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Teshuva to Escape a Cursed Life
"See I present before you today a blessing and a curse. The blessing that you hearken to the commandments of Hashem. Your G-d that I command you today. And the curse if you do not hearken to the commandments of Hashem your G-d You stray from the path that I command you today, to follow gods of others that you did not know."
(Devarim 11:26-28)
You have two options. There's no middle ground, there's no grey area with Hashem.
He simply says: you have bracha (blessing) or you have klala (curse).
HaShem Gives The Blessing or The Curse
What does He say? You have bracha or you have klala. Either your life is blessed or it's cursed.
We heard the curse. The curses are scary. If there's a blessing or a curse, obviously, if I'm smart enough to understand what this verse is saying, you don't need to explain to me that the blessing goes along with me doing what you say and the curse goes along with me going against what you say.
Obviously, I understand. But no, HaKadosh Baruch Hu knows His creation. He says you have a blessing and a curse.
The blessing is if you do what I say.
The curse is if you go against what I say.
Chazal says that the reason why there's only a dozen is that we simply do not understand what a blessing is. So it will simply be a waste of time and a waste of space in the torah, to detail the blessings. We wouldn't understand what it is anyway
The yetzer hara is going to get you off the road. The yetzer hara now changes uniform. He becomes the satan. The word satan means like, he rats on you. He goes up to shamayim, he becomes your prosecutor, he goes to Hashem and says:
Hashem, you see this rasha. What rasha? The son, your son.Instead of going to a shiur torah, he went to have a couple of drinks with the guys. This is your son Hashem. What an embarrassment in shamayim you have? What embarrassment a person has in shamayim when Hakadosh Baruch Hu, his father in heaven, watches this movie of His son. Hashem is not happy with this, then the satan takes advantage. What do you think? He's going to come up again. Another uniform. who does he become? Malach hamavet (angel of death)
Malach hamavet: Hashem, you know, somebody that desecrates the torah, You said in Your Torah, You says in Your Torah, Hashem, death penalty. Hashem, can I go to work? Can I go to work right now?
But now we ought to pray that we have some zchuyot (merits). Somewhere, we have tzadik grandfather or tzadik grandmother. Some mitzvah that we did that we forgot about, some potential that we have, something that's going to fight for us against the malach hamavet.
Once again Parshah re'eh, he tells us again there's a bracha and a klala.
Bitachon (Confidence in HaShem) Saves You
The Beit Halevi says that bitachon will save you from jealousy. He says that, in addition to all the other benefits of having bitachon we already discussed. One who has bitachon will be rescued from jealousy because jealousy is what makes the bones rot according to Shlomo Hamelech chapter 14 verse 30 of Mishlei (proverbs)
"A healing heart is the life of the flesh, but anger is the rot of the bones."
(Mishlei 14:30)
Jealousy Rabotai is one of the things that HaKadosh Baruch Hu detests. So much so, that if a person dies without doing teshuva for jealousy, he's only guaranteed one thing: he will not be resurrected with the dead. One of the 13 principles of faith is that you have to believe that there will a resurrection of the dead after the Mashiach comes.
When one has bitachon, and is convinced that everything Hashem does is good: Ein od m'levado – There's nothing else but Hashem.
If you constantly think that there's nothing else but HaKadosh Baruch Hu, nothing in the world could hurt you. You become untouchable. f you're constantly thinking that, it's so powerful that it's a segula that they teach to people. Listen, you want protection, think ein od m'levado. Constantly.
A lot of people talk about emunah. A lot of people love to discuss emunah, bitachon and things of that nature. But in reality, very very few among us actually have emunah or bitachon at all.
HaKadosh Baruch Hu is the best policy in the world. HaKadosh Baruch Hu is even better than that. He's free. Pray and do his mitzvot you already promised him time and time again, your life will be full of blessing.
But instead what do we do? We did a few mitzvot but we still want some insurance. We go and put all of our trust in the worst insurance company on the planet. What is it? People. We put all of our faith, all of our trust, all of our future, relying in people. How so? You're forbidden from being a chanfan (flatterer).
Unfortunately people do this daily and day out. As if the salvation is coming from them. Instead of actually realizing that it's simply HaKadosh Baruch Hu using them to help us. All they do is decide whether they're going to be the vessel that Hashem uses to run his world
That's all that's in our hands.
All that's in our hands is our decision of whether we will be the vessel that Hashem uses to fulfill His will.
Rely ONLY on HaShem
Don't forget that HaKadosh Baruch Hu is the best insurance company in the world.
And that's what David HaMelech tried to tell us in Tehillim 146 verse number 3:
"Do not rely on nobles, nor on a human being, for he holds no salvation.
When his spirit departs he returns to his earth, on that day his plans all perish."
(Tehillim 146:3-4)
You're only allowed to rely on HaKadosh Baruch Hu.
But not just when it comes to money – when it comes to everything. We have to understand, if you're going to put all of the credit, all of the power in the hands of people, you'll fall into their hands instead of the hands of HaKadosh Baruch Hu. When someone knows that HaKadosh Baruch Hu is watching all the time and he fears HaKadosh Baruch Hu, you can trust Him with anything. Because it doesn't matter where he is. He knows HaKadosh Baruch Hu is watching.
Meaning, when a person has bitachon, whether he's 14 or he's 40, he knows that whatever slice he has in his life, that's his slice. And nobody else's. Whatever he doesn't have, is not his.
Merit Comes with Our Own TeShuva
We have no place next to the shekinah, no place next to the salvation, no place next to anything good, because we've been calling HaKadosh Baruch Hu someone that makes mistakes our whole life. That mean's we've been kofrim our whole life so why do we expect Hashem to resurrect us?
It's not just about having money, it's also about having merit. That merit comes with our own teshuva.
The Beit HaLevi says that this bitachon will generate love of Hashem and attachment to Him. Because the one who trusts in Hashem will not remove his mind from the one whom he trusts.
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