As Far as You Can Go | Rabbi Aryeh Kerzner

The Belzer Rebbe once came down with a very serious illness. And after this episode, the doctor had a very strict directive for him, that going forward, you have to be extremely careful about germs. Don't go around places that have germs, because you don't want to get sick again. You don't want to catch a disease from people. And... included in this directive is avoiding the Mikvah. And for the Belzer Rebbe, as you can imagine, this was a very painful pill to swallow. The Rebbe, especially, observed unparalleled Kedushah and sanctity, when he immersed in the Mikvah, and now he's being told that it's off limits, because it's not safe for him. A couple of weeks later, a close friend of the Rebbe happened to be walking to Shul that morning, and to his utter shock, he notices the Rebbe walking into the Mikvah house. And he's a little troubled by this, because he knew about the doctor's orders, but he figured: You know what? Before I pass any judgment, maybe I should probe a little further. Tomorrow, I'm actually going to go to the Mikvah at that time that the Rebbe goes to Shul, and I'm going to see what happens. And that's what he did. The next morning, this fellow, he goes into the Mikvah house, he walks into the Mikvah, and he watches to see if the Rebbe comes. And in fact, the Rebbe does walk in. Walks over to the shelves, gets undressed, walks over to the Mikvah, takes one step down, is about to enter the water, stops, walks out, gets dressed and he walks out. What in the world is the Rebbe doing? Why go through the motions of going as close as possible to the Mikvah, if anyways, you're not allowed into the water? The answer is that the Rebbe was teaching us a profound lesson in the way we confront challenges to our Kedushah and our purity. When a person has a struggle and a challenge in the realm of Kedushah and in the realm of purity, whether it be at work, at home, or on the street, and you think: You know what? If I can't completely solve this problem, if I can't completely overcome this Yetzer Hara, what's the point? It's not worth even going halfway. It's either full success or failure. And the Rebbe was teaching us that this is a grave mistake. Sometimes you've got to show what you can do, and leave the rest up to Hashem. If the Rebbe wasn't able to go into the Mikvah, because it wasn't safe, okay. Every single day, I'm going to make an attempt, I’m going to get as close as possible to the water, show HaKadosh Baruch Hu I'm going through the motions to attain Kedushah. The rest is not up to me. It's not in my cards. So, too, when a person tackles the Yetzer Hara on a daily basis in his growth in spirituality and in his growth in Kedushah v’Tahara, you've got to do what you're possibly able to accomplish in the realm of Kedushah. If you're able to close the breach in your Kedushah for one hour a week, so be it. If you're able to close the breach for one hour a day, so be it. You do what you're possibly, in your personal capacity, able to achieve, and you leave the rest up to HaKadosh Baruch Hu. Because if you can't get into the Mikvah, at least go through the motions of getting as close as possible to that water.