Healing with Affirmative Prayer

I get a special feeling whenever I turn the page on my calendar and welcome September. Fall is around the corner and my birthday too. And World Day of Prayer at Unity is only days away. It’s always such a wonderful opportunity to join with others in prayer and remind myself how transformative prayer can be.

This year’s theme, Heart of Healing, is special to me because it brought to mind a recent experience. A little over a year ago, I was coping with neck pain so severe that I was unable to turn my head or sleep. I shared in the article that after two disappointing attempts to find good care and some relief, I finally found healing at a facility that treated me with kindness, empathy, and efficient competence.

Before I discovered Unity in 2000, I, like many people, thought the words healing and curing were interchangeable. Over time, I learned it’s possible to be healed without being cured, that healing is the realization of wholeness, our true spiritual state.

When I sought help for my aching neck, I was healed before I was cured. The healing came when I realized that even through my pain and limited mobility, I was foremost a spiritual being, and as such, I could use my divine gifts of dominion, wisdom, and will to advocate for myself, discern, and choose the right providers and treatments. Through those choices, I was able to help myself and ultimately feel better. The cure may have come through physical therapy, but the healing happened first because of prayer and the use of affirmations.

But that’s not all. Over the years, I’ve expanded my understanding of healing. I used to think it was all about relieving the body of illness or injury. It is that, of course, but it’s so much more. In other words, I thought the physical body was the only thing that needed healing. I see it differently now. Healing is part of spiritual growth. Developing a prosperity consciousness often means being healed of a poverty consciousness. Finding harmony in relationships might involve undertaking a forgiveness journey of healing. Discovering peace of mind could mean healing ourselves of troubling thoughts and feelings.

“No matter the healing need, you can find a new way forward with prayer. Your open mind and willing heart will help you transform that which troubles you to that which empowers you.”

Healing Your Life Through Prayer

The act of affirmative prayer is itself healing. It is a way to live our faith and remain committed to the truth that we are in the world but not of it. In prayer, we claim the peace and perfection of God for ourselves. We know our wholeness, which keeps illness and physical limitation in perspective. Put simply, as affirmative prayer helps us live the truth we know, it’s easier to believe we are divine beings with the capacity to heal ourselves.

No matter the healing need, you can find a new way forward with prayer. Your open mind and willing heart will help you transform that which troubles you to that which empowers you.

If you’re not in need of healing, maybe you know someone who would be blessed by your prayerful, healing energy. If you find the state of the world troubling, praying for the healing of the nations and people of the world and the health of the earth is a powerful way to bless us all.

I pray you will join me for the World Day of Prayer opening ceremonies next Wednesday evening and all day Thursday. It’s sure to be a wonderfully immersive prayer experience.