Icon of the Holy Prophet David the King
The image of St. David will be a good name day gift for a man or boy with this name. The icon of the prophet David is the image of the ancestor of Christ Himself. He was the direct ancestor of Jesus Christ. At a young age, the future king tended sheep belonging to his father. He was a deeply religious, devout man. During the military campaign of the Philistines on the land of Israel, David defeated the giant Goliath in battle, which predetermined the outcome of the war. The news of this fight spread throughout all lands, and legends were created about it everywhere. After the death of King Saul and the death of his heirs, he was proclaimed king of Israel. First of all, David founded the new capital of God’s chosen people - the city of Jerusalem, which translated from Hebrew means “City of Peace.” David died a very old man. On his deathbed, he proclaimed that the world would soon be visited by the Messiah and Redeemer - the Lord Jesus Christ.
Icon of David of Gareji
The Monk David of Gareji came to Georgian soil from Syria. He settled together with his student Lucian in the area near Tbilisi. Every week David came to Tbilisi and preached the Christian faith. One day he met a pregnant woman who claimed that the father of the child was Saint David. Later it turned out that local pagans persuaded her to make such a confession. Then David gathered all the believers around him and called the pregnant woman who had slandered him. David said that her wrongness would become obvious after she gave birth to the stone. This is what happened in the end. After this, David and his disciple went to the southeast of Georgia to a deserted place, where he founded the famous David-Gareji Lavra.
Foreign policy
David expanded his territorial possessions, taking lands from neighboring states. He conquered the historical region in western Jordan, defeated the Arameans in Syria, and annexed Idumea. In addition, the king discovered treasures of copper and entered into business cooperation with the Phoenicians, who were known as experienced traders.
Kingdom of Israel under David's reign
The Phoenicians bought cereals and livestock from David, paying by barter. In return, the king received wood and advanced technologies: David’s companions brought writing and the alphabet they invented to the state, which was later borrowed by the Jews.
What does it help with?
According to the nature of Orthodox deeds, saints are traditionally divided into faces (classifications, categories): apostles, equal to the apostles, saints, prophets, martyrs (great martyrs, venerable martyrs, holy martyrs), righteous, reverend, holy fools, holy believers, confessors, etc. Think about what you are could follow the example of their saint. Try to pay attention to their exploits and imitate them a little with your life, then the saint will help you.
Ask your heavenly patron David for everything, pray for all your needs. Try to live a church life. The David icon especially helps in the fight against evil thoughts. Start reading your daily prayer rule: morning and evening prayers, which are in every prayer book. If it’s difficult to read, go through the rosary with the Jesus prayer “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner” (one prayer - shift one bead). Also, if you are in serious condition and cannot read or watch movies, pray the Jesus Prayer more: just lie down and touch your rosary while praying. This is calming, and prayer will enlighten and heal you with the grace of God.
If possible, visit the temple and pray during the service. If you have not yet been baptized, accept Holy Baptism; either the church store employees or the priest will tell you about this. If you are baptized, you can confess to a priest, remembering your sins, and during the morning service - Liturgy - partake of the Holy Mysteries of Christ, having prepared with prayer. If you are seriously ill, you can invite a priest to the room; this is common practice in modern hospitals.
Take from the church or ask your relatives to bring from there a prosphora (given when they pray for your health at the Liturgy; for this, your relatives can write a note “On health”) and holy water (this is drinking water blessed at a water blessing prayer, it is distributed free of charge in every church ).Dear Brothers and Sisters, we remind you that it is easy to buy an icon of David at a low price in our Orthodox shop!
mosaic icons of our Temple
HISTORY OF THE WRITING AND ARRIVAL OF THE ICON OF ST. PRP. DAVID OF GAREJI TO THE TEMPLE.
I learned about Saint David of Gareji at the very beginning of the 2000s. It happened like this. A friend called me and told me that one of the residents of our Veshnyaki district, Marina, had an icon of a Georgian saint in her home (let me remind you that at that time I still knew nothing about David of Gareji). I was invited to pray and venerate this icon. “That’s how I learned about Saint David of Gareji.”
Those years turned out to be quite difficult for our family, so I immediately responded to Irina’s (that’s my friend’s name) offer and went to her house that same evening after work. In the room, on a shelf there was a small icon, in front of which a lamp was burning. Together we read a prayer and troparion in front of the icon. They asked the saint for God's help and kissed his image. Irina gave me with her a brief description of the life of St. David of Gareji, printed on a separate sheet. This is how I learned about Saint David of Gareji.
“The patients began to complain about life.”
That year, my sister Lyudmila was in the 15th city hospital, the one in our area on Veshnyakovskaya Street. Lyudmila had an accident. Her husband died in that accident, and Lyudmila was being prepared for surgery. Her one-year-old daughter Maryana was waiting for her at home.
Irina came to my sister’s room with the icon of David of Gareji. In that ward, in the traumatology department, there were several other women. Irina gave a sermon: “Ask Saint David of Gareji for help. He helps a lot of people in their needs and sorrows...” The patients began to complain about life.
One says: “No one has come to me for a long time, but I really need crutches. It’s time for me to get up after the operation...”
“I also need crutches,” says the second, “but there’s no one to bring them to me...”.
The women kissed the icon, and Irina left.
That same evening, relatives visited the forgotten patient and brought her crutches. A few minutes after they left, another relative came to her and also brought crutches. These second crutches went to the neighbor in the ward, to whom there was no one to come.
A few days later, my sister had surgery. And this day fell on the day of remembrance of Saint David of Gareji.
Over time, the sister got up. One day she had an appointment with a foreign doctor. Rolf came to Moscow to exchange experiences. He turned out to be a very good man, a Christian. Now my sister lives in Switzerland. They signed with Rolf. Now my sister’s husband is trying to adopt Maryana.
Although the injuries received by Lyudmila did not pass without a trace, she nevertheless leads a fairly active lifestyle. Drives a car. And recently she had another accident. It seemed that everything had turned out well, but Lyudmila was very worried whether her old wounds had harmed her in this new accident.
“German doctors conducted an examination.”
“Where did you have the operation? Who operated on you? - they asked her questions.
“In Moscow, and doctor Nikolaev operated on me,” said Lyudmila.
“You have nothing to worry about now. It feels like it was not a person who performed the operation on you, but God himself,” this was the conclusion given by foreign experts.
That icon of David of Gareji also visited my home. It was brought for worship by believers in our Znamensky Church in Perov. A week later the temple was closed for repairs, and the priest gave the icon to me for safekeeping.
It was a warm summer. Many left the city. I was unable to immediately hand over the icon to its owner. I called and invited everyone I could find in Moscow. Only one young woman came to me to venerate the icon of St. David of Gareji - Tatyana. She only came in for a few minutes. She knelt down in front of the image of the saint, bowed to the ground and only then venerated the icon. After that, Tanya thanked us, wished peace to our home, said goodbye and left.
I got the feeling that Tatyana was addressing the saint not through the icon, but was literally kneeling in front of him. She fell so sincerely before the image of the saint. My wife had the same impression then.
After that, I didn’t see Tatyana for several months, and when I asked our mutual friend about her, I heard: “And Tanya is on maternity leave. She is expecting a child. She and her husband didn’t have children for a very long time after the birth of their eldest daughter, but that’s what they wanted...”
Tanya safely gave birth to her second child, and after a while I met Tatyana and her husband with two small children in the church.
My wife and I also turned to David of Gareji for help. I can say that our request was also heard.
“Sergei did not have the chance to finish the icon.”
After consulting at home, we decided to order an image of St. David of Gareji from an icon painter.
We already knew Sergei Malyshenko from Novokuznetsk. He painted an icon of the holy righteous Matrona of Moscow for the Church of the Nativity of John the Baptist in Ivanovo.
Previously, Sergei was a military man. Participated in hostilities. Then he became an icon painter, and a good icon painter.
We phoned Sergei. Then we contacted him on Skype. I sent the image of David of Gareji like the one I had: exactly the same icon that Marina once showed myrrh - Saint David stands at full height, he has a stone in his hands, the temple of the holy city of Jerusalem is visible in the distance.
After some time, Sergei offered me another option: a half-length image of David of Gareji with the marks of the saint’s life. This is what we agreed on.
As time went. Things moved slowly. Sergei had a lot of orders. In addition, at times his health failed him. The board for the icon was ready a long time ago, the images were marked out, and paints were partially applied. I don’t even remember how many years it took to paint the icon. Three for sure, and even more. Serney did not have the chance to finish the icon.
The last time we called him was at the end of April or beginning of May in 2015. Sergei was in the hospital.
“Pray for me, ask for help from the Holy Matrona of Moscow,” Sergei said in a whisper. It was night in Novokuznetsk at that time. And the patients in Sergei’s room were already asleep.
“Now I can only trust in God. It's bad. If I get up, I’ll definitely finish the icon of David of Gareji,” these were the last words of Seryozha that I heard. On May 3, 2015, Sergei died.
Soon after this, Sergei’s wife, Irina, contacted me. She called me on Skype from the workshop of Sergei Malyshenko from Novokuznetsk.
I think there is no need to explain what state Irina was in then. She told me that when she entered the workshop, she found a lot of water under the icons. Irina took a clean rag and hastily began to wipe away the moisture. She was afraid that the icons might suffer, especially since these icons were painted by her husband, who had recently died. Irina wiped everything carefully. Nothing was damaged. Only after a while the moisture accumulated again. Only then did the woman realize that it was the icons painted by her husband that were crying.
“Since Saint David, by the grace of God, visited these places, it is probably fair that his image will appear in the local temple.”
Several icons of Sergei remained unfinished, including the icon of St. David of Gareji. The icon painters with whom Seryozha communicated during his lifetime came to Irina, in Sergei’s workshop. A young icon painter, Alexey Kovalev (baptized Vladimir), undertook to finish Seryozha’s unfinished works. Alexey recalls:
“I can say that when I took up the icon of St. David, I re-read His life, I learned that David is revered as a Saint in Georgia, you can say that monasticism was founded in Iberia, and I have roots from Georgia, and Orthodox Georgia, grandfather Shalva Chelukhadze, on my mother’s side, so I also understood the connection between this icon and me. I can say that not all icons are painted in one go, but St. David was painted in one go, this hagiographic icon seemed very interesting to me, besides, Sergius made a very good drawing at the beginning, so the painting of the icon, as they say, went well. I really liked his life, there was a lot of instructive information in the life of St. David. And of course I feel the prayerful support of St. David of Gareji!”
At the end of August, the icon of St. David of Gareji was painted. They began to prepare for the meeting of the icon. The question arose: in which church should we offer to accept the icon of the saint?
The following thoughts arose: a new temple is being built on Veshnyakovskaya Street in honor of the righteous Alexei Mechev. This is the closest church to the places where a small icon of the holy Venerable David of Gareji was cast in Marina’s house. Irina lives nearby, from whom I first learned about St. David. Opposite the temple under construction, across the road stands City Hospital No. 15, where my sister once lay. After consulting with friends, we decided to offer the icon of David of Gareji to the new church under construction on Veshnyakovskaya Street.
Since Saint David, by the grace of God, visited these places, it is probably fair that his image will appear in the local temple.
That's how it all turned out. Alexey had to seriously work hard to be allowed on the train with the temple icon. A baggage ticket was purchased for the icon. And yet, right up to departure, all sorts of additional permissions, letters and requests were collected and signed. Although everything was discussed and agreed upon with the railway administration in advance. And suddenly, a few minutes before the train departed, everyone somehow immediately calmed down. The demands hanging in the air melted away and Alexey and the icon left for Moscow.
The icon arrived at the temple on Saturday, September 5, 2015. On this day, Muscovites celebrated City Day.
At the Kazansky station, the temple workers - Mikhail and Lyudmila - at 6 am met Alexei with the icon of David of Gareji.
At 13:00 a prayer service for water was served near the temple. Father Victor consecrated the icon of St. David of Gareji.
I can only add that with the help of many people and donors, painting the icon became possible. I can't even list them all. Of course, these are icon painters Sergei and Alexey (baptized Vladimir), Sergei’s widow Irina. Among these people is my mother Valentina, who is no longer alive; and my grandmother Anastasia, who is already 94 years old; my aunt Lydia, a war veteran, who is also approaching 90. It so happened that my mother, grandmother and aunt raised the bulk of the money for the icon. Our friend Irina also helped us a lot. And of course, my family members and relatives, who all together collected funds for the icon.
Andrey Zubanov
Prayer to Saint David
There are few rules for reciting prayers, although you can address the Lord and saints anywhere. Prayers are read in front of the icons, in the “red corner”, where the home iconostasis is usually located. Cross yourself, looking at the icon, bow. Now you can read the prayer and supplement it by praying in your own words. Read the prayer with attention, stay in communion with God. After prayer, you can kiss the icon according to tradition - this is called “kissing the icon”: cross yourself twice, kiss the hand or the edge of the clothing of the image on the icon, cross yourself again. May the Lord protect you with His grace!
After prayer, you can kiss the icon according to tradition - this is called “kissing the icon”: cross yourself twice, kiss the hand or the edge of the clothing of the image on the icon, cross yourself again. The prayer to the saint can be read online using the text below:
“Pray to God for me, holy saint of God David, because I diligently ask for your intercession, an assistant in everything and a prayer book for my soul.”
