There Is Always a Purpose

Living Emunah By Rabbi David Ashear

Living Emunah 2685 There Is Always a Purpose Nobody wants to feel that they are toiling in vain. We want to feel accomplished and want to know that there's purpose in everything we experience. People have certain conditions that they feel are causing a big strain on their lives. They feel they could be doing so many more productive things if they didn't have this condition. Learning emunah is crucial because it teaches us that there is purpose in everything we experience. It's not just purpose; it is the best possible situation to be in and is accomplishing more than anything else we feel we could be accomplishing. Only Hashem knows what we need to accomplish in this world to be successful, and it is He who gives us the exact circumstances that we need to be in to fulfill our mission. Some circumstances may last for a month or a year or even longer. It all depends on our mission. If we can internalize the fact that there is purpose for the circumstance or situation and also internalize that serving Hashem under those conditions is the best possible thing for us, then we'll be able to do it with joy rather than stress. A woman told her rabbi that she is suffering because she takes to heart her friends' and relatives' issues as if they are her own. Someone she's very close to is going through such a difficult time and it is paining her to no end. She has tried to go to therapists to see how she can prevent herself from letting other people's problems affect her so much, but nobody has been able to help her. She has a hard time wanting to get up each morning because of all the stress she's feeling. The rabbi told her the pasuk says Moshe Rabbenu became great because he felt the pain of his brothers who were in slavery in Mitzrayim. Moshe Rabbeinu could have just taken it easy in the palace, but instead he chose to empathize with his brothers and became completely distressed over their pain to the point that he used to cry watching them and would go over to each person and tell him, "I wish I could die for you." Hakadosh Baruch Hu saw this and said, "Moshe turned away from his comforts to be in distress with his people. I am going to leave my comforts and appear to him from a thornbush." There he told Moshe that he was choosing him to become the leader to take the Jews out of Mitzrayim. It was this quality of feeling the pain of others that merited Moshe to become the Rabban Shel Kol Yisrael . The rabbi then told the woman that although she looks at this quality as something negative, Hashem views it as a great mitzva. Furthermore, the Sefarim HaKedoshim teach us that when a person is נושא בעול עם חבירו , feeling the pain of others, it actually alleviates some of the pain that the person is experiencing. So this woman's pain is not only considered a mitzva, it is also helping the one she's pained over. Moreover, we know that everybody experiences yisurim in this world. If she is feeling pain over other people's problems, then she is getting her yisurim that way, which means the difficulties that she needs to go through will not have to come in her own life because she's already experiencing them in other people's lives. These are just some of the benefits she's gaining by having these feelings for others. By learning emunah, she didn't need to fight her circumstances but rather accept them with love. Of course, we are always encouraged to make any hishtadlut that we feel would improve the quality of our lives, but we don't have to feel that what we are experiencing is ever in vain. There is always a purpose, and it's always for our benefit.