My dream had come true. I was teaching first through fourth grade in a two-teacher school in a remote Alaskan Indian village. This was a very happy time for me. But it also proved to be a very difficult period in my life. A period during which I really learned more about prayer. And I felt the presence of God's love and care touching my heart as I never had before. Here's what happened.

Midway through my first year in the village, I began to feel that the other teacher's wife hated and resented me. The situation escalated into the second year. One night, I woke to sounds of loud banging outside my house. I could not see who was there. The banging stopped, only to start up again two hours later. I got out of bed and opened the door to look again, and met the other teacher's wife standing outside with a two-by-four! I asked her to stop what she was doing, and she left. But she returned to continue banging around my house at regular intervals all night long.

I prayed throughout that long, cold, winter night to feel the presence of God's love surrounding me and my home. Eventually I found peace in praying the Lord's Prayer. The incident was never repeated. But there was ongoing tension in our school. I felt continually under attack. I found out that both the teacher and his wife had taken steps to discredit me and keep me from getting promoted.

The rays of sunlight in all of this were the wonderful children I was teaching, and a man I met in the village. I fell in love with this gentle individual, and we became such good friends that we talked of marriage and having a family. As much as we cared for each other, there were a couple of major obstacles in our relationship that had to be overcome. These obstacles would dramatically affect any family life we might have together. I wrestled and struggled with these questions until I found myself feeling all tied up inside. I did not know what to do or where to turn.

That summer I decided to take a course in healing through prayer, given by a Christian Science teacher—a course commonly known as "Primary class instruction." I felt the need to understand more deeply how to pray as Jesus did, and how to demonstrate the healing Word of God in my life. I learned the importance of praying daily to establish a clear understanding of my unity with God, and to look for the blessings He prepares for me through His great love. This disciplined approach to praying was just what I needed.

In my third year of teaching, the other teacher left, and I became principal/teacher. We accomplished wonderful things in our school. My friend and I were still very much in love, but I continued to wrestle with many issues that needed to be answered before we could get married.

Sometime that winter, I noticed an unnatural growth had begun to develop in my abdomen. My first thought was to call a Christian Science practitioner to pray with me, but we had no phones in the village and the mail plane came in only once a week, weather permitting. Communicating with my family or with my Christian Science teacher sometimes took a month. I realized I had to stop my frantic worrying about this condition. And I knew that I could instantly talk to God. Hadn't I already seen Him heal me of food poisoning the previous winter, and of other physical and emotional troubles? Hadn't I felt His protection and love in my home? I realized that I could depend on God to be "a very present help in trouble" (Ps. 46:1), and I decided to turn to Him again.

Christian Science had taught me that the only place to conquer discord of any kind was in my own thinking. I knew it wouldn't help to analyze my body's condition, because healing involves mental and spiritual enlightenment. I saw that I had to purify my thoughts, to open my consciousness to perceive God's presence and power and love, the way you open a door to let in the sunlight. My constant prayers were to keep all my thoughts, actions, and spoken words untainted by personal opinions or desires. I found it helpful in prayer to affirm that because the Mother-love of God was always with me, protecting my identity, my womanhood could not be attacked or compromised. Nor could I be a victim of hatred or love gone awry.

Every day, I reached out to God, praying to understand better that I was His child and that He was sustaining me. That because God is Spirit and incapable of creating anything discordant, I was wholly spiritual, and therefore no part of me could be discordant or vulnerable to abnormal growth.

I remembered a story I'd heard about a young boy whose prayers healed his mother of a bad headache. He had said to her, very simply, "God is. That isn't. And that's that." To me, the point was that because God is All and all-powerful, anything bad—unlike Him—couldn't have been created by Him and therefore must be unreal. This inspiring thought assured me that my whole being was intact, complete, and pure.

When I went home at the end of the school year, my clothes were not fitting well and my family was very worried. I agreed to have a medical exam to put their minds at ease. The doctor told me I had a very large ovarian cyst and that it needed to be removed immediately or I might die. Even with surgery, he said, I might never have children. In spite of my family's fears for me, the view I'd been gaining of myself as wholly spiritual buoyed me up—I was sure I'd be healed. And my family sensed my trust and expectation.

One day, as I was singing a verse from a hymn with words by Mary Baker Eddy, the woman who discovered Christian Science, I just knew that all was well. The hymn begins,

I realized that all really was well—that my Father had a wonderful plan for me, and that He was right there guiding me. I said to myself, "OK, Katie, all you need to do is listen. No more planning. No more worrying. Just listen." And I went on listening and praying.

At some point that summer—I really don't know when—the cyst disappeared. I was healed, and the growth never returned. The difficulties in my personal life were resolved as well. When I returned to the village, a new job opened up. And as I continued to listen for God's guidance, it felt right not to marry my friend, even though I still loved him. To this day, we remain good friends.

Some years later, I met and married a wonderful man—truly, my very best friend and soul-mate. Every day I see beautiful evidence of the completeness of my healing in the active lives of our three precious teenage children! css