An Answer to Our Prayers

We in Israel are in trouble; we need your help…

Our borders are tense as bowstrings and many of our children don’t have enough to eat.

Over the last 10 years, Hashem has blessed us. While America struggled throughout the great recession of 2008, Europe nearly collapsed. Overall, Israel survived it pretty much untouched. Now times are tough. Poverty is spreading. Exports are down, another recession is in full swing, and tax receipts are not covering national expenses.

Even the IDF has to tighten its belt. Every family in Israel, religious and secular, left-wing and right, are receiving less help from the government. Yeshivas – both Haredi and National Religious, are forced to endure cutbacks.

We have little choice. If we don’t make these cuts now, the amount of debt we will have to carry could destroy our economy. Then the suffering will become far worse. it will be our children who will bear the brunt.

We need your help.

Rabbi Zecharia Wallerstein relates three stories about blessings and receiving a resounding YES when we ask Hashem for something. The first was about a woman who had been married but had not borne children. She went to a Sage. He told her to ask for a blessing from someone. The sage told her she would know who to ask and when. A time later she went to a wedding. A member of the family was publicly humiliated by the mother of the bride. Instead of making a stink, she quietly left. She bore her humiliation with dignity, and the barren woman knew to ask her for a blessing that she would conceive. A year after receiving the blessing she gave birth.

A 10-year old boy suffered constant harassment at school. He was ridiculed, bullied, and emotionally tormented. Following every incident, he would mumble something. The teachers were sure he was privately venting his anger until they confronted him. At the height of one’s humiliation, if he holds it in he can ask Hashem for anything He wants. G-d will answer his prayers with an even greater mercy and compassion. The boy told his teachers was responding to his suffering by pleading with Hashem to heal sick Jews in the hospital stricken with critical illnesses.

Whenever we are insulted, embarrassed, or hurt by someone else, right at the moment of our anger we have the greatest opportunity to ask Hashem for a blessing. We can also ask for a blessing right when we resist the urge to look at something inappropriate. A businessman needed livelihood. He was walking in the street and a gorgeous woman appeared. He could “sense” the contours of her figure in the corner of his eye. Itching to take a closer look, he resisted the temptation as she walked closer. Right after she was out of his field of vision, he asked Hashem to provide him with a good livelihood to take care of his family. Within weeks, he closed the biggest deal of his life.

This is what we in Israel need from you.

We need you to resist the urge to hate, or to lust, and to ask G-d that He should provide every family in Israel with enough livelihood that their families will want for nothing. There are so many opportunities to resist these temptations each day. The service you can perform for us is very great.

May it be G-d’s Will that in the merit of your efforts, the blessing of abundance G-d showers upon every man, woman, and child in Israel will include among them you and your loved ones.