By Acarya Dasa
On September 12th the padayatra party reached the village of Muchakota. The heavens had opened up and it had been raining heavily for days when we reached the village. The rains caused many difficulties for us, the bulls needed shelter, and we needed a place to store the kitchen ratha and the book trolley. It was getting increasingly difficult to find a suitable place to take shelter from the downpour –if the rain continued at this rate, all the books and the other material we were carrying would get damaged, the advance party of devotees would also not be able to go to the next town to make arrangements. The bulls were getting wet so we housed them in a local goshala, which was still less than ideal because even though they were no longer getting wet, the goshala floor was saturated with water so they could not lie down after their long walk.
Drenched and looking for an escape from the rain we managed to get shelter in a Nrsimhadev temple in the village. We took darsana of the Lord and meditated on His form as the protector of devotees. It was funny how harinama sankirtana had become known for bringing rain, yet now we were in need of shelter from it. All the padayatris began to pray intensely to Lord Nrsimhadev, begging Him to protect us from the heavy downpour just as Lord Krishna had protected the vrajvasis from the torrential rains sent by Lord Indra.
The Lord was quick to reciprocate with our sincere prayers for shelter and protection, and just as we had desired the rain stopped. We slept the whole night through, knowing that our belongings were protected. The next day the astonished villagers hurried to meet us, they told us that what had happened was a miracle! They explained that it had been raining all over this area and just 2 kilometres from the village it was pouring down, but not a single drop of rain fell within the village where we were staying.
The padayatris all smiled and chanted loudly, “Bhakta vatsal Nrsimha Bhagavan ki jai! They had witnessed how Lord Nrsimhadev is the ultimate protector of devotees. He protected the boy Prahlad from the cruel onslaughts of his demonic father –it was only natural then that the padayatris had taken shelter of the Lord in His ferocious, protective form. In this epic padayatra tale the devotees, helpless and scared, had surrendered to the Lord’s mercy, begged for His protection, and got His special mercy in the form of a miracle.
