receivers quietly embrace suffering as God’s will. This paper invites Pentecostals toward greater self-awareness, recommending reforms: recognising faith and suffering as compatible, honest acknowledgment of healing rarity, expanded engagement with coping resources, and person-centred care.