I'd like to share with you a miracle which we received through Vladika John.
Our family — I, my husband and three children — came to America in 1963. We were not greeted very warmly by our new country. They found something wrong with our son's lungs and he had to have an operation. My husband was already ill and couldn't find work. I managed to find work, but it was very difficult to support the family on one income.
We didn't know Vladika John, but here in America we heard about him and about the miracles he worked. We began thinking how we could arrange to invite Vladika John to our home to tell him about our situation. We had no money, and so we postponed doing this.
As it happened, Vladika John himself came to us unexpectedly one night at eleven o'clock. We told him about our son, who was in the hospital. Vladika went up to my husband and for several moments looked him straight in the eyes. He then made the rounds of all the rooms, asking who slept where, and left, without saying anything else.
Soon my husband got a job and worked there for ten years, making it possible for the children to receive a higher education. Vladika visited our son in the hospital; he even brought the Wonderworking [Kursk] Icon. Most often he visited our son late at night. Soon our son recovered and everything was normal.
Two days before his repose, Vladika John visited us and asked after the health of my husband. Foreseeing his repose, Vladika nevertheless continued to be concerned about his flock.
A second miracle occurred with our other son. At work I received a phone call from his school and was told that the right side of his face was paralyzed. A specialist, after examining our son, told us that he had a pinched nerve, and that an operation was necessary. We began discussing when to schedule the operation. Leaving the doctor, we went straight to the cathedral, where we found Vladika John and told him everything. At that time our sons still served as acolytes. When our son who was ill approached Vladika for anointing (it was the eve of Saint Nicholas day), Vladika anointed him with a large sign of the Cross on several places on the afflicted side. Our son's condition improved, and when we returned to the doctor, he examined the boy and said that an operation was not necessary. Pressing my hand, he acknowledged that it was a miracle.
Tamara Bogatskaya, San Francisco