His Eternal Love

Living Emunah By Rabbi David Ashear

With the resha'im in Iran, firing over 300 missiles capable of causing complete annihilation, we are reminded of the words in the Haggadah, בכל דור ודור עומדים עלינו לכלותינו - in every generation they rise up against us to destroy us. And how fortunate we are to see the conclusion of that statement with our own eyes. והקב"ה מצילנו מידם - and Hashem saves us from their hands. Sometimes Hashem saves us with open miracles like in Yetziat Mitzrayim. And sometimes He saves us from behind the scenes like in the story of Purim. Giving us the capabilities to create machinery that can shoot down ballistic missiles and cruise missiles and giving us additional countries using their capabilities, is Hashem saving us from behind the scenes. But it's not really so hidden. To have that kind of threat with zero damage is HaKadosh Baruch Hu shooting down every missile out of His eternal love for us. In the Haggadah of Rabbi Eliezer Ashkenazi, he points out the fact that the Haggadah emphasizes Hashem saving us from our enemies, rather than Hashem wiping out our enemies. The reason, he says, is because if Hashem would just wipe out our enemies, we wouldn't necessarily see His love for us, because perhaps our enemies deserve destruction. But when Hashem comes just to protect us, that shows His complete love. It's only for us. Like when He told Avraham Avinu, אנכי מגן לך - I am your protector. And this is only what we see openly. We have no idea how much Hashem is protecting us from the billions of enemies that we have who are constantly plotting to harm us. We say לעושה נפלאות גדולות לבדו כי לעולם חסדו . We thank Hashem for the great wonders that He does for us that only He knows about. When Yitro came to visit us after Yetziat Mitzrayim , he told us more of the danger that we were in than we even knew, because he was in the government in Mitzrayim . If we would know about the miracles that Hashem is constantly doing for us, we wouldn't stop thanking Him. Regarding the Asher Yatzar , Rabbi Menashe Reizman pointed out, it says גלוי וידוע לפני כסא כבודיך - only Hashem knows how many miracles He's performing with our bodies constantly. If our bodies would be transparent and we would see the open nisim that are happening every second, we would be so appreciative. It says, הללו את ה' כל גוים - the nations of the world are going to give Hashem the greatest praises of all because only they know how much Hashem protects us. Only they see how many times their plots get foiled back in their faces. After Hashem showed us His love by protecting us, we hope now that He will avenge our enemies and bring the Geula . In the Haggadah we say, Dayenu , which many Mefarshim explain means, if Hashem would have just done one of the chasadim that He did for us during Yetziat Mitzrayim , it would have been enough of a reason to thank Him. How much more so that He did chesed after chesed after chesed . We say there, אילו הוציאנו ממצרים ולא עשה בהם שפטים - even if Hashem would have just taken us out of Mitzrayim without inflicting punishments upon the Egyptians, it would have been more than enough to thank Him. Hashem could have made Pharaoh not be able to sleep one night like Achashverosh and asked for His book of Chronicles to be read. And it would have said that Yosef HaTzaddik saved his country and he never paid him back. And then, with that, he could have released the Jewish people. But instead, Hashem allowed us to see revenge against the people that tortured us. And that was an additional level of love that Hashem did not have to do. We need to appreciate so much that we have Hashem on our side. And now, more than ever, we need to storm the Shamayim with our tefilot and good deeds to merit the Geula Shelema b’karov . Amen.