An amazing icon of the Mother of God "Kazan" is kept in a small church in the Log village of the Ilovlinsky district.
There are dozens of testimonies of how desperate people, contrary to the fatal forecasts of medical luminaries, were healed by praying to her.
Eyewitness testimony
At the age of 46, doctors in Volgograd Natalya Sokolova made a terrible diagnosis - the 4th stage of cancer, "the operation is not advisable." But the woman still insisted on surgical intervention. However, as the doctors had warned, the disease only progressed even faster.
- I was discharged home to die. None of the medical staff said this to me out loud, they only advised me to put things in order with the will as soon as possible,”says Natalya. - By that time, I was actually already a bed patient. The stitches were bleeding on my stomach, hellish pains … I was so exhausted that there was only one thought: to die as soon as possible. Out of despair, my daughter went to church to pray and light a candle to ease my suffering. There, some woman advised her to go to the Log to the miraculous icon of the Kazan Mother of God.
Natalia's daughter did just that. She returned from the trip with a photo reproduction of that very icon. Natalya attached the photo to the most painful point - the seams. The bandage on them was soaked through with brilliant green and the icon soon became the same color as the bandages, so that even the face of the Mother of God was difficult to see.
- It seemed to me that I had committed a terrible sin by ruining the icon. I tried to wash one corner of brilliant green, it's useless. Just damaged the photo. She put it on the table next to her bed at night. The next morning I was shocked - the Mother of God was looking at me from the photo … At first I thought it was a different photo, but small specks in the place where I tried to wipe off the brilliant green and damage on the reproduction of the icon spoke of one thing - the same one. A few days later, the son-in-law brought vegetables from the dacha, wrapped in an old newspaper. And in it - an article about the holy source. I am sure that it was the Mother of God who prompted me the way.
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The sick woman spent two months at the source. During this time, I had to overcome a lot, but the spark of divine hope supported and gave strength. From this period, a gradual recovery began. When, six months later, Natalya was examined at the clinic, the doctors simply did not believe that this was possible. But two conclusions of doctors, given after the examination, with an interval of several months, confirm that a miracle has happened.
The obvious is the incredible
In the guest book of the church of St. the apostles Peter and Paul in Logu dozens of such amazing stories.
Recently we met with the Volgograd resident Lyudmila Shikova. Her son's illness brought her to the icon of the Mother of God. At six months, doctors diagnosed him with partial atrophy of the optic nerves in both eyes.
- I will never forget how to my question: "How can I treat my son?", The doctor replied: "Yes, this is not treated." I myself am a doctor, intellectually I understand that there are situations when medicine is powerless. But how can you accept with your heart that your child's world will soon plunge into darkness? - says Lyudmila.
The miraculous icon became the “saving straw”. According to Lyudmila, she turned to the Mother of God, as a mother to a mother, begged to save the boy from blindness. With the baby in their arms, they stood at prayer services near the icon, they smeared little Dima with oil from the lamp on the eyelids.
- It is impossible to convey what we experienced at that time, a sea of tears was shed, - recalls Dima's grandmother Tatyana Skvortsova. - He saw only at a distance of 20 cm, did not fix his gaze on objects, no matter how bright they were. And a few months after visiting the temple, I noticed that he, lying in his crib, examines the flowers on the wallpaper …
Dima is already 9 years old, he studies well at school, reads, writes, draws. True, it is still impossible to get rid of glasses completely, but, as his parents say, his visual acuity is improving.
- I so wanted to thank the Mother of God. I embroidered the first icon in my life with her image, - says Lyudmila. “I got such inspiration from my work, did everything in one breath, without a single“blot”, and then I consecrated the embroidered icon in the church, and now it occupies the most honorable place in our house.
In gratitude to the Mother of God for the birth of a long-awaited child, a married couple from Volgograd paid for the manufacture of a new vestment for the revered icon. Through the efforts of another married couple, who had also dreamed of a child for many years, a major reconstruction and repair of the temple was carried out, an iconostasis appeared. Almost everyone who has felt the divine influence of the Mother of God tries to contribute to the development of the temple as much as possible.
Divine sign
As the rector of the church, Priest Alexander Loban, said, before the revolution, there was a church of St. the apostles Peter and Paul. In the 30s, the Bolsheviks destroyed it.
A new temple with the same name in the village appeared in 1998 thanks to the persistence of ten local grandmothers with the support of local authorities. Workers of the local cannery have allocated three cabins, change houses, which became the basis of the future temple. The locals brought images to the new church, which were kept as family heirlooms. This is how an ancient icon of the Kazan Mother of God appeared in the church in a tin vestment that had tarnished from time and a half-broken icon case.
In 2003, an event took place that made this temple a place of pilgrimage for the Orthodox. Soon after Christmas, the icon of the Mother of God "Kazan" was bled.
- I came to pray, I look, and on the face of the Mother of God a red dot, as if poked with a felt-tip pen, - says Father Alexander. - Every day the speck increased, as if pulsing. For two weeks, the dot grew on the cheek of the Virgin.
Father Alexander took photographs of the icon to Metropolitan German of Volgograd and Kamyshin. Vladyka gave his blessing to read the akathist and serve at the icon of prayer.
- The second or third time we read the akathist at the icon, now I don’t remember how one of the parishioners asked: “Father, what about the candle?” - recalls father Alexander. - The candle at the icon turned crimson-red right before our eyes. I took her in my hands, and from her like a drop of blood fell. Now the candle has turned brown from time to time, the color of caked blood.
Soon an incident occurred that revealed the healing power of the icon. A resident of Log, grandmother Anna Denisova burned her hands with boiling broth.
- The burn was severe, - says Father Alexander. - Shouts from pain: "Father, help." How can I help? I took a brush and anointed my grandmother with oil from the icon near the icon. The next day she came and showed her hands - as if nothing had happened. Only, apparently, this is how the Lord arranged, redness remained between the fingers - where we did not smear with oil from the lamp.
From that moment, the pilgrimage of those in need of the help of the Virgin began. Unhealed wounds, infertility, oncological diseases, heart ailments, as well as earthly requests for help in business, litigation and inheritance, judging by the entries in the temple's guestbook, were heard by the Mother of God. The news of the miraculous icon spread throughout Russia and crossed the borders of the state. Moreover, as Father Alexander confesses, to this day it remains a mystery to him, how people from afar recognized the small village of Log lost in the steppes and the icon giving healing.
- One day I go to the temple, and on the porch sits a woman with a suitcase, - the father recalls. - I came from Kiev. "How did you find us?" - I ask. And she replied: "I had a dream about the Log, about the icon, about your church, that here you can be cured." I don’t know how to explain it. But this is not the only case when Divine conduction brings people to our temple.
But not only those who were suffering healing were drawn to the temple. "Hunters for sensations" insistently demanded an almost forensic examination of the icon. For example, a landing of Ufologists who landed in the temple published a detailed report on how the Orthodox icon "affects the chakras: anahata, vishuhda, ajna sahasrara." In addition, "astral experts" listed their versions of the appearance of a spot on the face. Among them is the sunbeam, which melted the paint at one point on the icon, and then it, they say, spread over the face. In addition, ufologists did not exclude that the red paint was injected with a syringe into the icon. At the same time, they recognized: healings took place, but they are all associated with the belief of many people in the divine power of the icon, which gave rise to anomalies.
- Well, they wrote such heresy about the icon, - Father Alexander is indignant. - They are also offended that I do not allow them to descend to blasphemy - to scrape the face of the Virgin. Is it really the spot? The bottom line is that unexplained divine phenomena are happening. People are healed, there are many testimonies of this. And this is the main property of the revered icon.
To put an end to the pseudo-scientific dispute of amateurs, with the blessing of Vladyka Herman, an examination of the mysterious spot was carried out. The commission included scientists and representatives of the clergy. Professors of the Volgograd Cardiology Center came to the conclusion that the mysterious spot on the face of the Mother of God anatomically repeats the subcutaneous hemorrhage that occurs in humans as a result of heart disease. Like every mother, the heart of the Mother of God hurts for all of us sick, sinful and unlucky.