Zvi Yehezkeli's Personal Column: Blessed is He Who Performed a Miracle for Me

In recent days, I completed a two-year project involving filming a series abroad, investigations, intelligence information, and assumed identities – it was a real spy movie. Seemingly, it was an imaginary project from the outset, truly a wild imagination.

Two years ago in Uman, I met a friend who is also a television director. I asked him how he sees the new year. He said he prays to leave the film and television industry and enter a world of holiness, of study, and to continue the process of repentance he began some years ago. Then, I suggested he embark on that imaginary and impossible journey. Completely opposite of what he requested, but with the feeling that this is what the heavens desire. A person thinks one thing, is sure of it, and prays for it, and the opposite happens. Why? Because he made space and said: Hashem, I think this way and I believe it should happen thus, but truly, You are the king, and I want to be more attentive to hear what You think. Then that miracle happens, you see something else happening before your eyes just because you stepped back a little and allowed the One who runs the world to speak his words.

We embarked on this journey between countries and continents, each time with desire but without clear knowledge of how we would do it. Not because we had such a level of faith but simply because we didn’t know. I only knew the direction, but without understanding how it could be done. How to handle a journalistic subject that no one else was tackling.

Last week, the project ended, and for both of us, it felt like a miracle. A series of films produced and directed by Hashem. We stepped aside so things could happen. What a delicate and uncontrollable dance. At the moment when, out of necessity, we transferred authority to the Creator of the World, things began to happen. A thin line that if I could tell you exactly where it crosses, we would have the perfect recipe for dividing authority between man and heaven. Between effort and supervision. Between my actions and His deeds.

Tips for the Journey

Where is it written? How do we know? If it was written, it wouldn’t be real. It’s an internal point where a person knows within themselves when they are forceful and when not. When they truly allow and when they push.

What is that thin line? How will we at least know how to approach it? When does toil end and when does Hashem enter the picture? Why does it always appear when there is helplessness? So, here are some hints I discovered, and they are not a formula but certainly stages along the way.

It begins with desire. Do you really want it? Maybe you want other things and not truly this? Hashem wants to see how much I want.

Then you can ask if you know how things are going to happen. On one hand, you know the sequence of actions. On the other hand, you know nothing. Hashem, I think I need such and such, but I am wide-eyed to see how you want it to happen.

You can also start with not knowing. Hashem, I really want to... (everyone can fill it in) and I have no clue how to do it. Please show me. Please take me there, to my dream, my desire, my aspirations.

It is good to develop the ability to wait. To do without really doing. To study without really studying. To be here in the world but to be with Him there to be here. Does that make enough sense? Not really for me either, but that’s the direction.

A Kingdom Without Anything

Rabbi Nachman teaches that a person must always ask where? Where is Hashem? Let’s call Him where we are. If we thought that here He is, then likely we need to ask again where He is, so He’ll get a new place and once again we’ll need to make space for Him over and over... This is the dance of life.

The question always arises, so what to do... study all day without working? Work all day without studying? If only there were a proven formula; it very much depends on how you dance it. Every Jew has sovereignty. We were given authority. Each one according to their assessment, children, family, other points of influence and leadership. That means we are desired to be something. And on the other hand, we are desired not to consider our leadership as if it is that which performed the act. Very thin.

There is a moment when we stand before despair, tried everything and didn’t succeed. Usually, then we let Hashem into the picture. It’s a bit late to start dancing alone and then invite Him. It can be done at the beginning.

Driver's Words: Thank You

So, between despair, not knowing, and fear, with belief that all this doesn’t happen to make us fail, we passed two years. In the end, it happened, just like a miracle. Thus, dozens of actions in our lives can be accomplished. Meanwhile, with faith, every step is on the way to that dream, only asked not to disturb with lack of faith and lack of desire.

On the last day before presenting the project to hundreds of people, I drove and... boom, a motorcycle policeman instructing me to pull over. Oh, what is this delay? Well, just let it be over quickly. But the officer wasn’t in a hurry. Writing the ticket for two minutes, and I asked Hashem what now. Apparently, this was another test of how much I believe and want and let Hashem manage things. What does Hashem want from me now?

I understood. The policeman knocks on the window. Take the ticket. Then, after a complete decision to let go of my traits, I tell him "Thank you, brother." What did you say? Thank you? Why? "Because I am on my way to the series conclusion ceremony that Hashem produced for me, and I am full of thanks to Him, so will one traffic report change everything? No. Thank you!".

The officer, a bit astonished, writes - Driver's words: Thank you. I smiled. He probably thought I was delusional. I looked at the ticket like a child getting a hundred percent score. Thank you.

Published in the bulletin "Karov Elecha"