If any of you have ever suffered from migraine headaches, you will sympathize with MaryAnne Rodrigues of Bombay, India, who experienced them frequently.

“They usually started in the mornings at work,” she says. “I would have to leave the office immediately and come home, as I couldn’t bear light or noise, or concentrate on what I was doing.”

One morning MaryAnne felt the ominous warning signs of a headache. Her boss assured her that she could go home as soon as her work was done. But it was one of those hectic days, and not until three p.m. had MaryAnne finally worked her way through the piles. By now her head was throbbing, and she was feeling sick to her stomach.

She left the building and walked into the hot mid-day sun to cross the busy main road.

“The STOP signal was on but as I stepped on to the road and took two steps forward, I suddenly felt light in my head and could feel myself falling,” MaryAnne says. “My bag and the things I had in my arms went sprawling across the road.”

The signal changed, and MaryAnne saw a taxi speeding from the side street, attempting to overtake the slow-moving cars at the signal. The taxi was heading straight for her!

But seconds before she lost total consciousness, MaryAnne saw something amazing. Standing about four feet away, in the middle of the road, was a tall figure in a full white gown. “His arms were lifted up, signaling the oncoming traffic to stop,” she says. Then she lost consciousness completely.

According to witnesses, a crowd immediately gathered around MaryAnne, and someone sprinkled water on her face. She revived quickly.

“When I came around I saw people gathering my things together but the first thought on my mind was: Where was the taxi?” How could she have escaped those wheels, heading straight for her head?”

But no. There was the taxi in the middle of the street, stopped exactly where the figure in the white gown had been standing.

No one else seemed to have seen anything unusual, and tears sprang to MaryAnne’s eyes. Not only had her life been saved, she realized, but she had been given a brief glimpse of the unseen world, the angelic protection that is always around us, caring for us with silent strength. And she gave thanks.

Copyrighted 2004, Joan Wester Anderson. For more stories of God’s love, check the website at: www.joanwanderson.com.