Gloria:
Dear God, last night my daughter got sick suddenly. She looked awful and felt very sick. Not pain exactly but deep discomfort. She had blood in her urine and other symptoms that scared us. I suggested that she pray to You.
She said, "I can't. I just can't."
So I said, "I will do it for you."
When she was finally able to sleep, I went to my apartment and upstairs to pray to You, dear God.
But then I found I could not. I found within myself the feeling, not that You don't exist — not that — but that You don't answer prayers. I realized that I felt that it doesn't matter if I pray or not, and I thought of those beautiful Jesuits in that movie, how their prayers weren't answered.
God, even knowing that You do answer prayers all the time, I felt this. I know You are a benevolent Heavenly Father and that there are things I cannot understand. Last night, when it came down to praying to You, I could not do it and be in my truth. The best I could do was half-hearted prayer.
I can talk to You and hear Your answers, but I do not know how to pray or to believe in it.
God:
Ask Me to help you know how to pray. That can be your prayer.
Gloria:
I did. And I ask again. Please help me know how to pray. Please help me have the knowing faith that You do hear and You do answer.
God:
What you are feeling is that I may hear prayers but that they don't matter to Me all that much. Is that what you feel?
Gloria:
Yes. That prayers don't make a difference really.
God:
Prayers are not control, Gloria. A prayer is not an instruction to Me. I do not have to obey your prayer. A prayer is not something you order Me to do. A prayer is a little like lighting a candle for Me. It is an offering to Me. A prayer is more like:
"Here, God, is my heart. Here, God, is my daughter. She seems very sick. I know that sickness is not real, so I pray that You will bring both of us closer to You, closer to our knowing of You, closer to our allowing You to enter our hearts. I know You know that I want my daughter to be healthy and happy and to know You. I want to be able to turn her over to Your care. I want to believe the words I use. I want to believe in Your love even when Your Divine Will seems to be different from my human one.
"I know You are a perfect God, and I want perfect faith in You. Please help my daughter and me to love You more and to have more faith. I come to realize that a little faith is not faith. Some faith is not faith. I either have faith or I do not. I know You would say that faith is my choice or not. And yet I do not seem to know how to choose it exactly.
"I wish, I want, I desire perfect faith in Your Will, but I don't seem to know how to choose that faith."
And I would answer more like this:
Ask Me to give you faith. That is your prayer. Faith knows Our Oneness. Faith does not guess. Faith does not close its eyes and pick one. It sees that there is only one.
You have faith. You have great faith in other people, in events, in circumstances. You have great faith in doubt and fear. You have great faith in the physical. Turn your faith from outside to inside. I am inside. That which is invisible is real. The light that you shroud in doubt is real. The light is real. The doubt is not.
Gloria, you will not find Me in outside circumstances by themselves. I am there. I am in everything. But you are able to see Me in outside circumstances only sometimes, when the outside circumstances suit you. So you must look to Me within. And then you will see Me everywhere.
You like having an outside God. Someone far away who directs the universe and knows what He is doing.
A Godness within you is harder for you to worship. Worship Me within you, My beloved. Find My essence supreme in the lotus of your heart. Find My essence supreme in the lotus of your daughter's heart.
There am I, a perfect Governor. A perfect Magistrate. A perfect King or Queen.
Faith is not belief. Belief is too little.
Faith is finding Me. Faith is having found Me. You have found glimpses of Me. Now find Me. See Me. See God.
Prayer is holding your hand and heart out to God whether you see Him or not.
Faith is the convergence of your heart with Mine. Faith is the abandonment of divided thinking.
I am a Bright Light. I am a Bright Light in your heart. I am a Bright Light in your life.
Faith is acceptance of Me.
Accept Me.
Accept My love.
Do not accept less. What else is enough?