One Zchus

Sweetest friends!!

I am soooo far from what a Jew is supposed to be it is PAINFUL. Really. When you understand what is expected of a person in this world, when you know people who REALLY daven and REALLY learn and REALLY do chesed with a pure heart with no ulterior motives, it makes one realize his inadequacies and boy-oh-boy, I am riddled with them. It doesn't get me depressed. Depression is the number-one-super-duper-lethal-weapon of the forces of evil in this world. But it does hurt and the feeling doesn't allow my soul [and body for that matter] to rest easy.

However, there is ONE zchus I have. I can't deny it because doing so would be false humility. May I share? THANX!:-)

I live in Yerushalyim Ir Hakodesh. That is a TREMENDOUS zchus. Every mitzva I do, every daf gemara I learn, every tefilla I say, is worth more here in Yerushalyim than the same act done anywhere else in the world. Every second I am here besides the mitzva of living in Israel I also fulfill the mitzva of living in Yerushalayim. [See hakdama to the sefer Shiras Yitzchak for sources].

Have you ever had a tyve. You MAMESH want something. You are obsessed. You can't get it out of your mind. Let's take an example: An ice cream cone. It is a hot day and you walk by that store and you NEED the Vanilla Fudge [with sprinkles]. It consumes you until you consume it....

LI-HAVDIL A MILLION HAVDALOS it says כי איוה למושב לו  Hashem has tyve [כביכול] to dwell  Yerushalyim. That means that He is strongly connected to the place. If you are there it means that you have more of an opportunity to connect to the ONLY thing that is real. Everything else is הבל הבלים.

So beloved friends - even if you can't make it in person, the Baal Shem Tov teaches that you are where your heart is, so direct your hearts to Yerushalayim.

And if you can - come. Breathe the holy air. Visit Hashem in His home.

ברוך השם מציון שוכן ירושלים  -  Indeed Hashem dwells in Yerushalayim and after 2000 years you too have the opportunity to dwell here with all of the religious and personal freedoms and in addition with all of the earthly physical comforts you might be used to.

Yom Yerushalayim, when we commemorate the amazing miracles we experienced in 1967 and the recapturing of Yerushalayim is a VERY happy day.

שישו את ירושלים גילו בה כל אוהביה!!