Six years ago, my phone rang here in Las Vegas, where we had been living for about a year. It was my older daughter, Beth, from Dallas. "Mom," she said, "Remember the knot I told you about that the doctor found in my thyroid? The doctor just did a needle extraction on it, and she said she thinks it is cancer."

Cancer. My beautiful daughter, Beth. Cancer. It wasn't supposed to happen this way. My knees gave way, and fear enveloped my body. Trying to keep panic out of my voice, I asked her some details and told her that I knew it would be okay. After agreeing that we would get a second opinion, I said that I would call Barry & get back with her.

But I was frozen. Cancer! I asked God for help, and immediately a passage I had just read from CONVERSATIONS WITH GOD came to mind. (Isn't it amazing that when we turn our attention to God, what we need is right there?) I looked up the passage, and this is what I read:

"Faith. If you have but the faith of a mustard seed, you shall move mountains. You come to know (the answer) is there because I said it is there; because I said that, even before you ask, I shall have answered; because I said, and have said to you in every conceivable way, through every teacher you can name, that whatsoever you shall choose, choosing it in My Name, so shall it be."

I said, "Okay, God." You said, and I am asking. With every bit of faith I can muster, restore my daughter to Radiant Health!"

And I knew, in that moment, my prayer had been answered, for I knew everything was going to be okay. Somehow, deep in my soul, I knew it was all right. My strength had been miraculously restored, and I was able to be there for my daughter.

Then I called Barry, and he knew of a friend whose wife had just been cured of cancer at the City of Hope. He called the friend, the friend called the City of Hope, and Beth was on her way to California by the end of the week. The doctor there confirmed the diagnosis, and they scheduled surgery for the following Monday.

Waiting during surgery is very challenging. Especially when it takes much longer than expected. But, once again, God's grace lifted me up. I sat outside in the meditation garden, looking at the mountains in front of me, and a song came to mind. It was a song I had heard on a CD, but did not really know. But the words came through loud and clear, taking me to a higher place, the space of love. The words were:

The love of God is greater far,
Than all our silver ever could afford,
It reaches past the highest star
And covers all the world

It's power is eternal,
It's glory is supernal,
When all this earth shall pass away,
There's always be the love of God.

After what seemed days, the surgeon came out and told us that Beth was okay - that there was no cancer! Thank God!

That experience left me with not only gratitude for God's grace, but for a deeper understanding of prayer. For I never knew whether Beth had ever had cancer in the first place, but one thing I knew with absolute assurance: I had been changed, changed in the way that was absolutely needed, and the situation had changed for me, for Beth, and for the whole family.

This is what I learned: Prayer changes things, but first, prayer changes me!

How does this happen? I can best understand this if I think of everything as energy. Everything is made up of energy vibrating at a certain level. And we each vibrate at a certain level - which can change temporarily, depending on what we are feeling at the time. Everything we see around us is made up of energy vibrating at various levels.

We live in the physical world and tend to believe that the forms that we see are real, but in Truth, the formless is the reality. The formless is what is eternal - the physical is only temporary. This body will come and go, but the energy that fuels this entity is eternal - it never dies.

God is the highest Energy, vibrating at a level that is beyond our imagination. And this energy is everywhere present - always available to us. It's just that we have forgotten, we have forgotten that we can access this energy anytime we choose.

When we pray, we access the higher energy, and raise our vibrations. And when we raise our vibrations, we change. It's like we are lifted up, where we can see the problem in new ways, gain new understandings, become stronger & calmer.

So first, we change. Then things change. Why is this?

The energy that we are emitting sets up a field of energy. Have you ever been around a person that just makes you feel better - happier, more peaceful, stronger? Or, have you been around someone that makes you feel anxious, depressed, or angry? The reason you feel this is that we all create a field of energy around us. This field of energy impacts the things around us (after all, we are all one!) When we are vibrating at a hight level, things around us also begin vibrating at a higher level.

Groups have energy levels. You can go to an AA meeting where people are there to help and support each other, and feel the energy of love. You can go to a peace march where people are protesting and resisting, and not feel peaceful, but feel the energy of anger.

So when we pray, we are accessing higher energy levels, bringing up not only our own energy, but everything around us. And not just the things that are in our vicinity, but everything, particularly that on which we focus.

Mary Manin Morrissey tells the story about Lawrence of Arabia when he took some of his chieftains from Arabia to Paris for peace talks. Strange objects on the bathroom walls amazed the chieftains. If they turned these objects clockwise, water poured out. The chieftains were flabbergasted that this precious gift of life could come spewing forth from a strange-looking knob.

When Lawrence of Arabia took the chieftains back home, he was greatly amused by the contents of their bags. For tucked amid the robes & sandals were the faucets and handles his men had pried loose from the hotel bathrooms. They mistakenly believed that these bits of porcelain and brass were the source of the water and that if they just affixed them to their tents, they would never want for water again.

We may laugh, because we know that water will not flow from a faucet that is not connected to its source. Yet we can be just as quick to want miracles from God without first connecting to our Source.

Dr. David Hawkins, author of Power vs. Force, said that the Ganges River in India, one of the filthiest rivers on earth, vibrates at the level of love. How could this be? A river in which over 100 cities dump their waste, full of trash, feces, dead bodies - and yet it vibrates at the level of love? But the Ganges is a sacred river in India, and millions of people come to pray over this river. And, despite the filth, it vibrates at a high level.

You see, when we increase our energy field, we bring up the energy of the things around us, particularly those on which we focus. Think of the impact we have when we pray for others on Sunday morning, or when our Care Committee prays for others, and then sends those names to be prayed on by Silent Unity, 24 hours a day for 30 days.

Leotha Evins told me that she tells her patients, when they are filled with fear, that she will be strong for them until they are ready to be strong again themselves. And that is so. She is holding them in that higher energy until they are able to access it themselves.

I think people often do not pray because they think they don't know what to say. They are afraid of saying a prayer wrong.

Kids don't seem to have this problem, like the 3-year old that prayed, "Our Father, who does art in heaven, Howard be Thy name."

Or the 4-year old who was overheard praying, "And forgive us our trash baskets as we forgive those who put trash in our baskets."

But, you see, a prayer doesn't even need words. I believe that anything that puts us in touch with the Higher Energy is an effective prayer. The song I heard during my daughter's surgery became an extremely effective prayer for me, because it put me in touch with the power of God's love.

Authentic prayer is simply a thought of Truth that when held long enough and strongly enough evokes a shift of consciousness within us.

A prayer of surrender is the highest prayer of all. It allows us to surrender everything to God and trust that we are being moved to our highest good. A COURSE IN MIRACLES says that we don't even know what's in our own best interests. So when we try to tell God what to do, it's probably less than the good that God has in store for us.

In rock climbing, there is a step called a "commitment move." You're tied to the ropes, and there's a moment you have to let go of solid ground to move to the next higher place. It's a scary step. You must trust what you're tied to more than what you're standing on. That's what a prayer of surrender is - a complete trusting of something higher.

The Apostle Paul said, "Pray without ceasing." Make all of life a prayer - stay connected to that Higher Energy, and we will live life in a new way. When that phone rings with an overwhelming problem, we will know, with every fiber of our being, there is an answer in prayer.