Vigils Reading – Memorial of BVM

TO A TEACHER: ABOUT THE APPEARANCE OF THE THEOTOKOS

From the missionary letters of Saint Nikolai Velimirovich7

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You write to me with exhilaration how the Mother of God appeared to you and how you are now on the sure path of faith. Your little daughter was in bed with a terrible fever. You called for a number of doctors. They examined the girl and went to the other room to assess the situation. You listened in to their conversation with trembling. One of them said that she might be saved if the ailing girl could perspire. Others considered it was too late even for that.

In desperation, you wrung your hands and cried. Over the child’s bed was an icon of the Theotokos. Until that moment, you saw that icon more as a decoration of the house, not a necessity. But in that desperate hour, you kneeled before the icon and choking with tears, you cried out to the Mother of God, “O Holy Mother of God, you see my pain. You know, O Mother above all mothers how it is to lose an only child. You watched your only Son suffer on the Cross. I beg you, have mercy on me a sinner and help me. I place all my hope on you now. My hope in people is over. The whole world cannot help me now. Only you, O Precious Mother, can help me if you will. You have comforted more than one embittered mother throughout the ages. Comfort me also, O Most Holy, Most Pure one!” After long prayer and sobbing, you looked at the icon and you saw tears in the Virgin’s eyes.

A moment after that, you looked at your child and she was all in sweat. The day after, she sat up and ate, and soon after that she was completely recovered. Thanks be to the Holy Theotokos. And thank you for sharing this. Our faith is founded upon experience, not on self-willed judgments and theories. Your episode is most precious to me too. Last winter, we had a case like this happen also. The daughter of a poor widow was gravely ill. For a month, she was out of her senses and did not say a word. All hope was lost. The grieving mother started collecting money for the funeral items. One evening, the mother was sitting by the deathbed of her daughter and crying quietly. Suddenly, without opening her eyes, the girl said, “Do not cry mother. Take me to Kalishte tomorrow and I will get well. That’s what my Heavenly Mother said to me. She is now standing by me!” The shocked mother was quivering. The next day she took the sick girl to the Monastery of the Holy Theotokos at Kalishte, and brought her back healthy.

But were there only two instances of this happening; or three or ten? There is no number and no end of the appearances and intercessions of the Theotokos. Saint Seraphim of Sarov, fallen asleep exactly a hundred years ago, said that the Mother of God personally appeared to him six times during his life. And if the whole of this quiet people which considers all those heavenly visions to be its precious and sweet secret — if all of them would open their mouth and speak of all they have seen, the earth would be filled with amazement. Believe me, when one enters the knowledge of the working and appearing of the heavenly world in our earthly life, one feels like he has entered a new boundless and unstudied kingdom of a most wondrous reality, Into that darkness for the worldly eyes, the soul can enter only with the lit torches of faith and love, according to the wondrous words of the Apostle Paul, “may Christ by faith move into your hearts, that you may be rooted and grounded in love, so that you may later understand what is width and length and depth and height.” And you ought to thank God and His Mother that your spiritual sight was open. Do not blind it with sin and carelessness anymore. May God always help you