A Few Inches Away | Ari Chaimowitz

I think I could speak for every single presenter that ever sat in front of a Vayimaen camera, that there are two things that run through our mind. Hashem, please give us eloquence of speech, מענה לשון. And also, Hashem, help this message arrive where it needs to arrive. I'm about to share with you a story that is absolutely mind-blowing, but to share this story almost in first person is my dear friend, somebody who's beloved to Klal Yisroel, R’ Ari Chaimowitz. Shulem Aleichem, Morai v’Rabosai, I was Zoche to make a full day behind the scenes with Vayimaen as part of a series called What a Day, which I go with business owners or organizations, and I show a full day behind the scenes of their work. And now we’re going to the studio in Brooklyn, to meet Psachya and the two Rabbanim that are going to be interviewed. So my very good friend found out about Vayimaen from this video and he found time to watch the Vayimaen clips on Hoshana Rabbah night, right after he finished his Seder in Shul. He came home, he parked his minivan on a street in Boro Park, where it was mabuling. It was extremely windy that night and raining like crazy. He was sitting in his car, trying to check out the clips of Vayimaen. As he starts flipping one by one, he goes another clip and another clip, he's getting more and more inspired. And then at some point, he gets to the video that I was Zoche to make. The story of the guy who didn't go on a Nesher taxi, who was spared from this terrible accident, and it hits him in a very deep way. And he says to himself, I need to do something right here and right now to upgrade my Kedushah. But, Baruch Hashem, he's an ehrlicher yungerman, and his phone was already filtered. And he's thinking to himself: What can I do right now? He looks at his phone and he sees the Spotify app, which he uses a few hours a day for podcasts and mainly for Shiurim and Torah, but sometimes there are advertisements there that are not appropriate. He's thinking to himself, You know what? This is a good opportunity. Although it's very hard for me, I'm going to erase this app. And as he's erasing the app... Boom! His car is rocked by almost an explosion. The entire car shakes. It took him a few seconds to get out of the car and realize what just happened. A piece of this massive branch pierced directly through the windshield into the dashboard, inches from where he was sitting. It was as if he had pressed Delete, and the Ribono shel Olam had pushed that branch just a few inches away from him, saving his life. If that was the end of the story, we could walk away inspired, but there's another amazing piece to this. Part of him wants to share this story really badly. This is Hashgacha Pratis, like, a crazy one. But the other part, he says: I'm a private guy. I'm shy. I don't want this to get out. And the only person he thinks that would appreciate such a story is myself. He wants to tell me, Ari. The whole Yom Tov, he's going back and forth in his mind, Should he tell? Should he not tell? He comes home Motzei Yom Tov and he says like this, Hashem, if you want me to tell the story to Ari, bring Ari to me, and that will be my sign. He goes onto his computer to watch R’ Eli Stefansky. He does that every single day. In the middle of the Shiur, the craziest thing happens. A Maaseh, mamesh today, I reached out to our very good friend, R’ Ari Chaimowitz. I’m looking at you, Ari. He was shivering all over, and he realized at that moment that Hashem is telling him, Go tell this story to Ari. You need to tell this story of Hashgacha Pratis to more people. And Baruch Hashem, he did, because now we could see what happens when a person watches a Vayimaen video but doesn't just let it slide. He does something instantaneously. This holy Yid did that and his life was saved. And Im Yirtzeh Hashem, each and every one of us, when we act on the inspiration of Vayimaen and we do something, our lives, too, can change in an incredible way.