Paying Attention To Our Check Engine Light - Rabbi Shlomo Landau

dovey was thrilled he was recently married he had an amazing new wife and he also had an amazing new car well not exactly new but new for him and he was very happy to be a first time car owner he took good care of it he put gas in when needed he did what he was supposed to and didn't do what he was not supposed to but about six months into automobile ownership one day dovey saw the check engine light all of a sudden flicker on he didn't like check engine lights co-check engine lights mean go to the mechanic and it also means perhaps costly repairs he didn't want to go to the mechanic he certainly did not want to pay for a costly repair so he ignored it but after a while it began to nag at him every time he'd get into his car that check engine light would be on so he had an idea he had a friend that was electronically inclined and he said to his friend i need you to do me a favor come can you please snip the wire that provides the electricity to the check engine light in my car his friend said to him that's not a good idea a check engine light is an indicator that there's a more serious problem perhaps something under the hood why would you do that don't worry dovey said i got this his friend said okay he snipped the wire and sure enough the check engine light was extinguished and every time dovey got into the car he had a clear conscious everything was okay until a few weeks later when he was driving on the highway and all of a sudden smoke began to pour from underneath the hood by the time the fire department arrived all that was left was a burnt out shell of dovey's new car dovi was devastated we hear this and we think what a fool dove he was but the truth is are we any different because so many times in our life hakaresparachu sends us little check engine like messages a financial setback a challenge and shall unbias an issue with a child a medical setback and what do we do immediately we go to the doctor we speak to a financial analyst we try to figure out something in shalom bias and those are all important but often we just focus on that and we ignore the big bigger picture perhaps something is more seriously wrong perhaps hashem is sending us a wake-up call check out your life do it do a little bit of introspection and reflection maybe there's certain core issues that need to be repaired don't just look at the check engine light open the hood and examine and see what has to be rectified so going forward who does send us messages and sometimes they're not as pleasant as we would like them to be but instead of running to cut the cord to snip the wire on the check engine light let's try to understand what's really going on let's open up the hood and let's examine let's do a hajj because if we look at that message then the bunch line will take care of everything and the check engine light will never flicker flick