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| An open heart opens doors |
Or can you?
There is one way you can control your world - through tefillah. By davening, we have the opportunity to change anything and everything. You want something - pray for it. You don't want something - pray for that too. If we truly understood the sheer power of prayer, we would stop putting in all of our efforts into what some call it "real action," and pay more attention to davening.
Rav Nachman Horedenka was a towering tzaddik, and one of the greatest students of the holy Ba'al Shem Tov. After he married, he left his wife alone and went to live in a different town. His wife went to his rebbi, the saintly Ba'al Shev Tov, to complain how his prized student left her all by herself. The Ba'al Shev Tov heard her passionate pleas, and promised to intervene.
The Ba'al Shev Tov sent for Rav Nachman and questioned his odd behavior.
"It became known to me," explained Rav Nachman, "that immediately after my wife gives birth to our first child, she is destined to die. Since I don't want her life to fall short at such a young age, I reasoned that it would be wiser to leave her childless rather than allow her to die."
"It may be easy for you to come to such a decision," responded the Ba'al Shev Tov, "but perhaps your wife feels differently."
Rav Nachman's wife was summoned, and once she heard the dilemma at hand, she nonetheless wanted to have a child, regardless of the consequences.
"In that case, however," remarked Rav Nachman, "I am bound to raise the child alone!"
"Do not fear," the Ba'al Shev Tov refuted, "I shall raise him myself!"
As instructed, Rav Nachman and his wife returned home, and a year later, they merited the birth of a son that they appropriately named Simcha. When the new mother saw the child, she was overwhelmed with sorrow that she would not live to see him grow, and she lifted her eyes to the Heavens and cried out, "Master of the world, I beg of you to grant me the ability to at least watch him grow until he has teeth!"
The Heavens heard her prayer, and indeed she merited to raise her dear son until he was two years old. After that time, the Ba'al Shev Tov brought the child into his holy home, raised him, and ultimately married him off to his own grand-daughter. The young couple later would bring a son into the world that they named after his illustrious grandfather, Nachman, and who later grew up to be the legendary Rav Nachman of Breslov!
It is said that when Rav Nachman Horedenka heard about his wife's tefillah that she prayed after their son's birth - one that had delayed her destined death for two years - he painfully cried, "When she uttered her heartfelt words, she created a moment of great mercy. If only she had asked for 70 years instead of just 2, she would have granted that as well!"
We often fail to realize the strength of our own prayers. Just a few meaningful words from deep within our hearts can make all the difference in the world. People are used to pressing buttons and seeing change on a screen, though they inherently and mistakenly believe that this is only possible in a virtual world. If they would only understand that the same is possible in real life, only the tool is not some silly piece of plastic.
Tefillah is the tool.
A power tool.
Yet, like any tool, you have to know how to use it for it to work properly.
Pray again and again until you become a master.
Say to yourself ten times today:
"My prayers are meaningful to Hashem - let me make them meaningful to me!"
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