Amy Grant Thanks the Power of Prayer for Guiding Her Through Life-Saving Open-Heart Surgery

Amy Grant credits the power of prayer for guiding her through her grueling open-heart surgery — and her appeals to heaven were not only for herself!

At age 59, the country star was diagnosed with an enlarged heart due to an undetected birth defect called partial anomalous pulmonary venous return. Amy explains, “Evidently, one of the veins that carries blood from the lungs to the heart was going to the wrong side of my heart, enlarging the left ventricle.”

The 2019 doctor’s visit was a fluke — superstar husband Vince Gill had gone in for a checkup with Grant his cardiologist, Dr. underwent John Cage, who gave Vince a clean bill of health. Then Cage talked Amy into a checkup as well.

Amy recalls that after some diagnostic tests, he told her, “You’re going to need surgery … open-heart … and sooner rather than later. Open-heart surgery was a lot to wrap my head around.”

Then came the pandemic, shutting everything down and forcing Amy and Vince to remain home in Nashville. “The situation around the world was upsetting, and my prayers included all the people who were suffering,” reveals Amy, now 64. “There’s an old saying: Pray for yourself and you’ve prayed once, pray for someone else and you’ve prayed twice.”

When word of Amy’s serious health crisis broke out on social media, fans began praying for her as well. “It’s amazing how many people are praying for you,” Vince told her. “Thousands of them.”

Amy says, “I tried to read the responses, but there were just too many. I wanted to reach out and thank each person.”

And the words to God from stranger helped her tremendously.” “I could feel the peace of everyone’s prayers,” Amy reveals. “When I was prepped for surgery, I felt so completely enveloped in the presence of God’s love, in the love that came through all those prayers.”

The surgery was a complete success. “I felt like a walking miracle,” says Amy. “And I was.”

Now, the “Baby, Baby” singer confides, “Since my surgery, I’ve had an 8 p.m. alert on my phone, ‘Pray for the caregivers,’ it says. For all the people in hospitals and elsewhere who care for the ailing. And for the good people God put in my life who helped and cared for me. After all, what greater form of care is there than prayer? Especially when it comes from the heart.”