Why Did Rabbi Yaron Reuven Say NO THANK YOU To $7 Million? (13 minutes)

[Music] so now you thought about just just the morning you haven't even started your day yet you go pray you pray to hem you have a if you do you have a direct client talk to hem talk to Hemm you need help after that you go to whatever your job is your selling cars you're selling houses you're a doctor you're a lawyer you're whatever you are now if you think about Hashem automatically your business changes why certain deals you're just never going to do why you know they're wrong certain customers you're never going to deal with why you know they're criminals it's not worth it yeah but it's a lot of money Hashem will provide it in a different way hasem if hem is not is going to provide you two choices all the time is there always going to be a right choice and a wrong choice you're always going to have the ability to choose he's going to send you a customer that can give you a lot of money but he's a criminal he's going to have a customer that's going to give you a little bit of money but he's straight you have to pick the one that's straight why that's the right choice yeah but I'm going to lose on a lot of money and I can't give Stak don't give you're not doing anybody any favors it's better you do honest business I tell you a personal story I know if I ever told anybody you could believe it don't believe it doesn't make a difference to me when I was still working for Raymond James back in 2003 I just made my first million dollars and uh was 23 years old but you know you don't keep the whole million dollars taxes you have expenses you have the firm and so on and so forth but it's still I made some money anyway it was time for me to make a decision am I going to start working on maybe on my way out leave the firm start my own firm work for another firm a few firms were calling me to come work for them when you succeed people tend to find out whether you like it or not especially when you work for a big firm so anyway there was this guy Michael in my office and uh he's like listen I got a guy that's a uh has a firm and uh I think you should talk to them you have a big business you build whatever all the nice compliments that people say and uh she talk to this guy said okay no problem time to call me so the guy calls me and we start talking chitchatting and so on and uh he asks me about my business the size of the business how much clients I have how much money I'm managing what we're doing da da da he's like all right let me cut to the chase he's like listen if you move your business to my firm I'll pay you cash before you even the whole thing moves I'll pay you cash $3.2 million cash and then once you come and the whole business transfers I'll give you another $3 and half million now imagine I'm 23 years old it's $3 million a lot of money 23 93 it's always a lot of money so normally what should be the response can I go down can you pick me up can you send me an Uber but I was brought up with a certain I was brought up by by anest parents and my next question was okay what kind of business do you do wasn't a fool what kind of business you doing n it's not a big deal it's wait hold on a second what do you mean what and he starts explaining to me as oh so you have a boiler room you have a you know place that's illegal no no it's legal it's legal it's just a uh we just have our own thing that we're doing what do you care you just raise new money or do this I'm like you're asking me to steal this money from my clients in so many words in the legal way but in reality I'm still steal with my clients and give it to you listen I'm going to pay you this they started increasing the price said Thank you click now a $7 million test for any age is a lot of money but not if you have some level of Integrity for me it wasn't a test I told the story maybe a hundred times to my employees in the past not because it was a difficult test for me but it was a difficult test for them why they were willing to sell their mother for for a few dollars because they still they still sold money they still valued money as if it was God for me it's never been my test so I told him listen you can't sell your mom for for money you can't sell God for money it's money but you stealing from people they worked hard for the money why you going to steal from them they worked hard for the money why you going to steal from them why they worked hard for it why you don't work hard for your money how do you feel somebody stole your money no but they're rich so what if they're rich so it just makes it more right to steal from them because they're rich or they're poor or this or that who give you the right to steal it's not yours nobody taught you that yeah I didn't think about it that everybody always starts making I didn't think about it that way I didn't see it that way I wasn't sure maybe this everybody has excuses after the fact yeah but somebody died already at this point after the fact everybody has a lot of questions and issues and so on every if you ever noticed every financial crisis every major disaster everyone always says oh yeah I knew it and I saw it and I thought about okay so how come you didn't do anything before everyone knew that the do com bubble was was going to crash after it crashed everyone knew that the housing crisis was going to happen after it happened everyone knew that Bitcoin and all the cryptocurrencies is going to go to zero after it goes to zero but in the meantime everybody's in it oh I knew I knew I knew the point is abai is that hasem expects us to do the right thing before it's obvious to everyone else because it's obvious to us it's obvious to you what's right and wrong it's obvious to you it's important that you make these decisions and make sure that they're right because the tests are only going to get bigger they're not going to get smaller they're only going to get bigger these tests and sometimes that test is going to seem like it's a life and death test it's going to seem like if I don't steal the thousand bucks I'm not going to have food for Shabbat which seems like you're going to die but you're really not going to die inconvenient Shabbat you still have no right to steal you still have no right to cheat so how do you pass the test even though I wasn't necessarily religious I always was connected to some way in my own strange way you have a bigger Merit you have the real truth now you already know the real story you already know Hashem is real you're not 23 in questioning uh whether God's real or not whether this whether that you already know the truth B right now so the test should be much easier for you and the test is can you ask yourself every minute of the day do you really believe that God's next to you right now because if you believe that God's next to you right now all those tests as far as money is concerned become easy why if you know what God is watching God's watching right now he's watching and you're about to cheat this guy for 500 bucks or $5 or 5 million you're not going to do it so once you actually understand that God's watching already dishonesty leaves your blood system now you leave room for honesty dis honesty left honesty is the only thing you have room for so now that your money is going to be more more blessed first and foremost second of all second of all you're going to start since God is watching you think what does God want me to do now now that I have the money now that I made money whatever the money was 500 5,000 5 million whatever it is what does God want me to do with this money other than obviously survive pay the mortgage feed the kids if you have a pet feed the pet whatever it is the basic minimum needs what else does God want me to do once you start thinking with that type of straight mind of what does God want my money to be then your job becomes no different than Li why your entire existence has got in play not after not once you got the check not like oh once a month or once a year only when you meet the rabbi only when you see the email all the time what's Tam all the time all the time contract no contract you have to constantly think about hasm it's not easy at first it's not easy but if you get yourself used to it it becomes your second nature so especially when there's transactions especially when there's a transaction a customer comes in or calls or something there a a deal that crosses your desk always ask before you sign on a DED lines before you press the the cash register what does God think of this not is he think is going to be a successful deal or or failure no I'm not talking about success or failure I'm talking about is this honest or not is this an honest deal or is it a sin am I looking for a leniency for this to be allowed and hoping That hasem Forgives me or kosher bat GL kosher is your money kosher or not did you overcharge the guy did you sneak away an extra 3 4 5 6 7 8 9% and the guy didn't notice that what it saying small print really matter and you know that the guy didn't look and he's going to pay for it a lot of people going are going into these uh short-term lending businesses right now they're destroying their n they're not only destroying other people they're destroying their own why it's predatory business you know that the guy when you're lending the guy money and the guy's going to pay 25 30% interest you know for sure he can't pay back all he can do is refinance it and refinance it and refinance it and refinance it and only if he wins Lottery is going to pay back that's predatory loans that's dishonest business it's unethical business and eventually those business will be shut down too so you have to ask yourself would God be proud of you for what transaction you're doing you're about to sell a drug the drug killed 900 people last week out of a thousand that took it but you make $10 a pill $10 a pill is 10 times more than what you make on every other pill but you know that 90% of the people are going to take it they're going to die you sell you don't sell now all of you are going to say no you don't sell why because you don't sell drugs because it's not a test for you but someone that's in that business is thinking listen you know how much $10 a pill is I usually only get $1 a pill it's a test for them it's a test for them you have to understand each one of us has our own test only way we can pass it we ask is AEM with me or not if he's with me does he agree if he agrees I'll sign on a DED line I'll sign whatever you want no questions asked I'm not I'm not worried at all not worried at all but if if hasem doesn't agree all I have is worry [Music]