Transcript
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I want all of you to listen to me right
now. I am about to tell you something
that will change your life forever.
There is one item that stands at the
heights of the world that if you would
take this and implement this into your
life, your life would change forever. I
mean, it would be completely
unrecognizable. And the thing that I
will to discuss with you today
is prayer.
Let's talk about it.
Hey everybody, welcome back to the Nisin
Black Show. It's like amazing for me
right now. I am in Punta Cana right now.
I don't know if you know where that is,
in the Caribbean Islands, very, very
beautiful place. And I just couldn't
help myself that I wanted to speak with
all of you. I'm supposed to be on tour.
I have a few other dates that I'm
supposed to be in other places, but I
couldn't stop. I had to come talk to you
right now because what I'm telling you
right now is going to change your life
forever. About prayer, about talking to
God. it sounds like it's a very, very uh
trivial thing. Like, "Oh yeah, people
pray. I talk to God. I know about this
already." But the real truth of it is is
that do you really? And the reason why
I'm bringing it up like that is because
I had a very, very recent encounter with
a friend.
I was discussing something with a friend
who had mentioned to me that they had
something in their life that was really,
really bothering them. And of course, my
response is as it is most times with a
lot of my friends is, "Did you pray
about it? Did you talk
And the answer I got was, "Oh, did I
pray about it? I prayed about it. For
sure, I prayed about it. Absolute I
mean, you don't want to know how much I
prayed about it." And then I stopped and
I said, "But did you really pray about
it?" And the reason why I'm saying that
is because there's one thing where a
person can think that something is very,
very much so in need of prayer, needs
that type of attention.
Um and then there's another thing where
it's like my life and everything I have
is hanging in the balance right now and
I have nothing else except for you
Hashem. And there's a difference. And so
I went on to tell this friend I said,
"No, listen. I mean, did you really
pray?" And I related my own
circumstances that I was in
many years ago at a very very tough time
uh in my life at the time. And what I
was going through
was so deep and so
disruptive I would say in my life that I
had nothing else to do except for to go
to the grave of one of the righteous
people in Safed,
uh that's in northern northern Israel.
And I remember being at the grave of the
Arizal and I told that friend
I was there for 17 hours straight. I
didn't move. I didn't open up a single
book. There were people that came
through, you know, we needed prayer
quorum of of 10 men.
Uh and so I would join when they when
they were there and then I went back to
what I was doing. But I did not talk to
another human being for 17 hours except
for Hashem. I only talked to Hashem.
That was all I did for the 17 hours that
I was there crying, begging, pleading
for what it was. And ultimately I saw
the salvation that I was praying for.
And that's only one time. But this has
happened to me many many different times
in my life and I think that what people
misunderstand is that there's a
difference between praying and there is
another thing with living with Hashem.
That means that wherever I go and
anytime I'm in any place and no matter
what the circumstances, whether I'm
happy, whether I'm sad, I'm praying to
God. I'm talking to God. I'm checking in
with him. I'm letting them know how I
feel. Letting them know my dreams, my
goals, my aspirations, all the things
that I want to accomplish. There's a
difference like I said from just oh,
yeah, I prayed about it and the
difference still
when a person is actually engrossed and
lives in a certain way that prayer is a
part of that person's life. And that's
what we're discussing today. That's the
type of prayer that is going to change
your life forever.
Hey guys, what's going on? I want to
tell you really quickly about an
organization here in Ramat Beit Shemesh
named Colel Koren. Colel Koren is an
organization that provides essential
support to kids with dyslexia and other
learning disabilities. They do
everything from making sure that they
have personalized lesson plans all the
way to advocacy, which is very
important. A lot of these kids have
fallen through the cracks in the regular
system and a lot of them are
misdiagnosed. But Colel Koren through
their assessment has found that most of
the time it's just learning
disabilities. Unfortunately, because of
the war, people have reallocated their
funds to different war efforts and
misplaced families, rightfully so. But
unfortunately, what it's led to is a lot
of these kids falling through the
cracks. And now this wonderful
organization is at the brink of turning
kids away. I would never advocate for
something unless I was able to
personally tell you how amazing the
organization is. I want everybody that
can, please go to colelkoren.org
and make a donation. We must keep this
organization open and running and being
able to service all the families that
they service. For a long time when it
comes to organizations, many people have
asked me, but unless I know personally
that I'm dealing with real people, I
would never ask my audience. So again,
please make a donation today to Colel
Koren. That's k o l k o r e h dot org.
And I can honestly say that you will be
changing lives. Okay, back to the show.
So what I did to get today
was I compiled a list of seven things
that I wanted to talk to you about. Uh
seven tips, you could call them seven
pieces of advice about prayer of how to
structure these things in your life.
This is very, very important. This will
be a practical guide. That's what I'm
going to go. A practical guide and
spiritual uh guide for anyone,
regardless of what your background is.
No matter where you came from, no matter
how strong you are in your faith,
because when it comes to prayer, which
is ultimately the one thing that helps
us to cultivate and build our
relationship with God, it it's it's it's
it doesn't matter where person is
standing at that point in their life.
The only thing that matters at this
point is where they're at at that
moment. And God is going to see the
person right there in that moment. So,
let's discuss these few things. So, the
first tip that I want to give you is
starting with gratitude and with praise.
You have to start with gratitude and
praise because
so many times in our life we're going
through a lot we don't even realize how
many blessings that God has already
given us. We We talk about life, our
fingers, our hands, our eyes, being able
to use the bathroom in a normal way, and
and not not having to have a catheter or
anything like that inside a person's
body that is invasive and stopping them
from being able to eat. I'm talking
about how many blessings do we have day
and night that all of us have, are
experiencing them all the time, and we
never even stop to say, "Thank you." How
important it is. So, number one really
is gratitude and praise. Giving
uh uh words of honor and glory to God.
Now, the truth is this,
King David said it himself, how can we
be sufficient in our praise of God? God
is so great and so big, we don't have
words to really put in to uh uh uh uh
into praise for God because he's so much
bigger than anything that there possibly
can be, anything that we could be
descriptive about. So, God is beyond
anything that we've ever seen before,
anything that we ever experienced
before. So, how can we actually put it
in words? Nevertheless,
we should praise him. We should give
with all that we have to praise him and
affirm his kingship over our lives and
with a great great gratitude. We don't
understand that gratitude itself
is one thing that another person sleep
sleeps on when it comes to pray. Even if
they'll pray about other things, when it
comes to gratitude, a lot of us
sometimes we're we're very very stingy.
And we don't understand that gratitude
itself There's a few different items but
gratitude is one of those things that
when a person implements this into their
life you will literally see how much
closer you become to Hashem. Because
think about it, if you do something for
somebody, right? And they thank you and
they're always giving you praise and
thank you so much and even for you it
could have been a small thing but you
see how appreciative is is a person for
what do you want to do? You want to give
more and you want to give more and you
want to be more involved with the person
and you want to be more involved in the
person's life. So this is what gratitude
does for us that a lot of other things
that people you know spend their time on
actually won't help them as much as
gratitude would. Sometimes we don't even
have to pray for the thing that we want
God will see in our heart and give to us
just in the just because a person is
grateful. So we don't understand how
important it is but I'm telling you
right now start with gratitude. Begin
your prayers with gratitude.
Number two.
Be honest and be vulnerable.
Jews say every single day in the prayer
called the Ashrei
God is close to all who call upon him in
truth. A lot of people like to quote
this and they'll say God is close to all
who call upon him but they forget to say
in truth meaning that God wants to know
exactly where you are what it is that
you're experiencing exactly what it is
that you feel. It makes no sense for you
and we all know that God is omniscient
God is all powerful God is all
sovereign, right? He already knows what
it is that we need before we even say
it. So why is it that a person would set
aside time and go through all the
busyness of of their life and go through
all the different loopholes of whatever
it is that they have to do in order to
make this time with them and Hashem
and then get there and say things that
are not really true. You're not being
vulnerable. God wants for us to open up.
God is a loving father. He loves us. He
cares about us. He cherishes us, and we
mean everything to him. So, why should
we ever think that we shouldn't be
vulnerable with him? You have to be
vulnerable, and you have to be honest.
God is close to all who call upon him in
truth. In truth. So, say your truth.
Don't go tell God that you, you know,
you want to,
you know, be the most righteous person
in the world when that's really not a
concern for you. Your concern is, you
know, making it through your day-to-day,
making it through your bills, making it
through being able to educate your
children proper way. These are the
things that are really bothering you.
So, let's not talk to God about how much
charity you want to give. You don't care
about charity right now. You want to be
able to earn money. You want to be able
to earn a living. You want to pay a
light bill. Whatever it is, a person has
to be honest with God. Be honest and be
vulnerable with God. That's number two.
And number three
is the power of silence.
This one is really really underrated.
We have a lot that we go through in our
lives. We have a lot that we are
experiencing on a day-to-day. Any person
that's a human just deals with stuff.
And And this is just our life. We have
to deal with things. And And no person
lives without some type of struggle,
some type of something going on inside
of their life that ultimately, um, you
know, disrupts them.
And one of the biggest things and the
biggest temptations that we have when it
comes to prayer
is that
you know, maybe when a person is more
seasoned, but I think we all have this
at some point is that we're just really
ready to rush out everything that's
we're going through right now. We do
want to be honest. We want to be
vulnerable, and we want to talk God's
head off and and to really really say
everything that we have in our mind. But
the real truth is it's very very
important for us to have that moment of
silence when we're talking to God, to
speak to him and and it's a two-way
conversation. A person needs to really
understand that the silence allows for a
person to hear the divine Hashem. The
more and more that a person I you may
not hear anything audibly and you know,
anything audible, but the truth is is
that a person's heart is connected to
Hashem. Hashem created us. He formed us.
He he he he he he's given us life.
He's directing our life. Regardless of
how much you include him in your life,
God is directing our life. God is with
us.
So,
when a person goes to speak to God and
you are setting aside this time,
it's very important to have this silence
because God knows how to speak to you.
And that's another thing about love
languages, right? God knows the love
language of every single person. So, a
person has their own personal
experience, yeah?
And there ask, oh, how do you know that
this is what God wants from you? How do
you know I would have an answer. It's
very hard to say to somebody, oh, well,
I just kind of felt it in my heart.
Well, the truth is that these type of
things do happen. I mean, God would
never probably tell you to do something
that's, you know, anti-biblical
anti-Bible anti-Torah.
However,
when God does speak to a person, it
requires a certain amount of silence,
of quiet. Even if a person does have a
lot of things to say with God, it's a
very very important period of time where
a person should be silent to sift
through the heart and the mind,
especially after getting from that place
of of gratitude and being honest and
being vulnerable with God because one of
the principal rules that we have with
God is something called measure
connected measure, right? The way that
we are with him is the way that he he is
with us. So, the more and more that you
involve God into your life and the more
and more that he becomes a priority for
you, the more and more that you will
experience him. The more and more you're
going to have
what we call divine providence. Um and
so the the the when it comes to tefillah
at least, when it comes to prayer and
the silence,
by you taking these first two steps
before you get to the silence,
you've already begun to break away all
of those things all of those things that
have been attached to you that have sort
of separated you from being able to
actually hear what God has been saying
to you all along. God is speaking to a
every single one of us at uh you know,
all throughout the day trying to give us
hints and and signs and and and nuggets
and trying to, you know, direct us in
the proper path. But if a person doesn't
have a place of silence and the person
is wrapped up all the time and they're
busy with this world, then it's very
very easy for us to not hear what God is
saying to us. So it's very important to
have the moments of silence in our
prayer to where there's nothing else
except for listening very very closely
to the word and to what Hashem is trying
to say to us.
So number four,
pray with Torah.
I mean, if you learn something, this is
one of the biggest things. You go to a
very nice lecture. You go and hear
somebody speak or you listen to the
podcast, obviously. Thank you.
Um
but you hear things that are inspiring
you.
Things that I don't care if it was a
short clip. I don't care if you're
watching, you know, a motivational
thing, whatever the case is or you're
actually reading the Torah, you're
reading the Bible, you're reading
scripture. I don't care. Whatever it is.
A person
has to take this thing and to be able to
run with it. Now, it's very easy to get
inspired by something very very quickly.
You hear very nice lecture from your
favorite rabbi and all of a sudden it's
like, "Wow." And then, you know, 10
minutes after it, you don't even
remember what was said. So it's very
very important that you you should do
this. I had this myself. I used to go to
a lecture
uh every single Sunday that my rabbi
would give.
And it was a beautiful, beautiful class,
but we were really dealing with deep
things that if a person is at least, you
know, a little bit in tune spiritually,
you will want to acquire the things that
we talked about. We talked about
character traits and and and, you know,
certain ethics and and the way to live
and the way to cultivate and build
ourselves in our relationship with God,
you know, avoiding these pitfalls and
the things and whatever it was. It was
very, very inspiring every single
Sunday.
So, I
I didn't want to forget what it was and
I didn't want to forget the inspiration.
So, not only did I record all the
lectures, I I put a lot of online. Not
only did I record all the lectures, I
would literally go out after every
single class and I would go pray to God
on what it was that I just learned.
And I'm telling you,
this if you would take on this practice,
it has changed my life even till today.
That not only do I have um, not only do
I remember what it was, but the I'm able
to have a time capsule. It's the most
beautiful thing about making prayer part
of your life. I'm able to have these
this moment to where I look back on
those times.
And not only do I remember what the
lectures were about and major key points
of what those lectures were on is
because I live with them. I took them
outside of just where I was and I live
with them. I went on with them.
But the other thing I acquired from that
was these beautiful time capsules of of
things and places I could always go back
to. I can always go back to that in my
head and in my mind where I was, you
know, outside by by that lake in that
place. I would go out into nature and
and pray to God, you know, at least at
each time it was at least for hour. Most
of the time I was spending 2 hours
talking to God.
But the more and more you develop that
relationship, you don't want to let you
don't want to let God go.
And you have to take these things and
live with with in order for you to
implement implement them. The furthest
distance
that I say just say between uh the
furthest dis- distance in the world to
say just say is between a person's mind
and their heart.
In order to get something from up here
today, I'm meaning that uh you may know
something intellectually, but it doesn't
mean that you actually put them into
practice.
In order for you to actually bring them
there is to live with that thing. How do
we live with it? Through prayer. We take
these things to God. And Rabbi Nachman
actually writes in the uh in the book of
Likutei Amarim in the first chapter,
over there he talks about it and he says
that when a person does this practice of
taking Torah and turning this into
prayer before God, it actually gives the
prayer more favor. It has more chein. It
has more glow to God because think about
it. A person who goes and says that they
want to accomplish X, Y, and Z, right?
And the X, Y, and Z that they just went
to go pray to God was because they're
not well-versed in understanding these
things from a Torah perspective.
When they go and actually pray these
things to God, they could be praying for
things that are against God's will
because they actually don't know. But if
God has given us an instruction, he's
given us a way that he wants for us to
live, and we actually go and take what
he says in the Torah, what he says
inside of the Bible, and we go and turn
that into prayers, how would he not be
overjoyed to deliver for us what it is
that we prayed for because now the words
have favor in we've shown him that we
made him. It says in the book of Psalms
in the 37th chapter of the book of
Psalms, it says that for those who uh
37? Yeah, 37.
Got to remember my my my geography,
biblical geography, you know. I know
it's not geography, guys. Don't don't
don't try to slug me up for that one.
But
it says in the 37th chapter, it says
that those who uh God those who delight
in God, he will give them the desires of
their heart.
What does it mean to make God your
delight? Meaning that
I made myself like King David.
King David was a person who was after
God's own heart.
He wanted what God wanted. When God was
hurt, he wanted to hurt. When God was
happy, he wanted to be happy. He wanted
to reward what he rewarded and punish
whatever it was that he punished. He
wanted to be completely intrinsically
bound up with God. And this is what God
desires from all of us, that we should
all want the same thing. So, when a
person finds themselves delighting in
God, meaning that I'm making you God my
my ultimate delight. I'm going to spend
as much time with you and your Torah,
your words are going to be
become, you know, my my very breath.
Then God has no problem giving a person
like that whatever it is that their
heart desires because they their their
desires are always going to be in line
with God because they make God a
delight. So, it's a very very
interesting way to look at it. So, it's
very very important to take Torah and to
make prayers out of this Torah. It's
very very important. All right. So,
moving on to number five.
And it's so funny cuz I want to tell you
every single time that I get to another
point that this point is the most
important point that you need to have in
and whatever the case is.
But, number five is consistency.
Consistency. A lot of people in the
beginning, they don't even know how to
pray to God. They don't even know what
words to say. How do I start to and
begin with words to God? Now, here's the
truth. Those are the first words you say
to God.
Is that God, I I don't even know what
I'm doing.
Sometimes I have doubts. Remember what
we said, talk to God with your truth,
with your truth. And if you're
struggling with your belief in God, if
you're struggling with if God is
listening to you or not, those are your
those are your beginning words of
prayer. As a God, I struggle with the
fact cuz the God wants the
vulnerability. He wants you to be
vulnerable with him.
But the main thing is is that through
all of this is that you pray
consistently. Even if you have no words,
even if you have nothing that actually
comes to your mind, you should make it a
habit to set aside time for you and God.
And that And that time, nobody is is
allowed to interrupt. Either your phone
is off, whatever it is. And what I tell
a lot of people is to um
is to make a space. You You have to make
a space for you and God because
there is
there is so much going on in the world.
There's so many different distractions,
right? If a person doesn't give God the
quality time, then it's going to be very
very hard for a person over time to
build that relationship. I'm stating the
obvious. Come on. So, it's it The
consistency builds a habit and it
strengthens your relationship with that.
This is how you strengthen the
relationship is that I'm constantly
showing up every single day. God, I'm
showing up with you every single day.
Making it a a point. If you know you got
a busy day a- ahead of you, then okay,
I'm willing to sacrifice because
why am I here? What's the most important
reason
that I'm here in this world? Why am I
here? After everything that I could
possibly think of, what is the reason
that God put me here? One thing that I
know for sure, and that is to connect
myself to God, to be as close to him as
possible, to give myself over to him
with every single thing that I have, and
to be able to live and have a thriving a
real relationship with God, to know him.
This is why we're here. So, that's most
important. So, okay, you got a busy day.
Set aside time, set a place for you and
God that you're going to go meet with
him every single day. Make him room of
meeting. And and and Breslov in the
particular group of Hasidahs that I I I
affiliate with,
Rebbe Nachman said that a person should
set a room in the house that's only for
that time of you
you speaking with God. It's sort of like
the tent of meeting. Since that Moses
was always very busy to go meet and talk
with God in this tent of meeting. I mean
since that each and every one of us
should have one of those in our own
homes. We should have one in our own
homes that were even if we have no words
that just go sit in that place which is
that tent of meeting between you and
God. You set aside this place that you
go there but you do it every single day.
Consistency is the name of the game.
This is how we build. This is how we
connect ourselves and ultimately build
that thriving and real relationship with
God as by doing it every single day. The
consistency I I can't stress
stress this enough. Hey, sorry to stop
you. I just want to remind you to make
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channel. Hit the notification bell so
anytime a new podcast, any new content,
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will try my best to respond to you. But
make sure that you stay up on everything
new that happens on this channel. Okay,
back to the show.
I've seen the biggest gains in my life
spiritually
uh on a material level
um in anything that I want to accomplish
and the main thing was consistency. I
will tell you
I even feel like sometimes there's a lot
of prayers where I feel very very
inspired to talk to God. I feel overly
inspired to talk to God. I'm like super
ecstatic. And I hope you guys are
enjoying this. For everybody who's
listening to it in the audio, you know.
I don't know if you can hear all the
raindrops and everything. We went from
this beautiful sunny day to to raindrops
over here.
But
that consistency that I built with God
came like there were days where I felt
super inspired and the prayers
lifted me up. I'd be running out because
of the inspiration that I got from
spending that time alone there with God.
And then there were other days where I
felt like man, it's so hard for me to
speak. It's so hard for me to get the
words out. It's so hard for me to pray
right now.
And a lot of times I saw bigger results
from the days that I was just doing it
because I wanted to be consistent that I
was literally fighting to be able to
have that time with me and God. I was
literally fighting for it. And in those
times I seen amazing things and and
miracles and things happen in my life
just from the consistency. Saying to
myself that I'm not willing to give up,
that I'm going to go and pray to him no
matter what. So, the consistency is so
important because this is exactly how
most things are built. The how most
relationships are built is through that
consistency. So,
number six.
Another important thing
is to pray
with intention.
As much as you can. To pray with
intention,
you know,
is a very hard thing to do, especially
if a person is accustomed to praying um
uh
you know, from a prayer book or from
other things like that.
But,
all the prayer that I'm talking about, I
just want to say this also to for
disclaimer, the prayer that I'm talking
about today is praying to God from your
own words, from your own heart. Uh no
prayer books. I'm you know, it's very
important to pray from
from a prayer book. It's very important
to pray if you can um using the words of
Psalms to Him to pray to God.
But, the prayer I'm talking about that I
find that will be the most effective
because these are own your own words,
nobody else's words. If you talking to
God as you praying in your own words.
So, what I'm talking about praying with
intent.
Number six, praying with intention.
Is that you are directing your prayers
that you don't understand how much God
honors the prayers that are actually
coming from a person's heart.
They mean everything to him.
And just like it would for anybody else.
I mean, imagine that you have somebody
that, you know, you love with all of
your heart and all your might.
Uh and every time you decided to go and
talk to them, say a spouse even, you
know, say imagine I don't want to say me
cuz I I wouldn't do this. I probably
wouldn't either. But,
you take your your your your loved one,
your spouse,
and instead of actually talking
directly to them and telling them how
you feel, say you like, you know, even
wrote down all the time for yourself
even what it is that it was. Are you Are
you seeing what somebody else said to
their wife and you wrote it down?
And your your your wife or your or your
husband, whatever spouse will come to
you and talk to you maybe even want to
go deeper with you.
And you say, "Hold on 1 second." And you
And you dig in your pocket and you pull
out this paper and you start reading it
over to the person. Yes, you know, "Yes,
I really love you." I mean, you know,
come on.
With intention, with heart, and with
passion.
With passion and with your whole entire
heart, giving your whole entire heart
over to God with every single morsel,
every single fiber of your being to pray
to him and to be honest with him and to
be vulnerable with him. And all of these
things with complete and real full
intention. Giving yourself over to him.
This is what we're talking about here.
We don't understand how much it means to
Hashem, just like it would to any
spouse.
The difference between that and reading
off of a paper, what it what it is when
you say to that person, "I love you.
I care about you. I don't want to ever
live in this world without you. I don't
want to have a life where you're not a
part of that life. And any life that
doesn't include you ain't a life. You
are my everything. You mean everything
to me. You are precious to me.
And I want to do for you. I want to give
to you. I'm going to give all of what I
can. I'm here for you. Tell me there's
if there's anything that you need from
me. You know.
So, using words
that deeply come from that place in the
heart are even if you're telling them,
you know, I I you know, I'm I'm hurting
right now.
Uh things are are not going well for me.
I'm in a lot of pain. I don't know which
direction to go. And I really need your
support. I really need you to be there
for me. I'm saying obviously to a
spouse. When we say these things to God,
we don't understand
the power of tefillah and prayer with
intention, being able to talk to God
with our whole entire heart. These
things I'm telling you are
game-changers. Will literally change
your life. You'll be living a completely
different life if you were to implement
this.
Number seven.
Which is hard for me because number
seven is like
Number seven is uh
is very very very important.
I wanted to push it off a little bit,
but I think that is very very important
for all of us to
uh to implement this because we don't
understand this. And there's a very very
awesome principle that our sages bring
down. And this is praying for others,
praying for other people.
There's a principle
brought down in the Talmud
that if you would pray for someone else,
then God answers you first. If you take
something that you need, uh say you are
um struggling. You have a a certain
illness that you're trying to get over,
God forbid. Or whatever it is, or you
know, whatever. It could be a common
cold. I don't
And you know somebody else has said,
"Instead of praying for yourself,
pray for the other person."
And make it intentional. Now, we just
said earlier that God wants us to be
honest, he wants us to be vulnerable, he
wants us to, you know, speak our truth
to him. So, a person may ask, "How could
it be that you ask me to do all of those
things and I really care about myself
more than I care about the other person,
right?"
So, there's a little bit of a trick
that once you have the same issue as
someone else,
you know what it feels like.
And if a person uses, like we said over
here in number three, in the silent,
and they're able to contemplate,
put yourself in the other person's
shoes.
Allow yourself to feel what they're
feeling and you take the same pain and
the same limitations that you have
because of whatever it is that you're
struggling with. It doesn't have to be
something that you're physically going
through, it could be something
financial, whatever it is, that you
would
set aside
your own feelings about your situation
and put yourself in the other person's
shoes and it would be the most honest
prayers that you ever prayed for someone
else before in your life. A lot of us,
you know, now we're seeing, you know,
hostages returning back to the family. A
lot of us have been able to
put ourselves in the shoes of parents
who have loved ones that are behind
enemy lines
and we're able to
identify, we're able to feel that pain.
And if a person instead of just feeling
that pain turns those into prayers for
another person, ultimately that helps
you, that helps your children never have
to be in these type of situations or
yourself ever having to be in these type
of situations. So, this is this is of
the utmost importance is praying for
others. Another thing is is that when
you pray for other people,
you gain favor in the other person's
eyes, even if they don't know that
you're praying for them because there's
a certain connection, certain spiritual
law that by praying for other people
it gives you khane, it gives you favor
in the eyes of the other people, it
connects you to the other person.
And ultimately connecting you in the
right way, connecting you to the to the
ultimate source. Praying for another
person's well-being.
God wants more than anything else is
that we love one another, that we
cherish one another, that we're looking
out for one another, that you know, if
any person listening to me is a parent
that has, you know, more than one child
there's nothing worse sometimes than
when you see one or all of your kids
fighting with one another, uh not
getting along, not sharing, not giving
to one another, not looking out for the
other person. I have seven kids, so I
know how sometimes, you know, kids and
and that's just the way that kids are in
general, they're pretty self-centered.
But uh it gets very hard sometimes for
them to get along.
God wants for all of us to get along.
Love thy neighbor as thyself. God is is
is all about unity and the unification
of us with our brothers and our sisters
and and all of our loved ones and and
and
it means so much to him when we pray for
other people. So much so that the sages
revealed to us that if you pray for
another person that God answers you
first. He answers you first.
So prayer is the one thing that stands
at the heights
of everything and so many people
overlook it. They don't even think about
it. You have a struggle, you have
something going on in your life, you
need immediate something to happen very
very quickly, and the first thing that
we do is we start thinking that we're
the ones in control, that we can go and
fix the problem. We can go do that. Oh,
I have I don't have enough money right
now, also maybe
maybe I'll get another job. I'll I'll
start some other business. I need I need
more things going on.
And a lot of times when there are
there's a lacking of something,
it usually indicates that there's a
lacking between you and Hashem. Not that
God always wants you to be running after
some other thing that you need to be
doing. Oh, there's another thing that
you need to be doing. So, I think about
this. I just want you to think about
this.
If we said
if the Bible reveals to us and lets us
know
that our main purpose in life is to know
God
and to be in a relationship with God and
to be connected with him,
why would he want you distracted with
more things?
Why would it really be that God wants
you doing so many different things that
you become busy, more and more busy
that you don't actually have time to
spend with him, that you don't have time
to to build the relationship that you
want, and you don't have a time to know
him?
And I want to give you a bonus.
The bonus
tip that I want to give you
is trusting
that God hears your prayers.
And this all goes back to trust in
general that you have to trust that God
wants to help you.
A part of our belief in God isn't enough
to, you know, there's some people that
will say like, "Yeah, I believe in God.
I believe he hates me. Look at my life.
Look at everything that's going on in my
life or whatever." That's not called
complete belief in God. It's a It's a
little bit of a belief and it's you
know, I don't know how much of it's
commendable. But the real truth is is
that believing in God and trusting in
God
goes with trusting and knowing that he
wants the absolute best for you and he
wants to give to you because we're all
humans and we know what it's like. Some
of us who are parents or our children or
I have loved ones and people that we
love in our life and nieces, nephews,
whatever it is, that people that were
close to.
And honestly, we want to give.
We want to give to them. We want for
other people to be happy. Sometimes it's
friends that you know they've been going
through a tough time. And you're just
like, "Man, if I really had the
opportunity, I would give this person
this. I would I would help them out in
this way. And I I I would do that." All
of that desire to give is a part of the
fact that we were created in God's
image.
And that's one of the entrance, it's one
of the fingerprints that we get from God
himself is that he wants to give to us.
He wants to do good for us. He wants us
to experience him and to experience
complete goodness in our life.
We have to trust that God wants to do
for us. We have to trust that God hears
us and that he's listening to us.
And there's nothing more that brings
prayers about than being confident in
the belief that God actually hears you.
He actually wants to do these things for
you. He actually wants to help you. He
wants to give you that promotion. He
wants for your kids to be successful. He
wants for you to have peace, marital
peace with your with your with your
spouse. Wants for you to be successful,
to be able to pay your bills on time. He
wants for you to have complete goodness
in your life. God wants to do this for
you.
And this is a part of our belief and our
trusting in him.
And once we trust and we believe, our
prayers have more potency.
The relationship that we built with God
is a unbreakable bond. We have we're
going to always have times where we feel
distant. This is just a part of the
relationship. There's there will be
times where God so to speaks will will
he will he will hide himself in a sense.
And and
create
the feeling that it's not really there,
but it will create the feeling of
distance.
And the reason for that is is that
there's sort of a game of hide and go
seek that he wants you to go look for
him. He wants for you to go find him. He
wants for you to seek them out and seek
him out. So, when we're discussing
prayer today, we're talking about living
with God, living with prayer,
implementing it to our life in such a
way that we're not going a day
without praying with God. We're not
going a moment without even thinking
about him, without trying to find some
type of way to include him in whatever
else is going on in our lives.
Seeing him and believing and trusting
that he hears our prayers. And we need
to believe in the potency of our
prayers. I want to share with you one
story. I I have recently started to
share this story again uh publicly. For
a long time I didn't because, you know,
when a person doesn't live with prayer
and they're and they're not very strong
with their faith, when people are not,
it's very very hard for them to believe
in the supernatural. It's hard to
believe that uh God actually is moving
today as he always has. So, I wanted to
tell you this story. I was
working in property management years
ago. And I was working for a particular
company. And I wanted to
uh move in the next step with my
relationship with Hashem. I was actually
going to convert to Judaism at the time,
uh me and my wife. And we decided that,
you know, we wanted to find a place in
the Jewish neighborhood so that we can
get acclimated with the community. It
was one of the things the rabbi wanted
us to do. So, we finally found a place
and we ended up moving out of our
apartment. It was a three-bedroom
apartment. There was one lady who needed
to move out of her two-bedroom apartment
because she was living on assistant
housing uh with the Section 8. And she
she um I don't know what the problem
was. I think she had too many people
living in the house and so the voucher
uh got got raised to a three-bedroom
voucher and she needed to move. And on
the property, 476 units, there was no
other three-bedroom available except for
the one that I had just moved out of.
There was a major problem with this for
her. It was on the ground floor. Now,
this woman really needed uh a
a apartment and so she thought that was
on the third or fourth floor.
Unfortunately, she had been violated
before. Her house had been broken into
when she was, you know, somewhere living
on the ground floor and so she had the
biggest phobia of living on the ground
floor. She came into the office, she met
with the manager, and you can hear her
from the other room screaming and crying
frantically. Uh nobody at the time knew
what was going on. It wasn't until after
she left that we able to know and be
made aware of the story and as
sympathetic as we wanted to be for her,
there was just no other place available.
Only apartment available was my
three-bedroom apartment. So, she finally
moves in
and I want to say it was maybe a week or
so in to her living inside this
apartment.
She comes in walking into the main lobby
where offices was and she walks straight
up to me.
And I seen a tear roll down her cheek,
but she looked so content and so happy.
She had like a cup and a little gift for
me.
As she proceeds to give me the gift and
I'm looking at her and I'm saying, "I
don't understand why Why are you giving
me this gift? I don't I don't I don't
understand."
She says, "I'll tell you."
She said, "I had the biggest fear to
move in to your apartment because it was
on the ground floor."
She said, "I've been violated before."
She let me know the whole entire story.
She had a phobia from living on the
first floor and just thought she can
never do it.
She moves into the apartment, she says,
and she said,
"I have never felt the presence of God
like I have inside of this apartment."
She said, "I've never felt more safe
than I ever have before in this
apartment." And she says, "I'm no fool.
I know it's because you prayed in this
place." And when she said this to me,
I had goosebumps because she had no idea
how much I actually prayed in that
place. I prayed in that place unlike any
other time I'd ever prayed before. I saw
so much of the hand divine providence of
God in my life from the prayers that I
prayed inside of that apartment. I'm
talking about hours. I was doing 3-days
fasting with no food and praying and
cutting myself off from the rest of the
world inside of that apartment. Me, my
wife, my brother-in-law, my
sister-in-law, that house in itself was
literally a place of prayer because we
had made it into a place of prayer.
And even after that, she moved in
and she felt the prayer. We have to
trust and we have to believe in our
prayer. We have to believe in our power
of prayer and that God hears us. Please,
all of you, I want you to let me know
that you're implementing these steps. If
you're implementing these steps, are
they working for you? Please let me
know. Write me comments. You're more
than welcome to email me on the website.
I want to make sure that this is a value
to you. So, please let me know. Thank
you so much for listening. I'll see you
guys in the next show.