Created for This Fight | Rabbi Gershon Miller

Often when we are challenged with a Nisayon, we find ourselves upset, sometimes even מיואש, just from the very fact that we are experiencing this Nisayon. And because of that, we lose the Ko’ach to stand up and fight. I had the Zchus to be Mashgiach in Gateshead Yeshiva for 18 years. I remember one time there was a Bochur who had been in Yeshiva a few years, and it was time for him to leave, to move on to Eretz Yisroel. And he said to me: You know, I've been here four years and I just don't feel I've shteiged, I don't feel I've got anywhere. And I said to him: What do you mean? I know you, you're a good Bochur. You've done so well. How can you say that you haven't achieved anything? So he said to me: But... I'm leaving now after four years, and I still have the same Nisyonos I had when I came to Yeshiva. So I said to him: Yaakov, let me ask you a few questions. Do you feel you understand better, better than four years ago, the חומר, the seriousness of an Aveira? So he said: Sure, of course I understand it better. Then I said: And after your time in Yeshiva, do you feel that you have עצות, that you have an understanding, an insight, of how to overcome your Nisyonos, more than you had when you came to Yeshiva? And he said: Sure I do. And then I said to him: One more question. Would you say that you’re Misgaber, you overcome your Nisyonos more than you did? And he said: Yes, yes, of course. So I said to him: ישמעו אוזניך מה שפיך מדבר. That's called shteiging. No Yeshiva professes to be able to get rid of a Bochur’s Yetzer Hara. They don't want to. The Torah says, The Torah is telling us that we are human, and that we are people who are זונים אחריהם. But that we, as the עם קדוש, have a חיוב not to give in to those Nisyonos, not to give in to those natural תאוות. Shteiging means that we understand better and that we're better able to overcome the Nisyonos, not that we don't have them. In the words of the Ba’al HaTanya in Perek 27, A Yid shouldn't be downhearted, even if he's fighting this מלחמה all of his life. Perhaps he was created for this, for this fight. His Avoda is to overcome the סטרא אחרא, the כוחות הטומאה, again and again. We mustn't get upset from having the Nisayon. On the contrary, we have to be משמח in the opportunity to be מקיים this Mitzvah. When we don't allow ourselves to become saddened by the Nisayon itself, then we'll have the Ko’ach to approach the Nisayon B’Simcha, and be מקיים this great Mitzvah of ולא תתורו אחרי לבבכם ואחרי עיניכם.