Transcript
Okay good morning boker tov welcome back to living with emuna so glad that you are here and we are on this emuna journey together. So much to discuss, so much to learn, so much to get to but let's start as we always do with our gratitude which is expressed to our amazing series sponsors, the Emuna series Dr. Avi and Bella Morgan in memory of Rabbi Dr. Brian Galbut and in memory of Bella's mother, Dr. Ellen Shanzer. We remain very grateful to the Morgans and we always continue to invite anyone who wants to sponsor a particular shiur episode to please feel free to do so. We're going to the emails continue to come in and Baruch Hashem in fact so many come in I can't possibly read them all. I can't read them all in the shiur, I read them all personally, respond to them all and they're all deeply meaningful so continue to send them in even if we can't get to them or can't get to them immediately we will but I appreciate it. So I want to share with you what I've shared many times already and we'll get to today in our learning in the text we're going to study from the Ohev Yisrael the Apter Rav, Avraham Yehoshua Heshel, zchuto yagen aleinu but the emuna stories that all end with a happy ending and I was delayed and then it worked out because I didn't go down with the crash and the thing and the thing and the thing, that's not why we believe. Our emuna is not dependent or conditional on everything working out because such emuna is not emuna. Such emuna and bitachon is not submitting or surrendering to Hashem that He's in charge, He's in control, that everything is for our best. If every emuna story has to have the ending that we want the way that we believe then in fact that's not emuna or bitachon necessarily at all. That's simply trying to micromanage and control we're competing with Hashem in this world. Emuna stories and bitachon stories that touch me the most are the ones where even if it didn't work out the way one wanted they leaned in to say this wasn't random, this wasn't chance, this wasn't happenstance, this was carefully curated and choreographed from above, this was from Hashem and I'll find meaning in it nonetheless. So I share with you an email to that effect. Hi Rabbi I want to share an emuna story with you. One of my new businesses is selling disposable certain types of gloves. We didn't get into it until about a year ago, I missed a big Covid rush, some we sell to some medical uses but mostly sell to non-medical use. Our largest customers at the moment are, I don't want to get too detailed even though I'm sure he doesn't mind my sharing it, our largest customers at the moment are certain dealerships for their service centers. I've been talking to a group in another state for a while now about being able to provide all 15 of their dealerships with their gloves, give them that corporate bulk discount. Their representative told me corporate had approved it, they were good just getting the mix of glove sizes so they could place their first order. It's been a few weeks but it's corporate so it takes a while. Right, so the person is about to land this big deal they're about to grow the company not just sell mom and pop not just sell individually to purchasers but a corporate deal to cover a large amount more than a dozen dealerships which certainly will have a big payday for him and for this business. He writes: I just got an email today letting me know that corporate was able to get their current vendor to match our prices so they won't be buying in bulk from us. The individual dealerships can still order from whoever they like so my contact will still buy from us individually but we were really counting on the account to help us not only get a corporate buyer but hoping it would sell other big groups as well. We'd also be able to use that volume to run our own line of product and have our own packaging to start manufacturing ourselves. When I read the email this is the key. When I read the email I didn't get angry or think what if or what I could have done differently. I was able to use the emuna muscle you've been training me on and growing and realize it's all part of Hashem's plan. Thank you. Now why are those the best emails? Because they're not and it turned out that they called us back and they agreed to do it and they paid more than originally and it was a, that's not how the email ended. And if that's our relationship with Hashem that I believe in You I love You I surrender to You only when You make it work out the way I want and I got the job or I got the girl or I got the baby or I got the house or I got the, only then then that's not emuna that's not bitachon and that's not real and that's not life and if that's the expectation you're going to be let down and your emuna is going to crash it's going to implode it can't last and you'll be left in those moments of disappointment with no one to turn to because you only want to lean on Him and rely on Him and love Him when it all works out. So who will you be with? You'll be all alone. So these emails are the ones that mean a lot to me, they inspire me, the person who says I got a big disappointment something didn't work out something was really upsetting but you know what? That's when I remembered that that too was by design and it was for me and it was for my best and even if I can't see it or appreciate it right now and even if I'm disappointed or frustrated with Hashem which we are entitled to be. Davening is a form of protest and objection and Hashem why and I need You and why did it have to be that way and we spoke last week that the moment we lean into Hashem You're the one who brought the problem then we can also lean in and say so You're the one who could have the solution. Tell me what to do next, tell me how to fix this, tell me what's the next step. So the email that says I got a big disappointment, was frustrating and upsetting, but you know, I didn't get angry. I didn't lose my cool, I didn't panic, I didn't get anxious, I didn't worry, because I knew it was all from above. Those are the emails that mean a lot to me. And that's what I want to learn with us with you today. So if you look, if you have there more copies here if you'd like, we'll put a picture in the WhatsApp group after the shiur, if you're part of the Emunah WhatsApp group, make sure join it if you're not, rabbiefremgoldberg.org/whatsapp. I don't make any money off of it, but you can be informed of when we're having shiur, if it's cancelled or rescheduled, bonus material, so it's worth it. Just one more group, one more group, it's worth it. So the Ohev Yisrael, who was the Ohev Yisrael? The Ohev Yisrael was the Apter Rav, רב אברהם יהושע השיל, the Apter Rav, and he lived from 1748 and he died in Mezhbizh in what is now the Ukraine in 1825. He was a great Rav. He was a great Chassidishe Rebbe. And in fact the whole sefer Ohev Yisrael, he goes through parsha by parsha the whole Torah, and the theme of this sefer, he says you could find in every parsha the mitzvah of Ahavas Yisrael. The mitzvah to love every Jew. This is that time, the three weeks, there's such distance, such tension, such animosity, such divide in Klal Yisrael, such partisanship. And this is when we have to heal it. If we want Moshiach and we want to end this galus, if we want redemption for ourselves personally and collectively and for this world, then we have to heal these distances. I wrote an article this week about our visit to HASC this past Shabbos, in a place that's filled with love and filled with no judgment, and it's a special place that we should learn from and implement everywhere that we go, to always know that what we see on the outside does not necessarily reflect what's happening inside. This autistic young man who I met, who's non-verbal, but was taught and learned how to communicate, and his parents published recently a booklet of divrei Torah that even though on the outside he was measured as having the development of an 18-month-old, turns out on the inside is someone who understands and thinks and can communicate if only given the tools. And my takeaway was, some people look broken on the outside but they're whole on the inside, and there's a whole world of people we interact with who look whole on the outside and they're broken on the inside. And if in HASC nobody has a problem with those who are making noise or screaming or acting out because we understand that they're special needs, well, everybody's special in their own way, some on the outside, some on the inside. Can't we create environments of unconditional love and no judgment? Can't we find our similarities? Can't we practice a little bit more Ahavas Yisrael? So the Ohev Yisrael wrote a sefer, and he said in every parsha we could find this mitzvah, an allusion, a hint, an obligation, the mandate to Ahavas Yisrael in every single parsha. Ahavas Yisrael, love a fellow Jew. Most famously was in Parshas Balak two weeks ago, when he was asked by his chassidim, where's V'ahavta L'reiacha Kamocha, where is Ahavas Yisrael in Parshas Balak? He said, where's it in Parshas Balak? It's in the name of the parsha. He said, in the name of the parsha? Where's it in the name of the parsha? He says, Balak, V'ahavta L'reiacha Kamocha. So the chassidim looked up at him and said, V'ahavta L'reiacha Kamocha, it's all the wrong letters, it's misspelled. Balak, Parshas Balak is spelled beis, lamed, kuf. And V'ahavta is vav, lamed, chaf. So it's the wrong letters. So the Apter Rav looked at them and he said, exactly. If you're going to be so exacting with others, you'll never practice Ahavas Yisrael. It's close enough. You want Ahavas Yisrael, it has to be close enough. Balak, V'ahavta L'reiacha Kamocha, ah, it's a beis, not a vav, ah, it's a kuf, not a chaf. Yeah, if you're going to be so strict and exacting, you can never practice loving a fellow Jew, Ahavas Yisrael. To love a fellow Jew, to practice real Ahavas Yisrael, you have to not be so exacting. That was his most famous Parshas Balak. But in every parsha he finds a hint, an allusion, the mission, the mandate, this is our time, this is the healing we need to be doing during these three weeks. Anyway, he has on page reish mem, the side that says reish mem, the Ohev Yisrael, the bottom left, ואת הערים אשר תתנו ללוים את שש ערי המקלט ועליהם תתנו ארבעים ושתים עיר. At the end of Parshas Matos-Masei, we read two parshiyos this Shabbos, but whenever you're listening to this Living with Emunah shiur, it doesn't have to be these parshiyos, the message is relevant always. So the parsha tells us that once the Jews enter the land of Israel, we set up, both in Israel and east of the Jordan as well, we set up six cities of refuge. What are cities of refuge for? If a person would murder, kill accidentally, meaning not with malice, it wasn't manslaughter, it wasn't premeditated, a person was took an axe back to chop a tree and the hand and the blade flew. Until the death of the Kohen Gadol. Whoever is the high priest of that generation, upon his demise, then they go free, they go home, then they are no longer in danger, nobody can touch them. Why is their term in the Ir Miklat dependent on the lifespan of the Kohen Gadol? So we were going to in the parsha yesterday, we didn't get to it, offered eight or nine different reasons that are provided. The most famous among them is the one the Gemara itself says, because the Kohen Gadol had a responsibility, and that was to daven for his generation. And if even an accidental murder happened under his leadership and his watch, therefore, it's a reflection of his failure to have davened sufficiently to have earned the merits to protect his generation. רב וולבה זכר צדיק לברכה, the great mashgiach derives from here something that we too often neglect. That one of the core responsibilities of a parent in caring for our children is not only to run and make sure that they have the best tutor, the best doctor, the best teacher, the best coach, the best therapist, the best, the best, the best, the best, the best, the best, not only to ensure they have the best SAT teacher, the best, not only to run and ensure they have the latest clothing and the latest style and the nicest sneakers and the latest and the best and the best and the best, which we do, but our core responsibility as a parent that we often neglect and forget is daven for our children. Is to daven for our children, each and every day. So you'll say, why do I have to daven for my child? God forbid chas v'shalom a person's child is sick or in danger or at risk you have to daven. But they're healthy and they're well and they're good, so why would I daven? So the answer is, because you're a mother, you're a father, you're a bubby, you're a zaidy, because that's what it means to be a parent or a grandparent, and please God those who long to be should have their tefillos answered and celebrate the birth of healthy, beautiful children who give them nachas. To be a parent, to be a grandparent is to take responsibility, and to take responsibility means not only on the education and the learning and the chinuch and the clothing and the camp and the, we do all of those things. And by the way, we panic and we worry and then we just double down on those things. I need a better therapist and a better tutor and a better doctor, nicer sneakers and a better SAT tutor and I need a nicer camp and I need a better, but we continue to leave out what is central and that is our responsibility to daven. Daven, daven, daven. I have, I share this not as a way of flexing or boasting, there's nothing special about it, but only as a way of motivating and inspiring, but when I first learned this years ago, this beautiful piece by Rav Wolbe of a core responsibility that we learn from the Kohen Gadol in this parsha to daven for our children and grandchildren, I printed out cards that have my parents' and in-laws' names in Hebrew, mine and Yocheved's name, and then my children and grandchildren's names, and it's in my siddur, it's on my shtender, and every day every tefilla I look at it and I run down the names. Now I'll tell you what ends up happening is, ברוך השם בלי עין הרע even if your children and grandchildren are all well, as you look at those names you always think of something that you say you know, they're off to camp today let it be successful, let them find friends, let it work out, let them be safe, you know they have a big test in school today, you know they're having this issue. As you look at the names you think Baruch Hashem nothing catastrophic, but every one of us and every one of the people we know always has something that is worth davening for, and you then personalize it, and you think about them. On the bottom of the card I have this beautiful, very short, it'll take you eight seconds to say, a beautiful tefilla that was written by the Chida, רב חיים יוסף דוד אזולאי, the Chida. He wrote a beautiful tefilla about what one can say for their family every day. Protect us from harm and injury and mistakes and sin and let us have success and good health. You know what that does every day when you count your brachos? You literally look down you count your brachos. You count your brachos. In fact I was originally motivated, Baruch Hashem I ran out of room and couldn't do it, but I actually got a tallis bag where I had, you know people on their tallis bag have their name, sometimes they have their name and their father's name, I guess it makes it easier for the gabbai if you get an aliyah. So I had on the back of the tallis bag all my children's names in Hebrew. And I turned the tallis bag over and when I daven I would look at the tallis bag and their names. But Kenayna Hora and should be with all of us we should have many many simchas. So a little card. And if you put that stick that card in your siddur, stick that card in your Tehillim, stick that card on your shtender, stick that card wherever you need to, daily take stock. And you know what that does to make you feel overwhelmed with gratitude? Look at the brachos that I have. Look at the brachos that I have. And so there are challenges, it's not easy, to be alive is to have challenges. So but look at the brachos, let me count them, let me express gratitude for them and let me daven for them, each one each day. each and every day. So we learned that from the Kohen Gadol that the term of the individual who runs to the city of refuge depends on and revolves around the lifespan of the Kohen Gadol. In fact, the Gemara tells us, so what would happen? The individual who was in the city of refuge who wanted to finally go home, what might he do? He might daven that the Kohen Gadol drop dead. It's long enough, I want to go home. So what did the mother of the Kohen Gadol do? She would bring cookies. Every day she'd come to the Ir Miklat and bring cookies to the inmates at the Ir Miklat. Don't wish my son well, let him live long, don't daven for him to die. She'd bring him cookies, I don't know, brownies, ich veis. Whatever, a steak, fries, I don't know what she brought them. She definitely never ever ever brought them kale, that would just make them daven harder that he would die. So but she brought cookies or cake or muffins or more likely some charcuterie, a charcuterie meat board or something good like that. Every single day? I don't know every day, but she would motivate them, motivate them. But again what we see from here is our responsibility. So we have the Ir Miklat. Ay, why were there the same number of Ir Miklat for two and a half tribes east of the Yarden as there were for the other nine and a half tribes in the land of Israel? Six cities of refuge, three east of the Yarden, three west of the Yarden in the land of Israel proper. Why would two and a half tribes just proportionally need the same cities of refuge as those in Israel? So Chazal tell us, you know why? Because those east of the Yarden had a disproportionate focus on materialism, business. This we did speak about in the parsha class yesterday. Bnei Gad and Bnei Reuven when they say to Moshe, is it okay if we stay in Chutz La'aretz? Can we set up shop east of the Yarden? We've got a lot of livestock and this is the perfect place for our abundant livestock. Our business is really thriving here. And you know what happens when you're materialistic and money hungry and you're focused on your business even ahead of your children, which Moshe gives them rebuke for, you know what ends up happening? A lot of accidental murder, neglect. In an environment that doesn't have the right priorities, one has, so therefore proportionally needed the same number of Arei Miklat. Okay, that's Ir Miklat. Listen to what the Apter Rav, the Ohev Yisrael has to say. And then we're going to come back and I'm going to tell you an incredible idea that I learned from somebody that I just met, not in Boca, about these ideas of leaning in and finding Hashem and stretching our emunah bitachon muscle, not when it works out, not when it's all well and good, but even when it hurts. So listen to what the Ohev Yisrael says: באור לב להבין ולהדעת יש לרמז בזה כי מצוה זו נוהגת בכל זמן. Now you'll say why am I reading about this? Why am I learning about this? Why are we speaking about this? We don't have Arei Miklat today. We don't have cities of refuge today. We don't have places to go. This is the original safe space. We don't have safe spaces in this sense today. We don't have cities of refuge. So why do we read about it? Why do we learn about it? Why are we talking about it? Why are we unpacking it? He says we do. Ki HaTorah Netzchis. The Torah, its messages, its laws, its values, they are eternal. They are universal. They apply always and at all times. ועל כן אפילו בזמן הזה יש לנו שייכות והוא תיקון למכה נפש בשגגה. And we can still extract and extrapolate, we can still learn a powerful lesson of the Ir Miklat even today that we don't technically have it, we still have it. And what does it do? What was the original purpose of an Ir Miklat? It was a place for a person who killed, who murdered accidentally to run and find safety. So who is the makeh nefesh bishgaga today? Who is the one who strikes a soul accidentally? Is us. And whose soul do we strike? Ourselves. When we underachieve spiritually, when we underachieve in our relationship with Hashem, when we walk around thinking it's all about the here and now, when we take inappropriate responsibility for that which we don't control, then we're hurting ourselves. We're hurting ourselves when we think that all there is is the here and now, when we live on the surface, superficial, the external life, when we don't dig deep and get into the pnimiyus, when we don't stretch high and invoke and embrace and invest Hashem, then we're hurting ourselves, we're striking our soul bishgaga. It's accidental. We just get swept up and caught up in this world. We get caught up and swept up in the here and now and what we see. It's bishgaga, it's accidental. It's not premeditated, but we're murdering a piece of ourselves. Any moment of any day that we live without Hashem, that we don't lean in, we don't turn to him, we don't submit and we don't surrender, and we don't depend and we don't rely, and we don't thank him, we don't object and we don't protest, and we don't daven to him, what we don't recognize that it's his world and we're just a small part of it, then we are murdering a piece of ourselves. a little piece of ourselves, we're underachieving ourselves. So what's the antidote, what's the answer, what's the response? Rotze lomar, מי ששגג בחטאים ועוונות u-mashchis es nafsho. A person who accidentally makes mistakes and violates iniquities u-mashchis es nafsho we're hurting our own soul, we're hurting our own soul. You know we're hurting our own bodies. I'm not going to get into this right now or stand on some soapbox or act like I don't struggle with it myself, but we hurt our own bodies. Not intentionally. Does the person who I'm going to speak about this on Shabbos Shuva. I've never known what I was going to speak about on Shabbos Shuva this early, but I read a great book. So I'm going to speak about it on Shabbos Shuva: your future self. Are we in the present invested in enough of a relationship with our future self? So while we're downing the food that's unhealthy, that's bad for us, the quality, the quantity, the time of when we eat it, if we had a crystal ball and could see our future selves getting diagnosed with high blood pressure and diabetes and shortening our life and shortening the quality of our life, we'd never eat it right now. But what's the problem? Right now it tastes really good and I don't have a crystal ball. And it's going to be different, I'm going to be different, it's not going to impact me. We don't have the relationship with our future self. So in our present self we do all kinds of things bishgaga. So what's true physically is true spiritually. If we had the crystal ball to understand that I'm murdering, I'm killing a piece of myself, I'm amputating a piece of my spiritual self, my spiritual self is malnourished, my spiritual self is dehydrated because I'm not talking to Him, feeling Him, leaning on Him. I'm not living a life involving Him. I'm malnourished, I'm dehydrated. If I saw that future spiritual self, if I saw the impact on my children and grandchildren of my failure to model what it means to have a relationship with Hashem, if I understood that future self and what that could mean, of what that could mean, if I had a future self vision of children or grandchildren who are uninspired, turned off, or God forbid walking away or making decisions that are irreparable, then I might live a different life in my present. So that's what it means makeh nefesh bishgaga. It means every day when we spiritually underachieve and spiritually neglect ourselves and spiritually don't nourish ourselves, we are we're striking ourselves, we're hurting ourselves, we're murdering a piece of ourselves. Granted, it's accidental. שיעשה תיקון זה בקבלת עול מלכות שמים. So what's the antidote and what's the answer? How do we fix it, how do we repair it, how do we redeem ourselves from it? The answer is the answer is lean in, surrender, submit. קבלת עול מלכות שמים b'ahava sheleima with a full love and a full heart. Wake up in the morning and say Hashem I love You. I see You, I feel You, I surrender to You. I'm grateful to You but I'm also angry at You. I protest to You, I object to You, the things I want, wish You did differently, that frustrate me or hurt me, but simultaneously I understand that this is Your world. That I work for You, You don't work for me. That You're in control, not me. And I live a life with that awareness and that knowledge and that mindfulness always. ומסירת נפש גדול באמת בכל לבבו. And I moser nefesh, I surrender, I sacrifice, I submit to You with all my heart. How do I do that? בשישה תיבות שמע ישראל. One of the mottos or one of the bumper stickers of the Jewish people are those six words that we receive, that we accept קבלת עול מלכות שמים every day, morning and evening. שמע ישראל ה' אלקינו ה' אחד. Hear, O Israel. Who's the O Israel? Who am I saying this to? I could be all alone, I'm at home, I'm saying Shema. Who's the O Israel? Who am I speaking to? Ourselves. I'm speaking to the pintele Yid in me. Wake up, Jew! Wake up, inner Yid! On the outside you've forgotten who you are. You're neglecting your spirit, your soul. It's dehydrated, it's malnourished. So Shema, wake up! Yisrael, the Yid, the Jew inside you, the soul, the spirit, the tzelem Elokim, חלק אלוקה ממעל ממש, the piece of God in us. Wake up! Shema, listen, understand. What? That Hashem, haya hoveh ve'yihiyeh, was, is and will be. Hashem, He's Elokeinu. He's our God. He's not a distant God, He's not an abstract God, He's not a theoretical God, He's not a conceptual God, He's not a God that you study in iyun, He's not a God that you bring evidence and proof for His existence. He's Elokeinu. He's your God. He's involved in your life, He's intimately connected to you. He is aware and knowledgeable and invested and involved in every single aspect of your life. That same Hashem, He's echad. He's everywhere, He's for everybody. He's for everybody. I'm going to write an article soon because I had this thought. I was in Tennessee a couple weeks ago with my daughter, I think I told you, I went with one of my daughters to get away for three days. We went hiking, we saw waterfalls. We had a fantastic time. It was amazing, it was amazing. So it just startled me, it shouldn't at this point, but I got off the plane and we rented a car and I needed to figure out where we were going, how to get from Nashville to Chattanooga. And what did I open on my phone? Waze. And I put in the address and it worked. And I thought to myself, that's cool, Waze works in Boca and Waze works in Tennessee and Waze works in Israel and Waze works if I dropped you and deposited you right now in Costa Rica and Waze works in South Africa and Waze works in Australia. And I was like, wow, how is it able to know the roads everywhere? And it knows every car on every road, and each car that is in traffic or each car that made a mistake, a wrong turn and needs to be rerouted, and each car look out for the police, and each car... how does it know all that? And then I thought to myself, it's just a computer and an algorithm and a program, but that's a mashal of a mashal of a mashal. It's a parable of a parable of a parable. I thought to myself, anyone who thinks that there can't be a God who knows about all, what are there, fourteen billion, how many, eight billion, how many people are on earth? I think eight billion. There can't be a God who's aware of all eight billion people on earth, where they are and what they are doing and how to reroute their lives? It can't be. It can't be. If in your phone there could be a button you press and it can be, then it can be. If it could be an app in your phone, you don't think there could be a deity and a God? If the app could know all eight billion people, where they are, how to avoid traffic, how to make a turn, how to reroute, if the app could work for all eight billion, maybe it would crash, but it could work for all eight billion people simultaneously, why does it... because it's a Jewish invention, it came out of Israel, if the app could work, if the app could work for all eight billion, you don't think that Hashem could work for all eight billion? So that's what we say Shema Yisrael. Wake up! Wake up you sleeping Jew. Wake up you deaf Jew. Wake up you Jew who stopped listening, who thinks that the world is the here and now and this is all there is, and that you're in control, and that you can navigate it, and that you're in charge. Wake up! Hashem, this God who was the creator, the source of everything, He's Elokeinu, He's our God, He knows everything in your life. And simultaneously, even though He knows every detail, every thought, every speech, every action, He's involved in every part of your life. He's still Hashem, He's still the God of everyone, echad, He's the one God. He's one God. He's the one kiveyachol lehavdil app who knows and controls and routes and reroutes everyone. Six words והמה בחינת שש ערי מקלט. Says the Apter Rav, the Ohev Yisrael, do you want to know where the six cities of refuge are today? Where can you run when you've malnourished, when you've murdered, when you've hit yourself, harmed yourself, unintentionally, accidentally, neglected your soul? Where can you run? Where can you hide? Where can you find safety and security? Where is a safe space? There are six cities of refuge still today. You know where they are? The six words of שמע ישראל ה׳ אלהינו ה׳ אחד. ועליהם תתנו מ״ב עירו בחינת פרשה אחת. Because the pasuk then goes on and says there are shesh arei miklat and then there are 42 cities corresponding with them. So not coincidentally there are six words in Shema and 42 words in the first paragraph of Shema, V'ahavta. That is 42 words. קבלת אהבתו יתברך ותורתו בכל לב ונפש. So where can we go today? You're scrambling, you're running, you're panicking, you're fearful, you're in crisis mode, and you're running for your life. Where can you go to run when you run for your life in panic mode, when you're anxious, when you're afraid? Where can you go? The cities of refuge. And what are the cities of refuge? שמע ישראל ה׳ אלהינו ה׳ אחד. The six cities of refuge, Shema. The six cities of refuge, emuna and bitachon. Lean in to this relationship with Hashem. And the Ohev Yisrael goes on and on and talks about this here and I want to tell you that there are people who are desperate and there are people who are struggling and there are people who want and need. I was at the hospital yesterday visiting my daughter, Baruch Hashem bli ayin hara, who had twin girls. And there was a nurse, she told me there was a nurse who was in her earlier that day. Nurses are amazing people and they deserve all the bracha in the world. And this nurse said to her in passing, it was the same nurse who helped her when she delivered her first child, her last child a couple of years ago on Yom Kippur. She saw the same nurse again and now she was there and she delivered twins. And the nurse said you're so lucky and you're so blessed and beautiful three girls under two. What an incredible bracha, which was very healthy and important to hear and put in perspective with its challenges. challenge, but what a challenge so many would give anything for. And the nurse said, "If only I could borrow one from you, I just failed my seventh round of IVF." Seventh round of IVF. I don't even know this nurse. I never met this nurse. She was there earlier in the day. I wasn't there, but I heard this. How does your heart not break? Works in the maternity ward, helps mothers and babies and failed her seventh round of IVF. And we daven for her. We daven for her. She should have many healthy, beautiful children. So people go through struggles. We can't imagine. Some can't imagine, some here, some watching can't imagine the shots, the extractions, the experience, the investment of tens of thousands of dollars, the disappointments. It's an unbearable pain. Rachel Imeinu said to Yaakov, הבה לי בנים ואם אין מתה אנכי, "Give me a child, if not I'm dead." I'll die. There's a piece of me that dies with every failed cycle. Every month I don't conceive, there's a piece of me that dies. That pain is unbearable. We daven so hard, so hard, so hard for the people who are struggling. So I met somebody else, a nurse elsewhere, who also has her struggles. Went through pain in this area and in others, has her pain. And we were talking about emuna and bitachon. And I was saying about the email I shared last week, the email I was gonna share this week. Last week in particular the person who said, "You know, I used to get angry at Hashem when things hurt me in this world, and then I'd pull back from him. So I didn't daven or I didn't daven with the same kavana. I wasn't as focused on Torah and mitzvos. I wasn't as invested in seeing him here." Remember this email from last week? She said but the Emuna Shiur we'd be talking about, it's okay to be angry at Him. That too is an expression of emuna. You're not angry at someone you don't believe exists. You're only angry at the person you believe exists. So that too is an expression of emuna. And then she taught us in last week's shiur and last week's email, she taught us that in the moments that she's hurt and pained and frustrated with Hashem, she says, "I'm angry at You. You did this. I believe You did it for a reason. I give You that. But You did it. Now get me out of it. Give me the strength to be able to live with it. Give me the answer to what to do next with it." That's what she taught us. So I was relaying this to the person I was speaking with and she told me the following. Such a powerful image. And I already told her, "Thank you for next week's Emuna Shiur." She said the following. I just get the microphone, but I'm just relaying through the emails and through the Torah texts and through the people. None of these are mine. I just have the privilege of sitting on this side of the camera and this side of the desk, but I'm so grateful to the people who give all the beautiful insights to share. So she's a nurse and she works at a emergency care, one of these- what do they call them? Urgent cares. So a child who came in and the child they needed to draw blood on to know what was going on. And the child was not cooperative. Not cooperative. So she the nurse asked the father for help. And the father held the child down while they were drawing the blood. And as the child's being held down by the father while they're drawing blood, the child is screaming, shrieking, crying. And over and over again calling out, "Abba, Daddy, Daddy!" Cause the daddy who's supposed to love you and care for you and protect you is now holding you down while someone sticks you with a needle and hurts you and harms you. He's yelling, "Daddy, Daddy, Daddy, how could you do this? Daddy let go! Daddy make them stop! What do you mean Daddy you're assisting? What do you mean Daddy you're holding me down?" Now that part of the mashal is itself very valuable cause sometimes it feels like Hashem, Abba, Tateh, You're holding me down while the world's hurting me? You're holding me down while the world's injuring me? You're holding me down while the world's disappointing me? You're supposed to be my father. Let go! Stop them! Help me! But we understand that in the urgent care, the father is helping the child. The father's doing what the child needs to get better in the long run, even if the child doesn't understand it in the moment. That part of the mashal, dayenu is enough. But it goes even further cause she said to me as the nurse who saw it all happen in front of her. "What do you think happened the second they got the blood and the father let go? What do you think happened next?" So I would have thought the child would say, "I'm not talking to you. I'm taking an Uber home," the two-year-old would say. "Stay away from me. You're not really my father. I'm getting a therapist. I'm writing a book. I'm hiring a lawyer. We're done. We're done." But that's not what the child does. What does a two or three-year-old or four-year-old or five-year-old do after their father held them down while they had a needle stuck inside them and they screamed for the father, "Let me go! Make them stop!" Stop, how could you do this? Help me! What does the child do the second it's over? Runs into the arms of the father and now says, "Hold me," and cries in the arms of the very father that a moment ago held them down. And that is emuna. That is bitachon. We can go through our life and it feels like Hashem is holding us down. He's an accomplice, he's an assistant, he's helping whoever's hurting us, the world, nature, people. How could he hold us down? So we're screaming Abba, Tati, let go, make them stop, how could you? But a moment later we have to run into his arms because there's nowhere else to go. There's no one who loves us as much, there's no one who's as invested in taking care of us, there's no one who all along was doing it in our best interest. That a moment later after we say how could you and where are you and why would you, we then say but here I am, hold me. I need you to hold me. I need you to tell me it's going to be okay. I need you to tell me you did it for a reason. I need you to give me the strength and the resilience and the tenacity and the fortitude to be able to get through it. The same father who held us down, the same father we can say now I need you to hold me. And when she told me this mashal, it wasn't a mashal, she lived it, she's a nurse, she saw it, and in real time had this image that this is emuna, this is bitachon. This is what it means. As the child is yelling let me go, let me go, Daddy, Daddy, make them stop, and then ran into Daddy's arms, that we say Daddy, Daddy, make them stop, make it stop, and then we have to run into his arms because there is no other choice, there is no anywhere else to go. He is our ir miklat. The six cities of refuge that we have today are שמע ישראל ה׳ אלקינו ה׳ אחד and the 42 cities that surround it are the 42 words of v'ahavta. The city of refuge we have to go to is the life of meaning, the life of purpose that we can find when this world that is so complicated, I've been saying over and over lately because it's so obvious, we're the most prosperous generation of all time and we're the most unhappy generation of all time. We are the most prosperous, comfortable, convenient generation ever, we're the most unhappy. Because if you cut God out of your life, if you live a godless life in a godless world and you think it's all about the here and now and it's all about the physical pleasure, material success, it's all about the fame and the fortune, and you cut God out and you cut meaning and purpose out and you cut out something being bigger than ourselves and you think life is all about taking not giving and life is supposed to serve you not you serve others, then you're going to end up unhappy no matter how comfortable, convenient and prosperous your life is. You want a city of refuge to run to when life gets difficult or hard, when we feel struggle or pain, the city of refuge to run to is emuna and bitachon right into his arms. The same him who it feels like abandoned us or hurt us or harmed us or was an accomplice to those who were, that same Hashem, that same father, that same Abba, that same Tati, we can run into his arms. And we're out of time, I was going to share with you but I'll save it for next week im yirtzeh Hashem, an email that I got that includes a poem, a beautiful poem that we should print out and stick the Emuna Shiur logo on and appropriate for ourselves. No, but a beautiful poem by somebody who also has an emuna story that doesn't end with a and then it all worked out and then they called me back and gave the job and then I married the girl and then I had the baby and then I found the pot of gold. It's not the way it works out. But then you know what I found? Hashem. I found myself. I found my strength. I found what I didn't know was inside me all along. So we'll start off next week im yirtzeh Hashem with that, which continues this same theme of this time. And this is really a theme of the time in which we find ourselves, these three weeks, כל רודפיה השיגוה בין המצרים. In this time of pain, in the time of hester panim. These are three weeks where it feels that God hid his face. Three weeks where it feels where's Hashem? When the destruction of the two batei mikdash and the crusades and the inquisition and the holocaust and the burning of the talmud and everything we're going to say the kinnot over. Where was he? Where is he? Father, where are you? Why are you holding us down while the world is slaughtering us? These are these three weeks where Hashem feels hidden. But it's in his hiddenness that we can find him. Kol rodfeha if you pursue him, if you chase him, if you look for him, if you run to the city of refuge that is him, if you run into his arms, he will embrace you and you'll feel it. You'll feel it tightly. You'll feel his hug. It's another email I got. Somebody who was making aliyah lost one of their kids' special stuffed bunny. Couldn't go without it. At the last minute Hashem helped them find it and it was a sign from Hashem they felt his hug. And the stuffed bunny 22 years later it's still on the shelf in their house in Israel is the hug from Hashem. You can find and see the hug from Hashem every day if you look for it. If you're open to it. If you want to feel that hug. The parking spot that opened just for you in the perfect spot when it was pouring rain right near the store, that was a little hug. Micro moments of hugs. Micro moments of hugs. It's a hug, it's a hug when the technology didn't work out it worked out and it wasn't supposed to, when the thing happened and the thing and the thing. Those are micro hugs from Hashem. Even while the world's—you know how many people there are who are sitting, getting chemo at a hospital, but they're like, "You know, but the appointment worked out, I wasn't supposed to be there and I got it today, Hashem loves me." Hashem loves you? You know the appointment's for—they're putting poison in your veins. Yeah, but the fact that that appointment worked out was a hug. You could find micro hugs even within the big picture of He's holding me down. There are micro hugs even while He's holding you down. The father could be holding you down and He gives you a little kiss on your keppe while He's holding you down. He's holding you down and He's stroking your cheek while He's holding you down. We could find the micro hugs while He's holding us down. That's Yemei Bein Hametzarim. That's these three weeks that we find ourselves in. That's what we're using them for. That's what we're working on. If you want to hear a Behind the Bima tonight, tonight's a great episode because we were in HASC this past Shabbos. I told you the article I wrote about it, but I also on Motzei Shabbos, first ever Behind the Bima we recorded before a live audience. And the whole staff was there and we interviewed directors and counselors and campers, even incredible special needs campers and alumni, and it's a great conversation in a magical, magical place. It's tonight 9 o'clock. See everybody next week. Until next time, stay happy, stay healthy, and stay holy.
