“O Lord, I beseech thee, save my life!”

On Sept. 20, 1998, my then-2-year-old daughter Claire was given a death sentence by the oncologist who looked at the MRI of her newly diagnosed brain stem tumor. “Fatal, inoperable, there are no survivors to this kind of tumor.” Those were her words.

Today, Claire is alive and well, thanks be to God. Six months after radiation treatments ended in May 1999, her brain tumor started to shrink, collapse and die. She is in remission. Of course, that means that the tumor could come alive again at any time, but we have learned to live with that.
There are many events throughout our ordeal that increased my faith. The night of Oct. 14, 1998, stands out in particular.

Claire was very ill; we were about two weeks into the radiation treatments. She was dehydrated. Steroids caused fluid retention in her body and she would not drink. We had to hook her up to intravenous fluids overnight.
I kissed her in her crib, tears running down my face. As I prepared to leave, my little baby told me, loudly and clearly, “Talk to Jesus.” As simple as that. I caught my breath, and then prayed out loud with her. When I finished, she ordered me to “Get the water!” (She was referring to a bottle of miracle water from the Holy Grotto at Lourdes, France, given to me by a friend. Reverend Noland had blessed her with this water when Claire was in the hospital.) I touched a few drops to her head and neck. She fell peacefully asleep.

I came downstairs trembling, shaken by the profound power and realization of Claire’s connection to God through Jesus. Obviously, this little 2-year-old was fully aware of it. Now I was too. We have prayed out loud every night since. We used the Lourdes water for nearly 18 months both on the tumor and on her paralyzed left side (now back to normal). “Talk to Jesus.” Claire knows what to do. So now do we.

— Elisabeth Russell