Dear readers, I’d like to share with you a story I happened to witness and participate in, according to God’s grace. This wondrous story of salvation of one worthy man served as a cautionary tale for me, as well. I intentionally changed the names of the locations and names of participants, since we can’t obtain their consent to this publication.
The Holy Hierarch St. Spyridon, Bishop of Tremithus. Artist: Elena Charkasova
I will begin, perhaps, by giving a little bit of a backstory in order for our reader to fully sense the cause-and-effect relationship of the events that took place there.
At the very start of my path as an Orthodox, I was somehow certain that I should only address God in my prayers, whereas the saints did seem to exist; but somehow I made nothing of them and the role they played in the help we receive from God. I always wondered why we should read those long akathists to the saints or go to pilgrimages to holy places. If God is omnipresent, you don’t have to seek out certain places—if you pray and repent and ask for everything you need, you can just relax and wait for God’s help to arrive! What’s worse, even over the years I didn’t gain a better perspective on this matter… Of course, I did occasionally receive help from God, but it was hard to trace a particular pattern between, “I asked,” and, “I received,” as it all too often looked like a coincidence one day and a pattern the next day, or like a wish mistaken for reality.
And so, one summer, it all happened when my wife and I were forced to move to another apartment in our southern resort town. During high season the local rentals get rather pricey, and we were cash-strapped, as usual. But even with money, it was nearly impossible to find any decent housing at an adequate price. As bad luck would have it, there was no cash inflow in principle in sight at that moment, but we had to move out one way or another, and so we were practically almost forced to live on the street.
As I was pondering what I am to do next, I just happened to browse through this particular website and accidentally came across an article telling stories of the St. Spyridon’s miraculous help. Impressed by what I read there, but not without a dose of skepticism, I thus decided: What if I find and read the akathist to this saint, and maybe things will gain traction?
I went to church, had confession, received Communion and went to read the akathist for several days. Toward the end, I have to confess, I practically reached the point of panicked desperation. And then suddenly, practically at the last moment, as if out of nowhere, work orders rained down on me one after another. Yet, I have to admit, due to the specifics of my field of work, summer months are always the dead season through and through.
As it turned out later, Divine Providence took us there for a reason
All in all, we now had more than enough cash to make the move, but we were still unable to find a rental we could afford. I continued to read the akathist, but this time, I was asking for help with the move. In the end, again at the last moment, we received a call from a man who had a house for rent, but in a rural area. My wife and I off-handedly decided that, since it was our only option, we had nothing left but to move there for the summer. At least it was better than just living on the street. It ended up being quite a decent house and, once we cleaned it up inside, we were perfectly happy with it.
And, as it turned out later, it was Divine Providence, which brought us there for a reason.
***
It was from that moment that the very events I planned to tell you about began to unfold.
So, we settled in this house. Its owner was a simple man—let’s call him Oleg—and he lived just across the street from us, and so we somehow became friends with him right away.
Then, one day, he tells us that they had a man in their village—let’s call him Grandpa Sasha—who was once a shepherd but who is currently hopelessly bedridden due to old age (70+) and poor health.
He also mentioned that no one visits him, because in his time he used to “hoist a few,” in other words, he was a drunkard. So, with all his acting up while being drunk, he managed to completely alienate himself from the rest of his family.
Oleg also added that he once had an apartment in the city and even owned a small business, which he had lost for the same reason, so he had to move to the village and live out his life all alone in someone else’s abandoned house. From time to time, however, concerned neighbors would stop by and bring him food.
Well, as he shared this story, we all agreed that no one should live like that and that was that.
Then, one evening, after a short time, Oleg comes by a bit tipsy and starts complaining about life, that this is bad, and then says as if incidentally:
“Eh, my life is bad, do you remember that Grandpa Sasha I had told you about? Can you imagine, his toes fell off today!”
“What do you mean, they fell off?!” I was horrified. “You are not joking, are you?!”
“I’m dead serious, it’s just as I told you, they just fell off! He’s had gangrene for several years, who knows how many times we called the ambulance, and grandpa even stayed in the hospital, but they eventually kicked him out. So, everyone is sick and tired of him.”
It also turned out that he was practically blind due to cataracts in both eyes, and, in fact, he was no longer able to take care of himself properly, so the villagers appealed to the local authorities many times to somehow find a place for him to live; but in the end, nothing was done.
So, everyone has abandoned this man dying of gangrene somewhere in this village, and yet no one can do anything about it. But he remains perfectly sane, and besides, he quit drinking once he became bedridden, but there is absolutely nothing he can do about his life—neither he nor his neighbors, who seem to feel sorry for him but have no idea what else can be done to help him.
He has already told his neighbors to stop bringing food so he could die and end his suffering.
At the end of our conversation, Oleg made an offer:
“If you like, let’s go and see him, he lives nearby.”
I hesitated at first, thinking that I’m not a doctor and what I can do to help him, that I don’t have enough money to help him out anyway, and I can barely make ends meet myself.
But, in the end, I did go there and it turned out that truth was so much worse than I could have ever imagined.
***
When we came to Grandpa Sasha’s house, I saw garbage-filled front yard and a ramshackle single-room house, with its front door completely ripped off its hinges.
Upon entering, a sweetish odor of rotting flesh blasted my nose; the floor was strewn with tin cans, trash, and some food scraps green from mold; the ceiling and walls, once whitewashed, were pitch black with soot from the burning stove and tangles of cobwebs were hanging from the ceiling.
There was not even water there, not to mention any other conveniences—nothing but an inexplicable feeling of gloom and despair hanging over it all. If we could ever picture to ourselves what hell looked like, it would have probably looked like that.
In the midst of all that “splendor” stood an old iron bed strewn with some dirty rags and bales and there, in the midst of it, lay a man, that same Grandpa Sasha, worn-out from his protracted illness.
Heavy hearted, I shuffled back home not knowing what to do or how I could help him, if at all
After talking to him a little about how he fell so low and learning a few more details about the circumstances of his life, but most importantly, finding out that he would have really liked to get out of this trouble and change things, but he had no clue how to do so, I heavy-heartedly shuffled back home not knowing what to do, or how to help him at all.
I stood for my evening prayer feeling totally sad and frustrated, and prayed to St. Spyridon of Tremithus
“>St. Spyridon, asking him as well:
“Father Spyridon, you were a shepherd, and this wretched man was also a shepherd, so it seems like he is your colleague or something like that. Help him, if there is the will of God and if you also want to help him.”
So, a few days had passed as I continued to pray for help, but somehow my confidence slowly dwindled away about a chance of seeing any changes in his life. Besides, I began to feel guilty that the man might have hours left to live, or if, God forbid, there is sepsis due to gangrene or something else. But all I was doing for him was praying, and to no avail. Then, immediately, once I thought about it, an idea suddenly crossed my mind that I should probably make his problem known to other people, spread the news via social networks, or at least try to do something in this direction.
***
As a result, when I got up in the morning, I decided to meet Oleg again and tell him what I came up with for helping the man. I also asked him whether I could use his phone number, since I didn’t know Grandpa Sasha in person. But if someone calls and begins to ask questions about his situation, we’d have someone who can tell everything in greater detail.
So, having agreed with Oleg about all these things, I returned home, logged on to social networks and made several publications at various social network groups describing the essence of his problem. But honestly speaking, I never really expected that something would ever come out of it at all.
Still, I prayed about it one last time, asking St. Spyridon for help and only then went on with my daily chores.
***
In the evening of the same day, Oleg excitedly came to see me and said:
“Hey, you, there, what have you done, I’ve already had fifty people call me?! Even the local administration center called me and asked what those amateur activities of mine were all about.”
I didn’t even finish listening to the end of this story but immediately ran inside, jumped to the computer and… I couldn’t believe my eyes—the support groups where I had published my story were buzzing like beehives, and my inbox was flooded with messages.
I had at one group five, at another fifteen, thousand views (depending on the size of the social network group), people made hundreds of shares, left a ton of comments—and it all happened in a matter of several hours.
It looked like an information bomb had exploded. People were willing to travel to this village right away, someone was wondering where to send the donation, while others wanted to find and punish those responsible for such situation, like the doctors, the administration, and God knows who else.
By afternoon of the next day, a string of dozens of cars lined up in front of Grandpa Sasha’s house, the whole village went haywire, and volunteer organizations got into the act.
Unknown to anybody and only yesterday a castaway, Grandpa Sasha was literally flooded with food, things, attention and all possible assistance.
Unknown to anybody, a castaway only yesterday, Grandpa Sasha was literally flooded with food, things, attention and all possible assistance
Oleg’s and my surprise knew no bounds, as even in my good mind I couldn’t imagine that this problem would stir any interest, as I knew quite well how social networks make those assistance collections: It takes them forever to collect funds even for cancer-stricken children, and often when they receive the necessary amount down to the last ruble, it is already way too late to treat something. But this… here… was something!!!
As a result, it was a week before donors were found who took Grandpa Sasha under their care, drove him away, washed, hired a hairdresser from an expensive salon, paid to treat his leg, the cataracts, and anything else that could be treated. They bought him a completely new set of clothes, a smartphone, helped him to register as a senor citizen and receive retirement benefits, and did everything so that this man could begin life with a clean slate.
On top of that, his treatment was a complete success, and neither I, nor even Grandpa Sasha himself expected that his leg could be saved. Generally speaking, his leg was supposed to be amputated because of the unsanitary conditions, the extended time it was left untreated, and maggot-infested sores, and it generally looked like a prop in a movie about the living dead.
When I met the hero of our story some time later, I hardly recognized him: he was a born-again man
When I met the hero of out story some time later, I hardly recognized him: he was a completely new person—clean, neatly dressed, with a firm, confident look in his eyes and plans for the future, despite being in his seventies.
Almost nothing was left of the Grandpa Sasha we knew before; and what’s most reassuring was that he was so impressed with his miraculous salvation that he became seriously interested about his life and the role of Divine Providence in it.
***
This is how I became a witness of assistance coming from a truly great servant of God, the Holy Hierarch Spyridon. Besides, it wasn’t help that took long to receive, when we could involuntarily begin to think that it was just by accident or coincidence, but something, so to speak, happening live, before our eyes, and so huge that it was hard to believe our eyes or ears and that it can ever actually happen this way. You see it yourself and know full well where it all came from; but what’s most important, Who sent it and that He, the Lord, and His Providence isn’t somewhere out there on the pages of ancient lives of the saints, but it is right here, now.
It is quite hard to describe my feelings, but even years later this experience never faded from my memory.
I realized a simple and obvious thing: If you ask God for something and you do not receive it, it is probably not even because it isn’t good for you, but it’s because you probably don’t ask God properly and boldly enough for something, to be heard, or, even more so, to receive something as the result.
It is probably exactly cases like this one when assistance from our saints becomes truly indispensable: not only does it help to solve the problem but also teaches a lesson and opens our eyes on many things.
***
O most blessed hierarch Spyridon, pray to God for us with all the saints!
Glory to God for everything!
