(The following is from Powerful Moments by Rabbi Yitzchok Hisiger)
In the 1950s, R’ Avraham Chaim prepared to leave his Williamsburg home on Leil Shavuos to walk to shul to learn all night. Trailing him was his 8-year-old son.
“Can I come with you?” asked the boy, his cherubic face practically begging.
R’ Avraham Chaim knew that his son wouldn’t be able to make it through the night. It would be better for him to stay home. Perhaps next year, when he’d be a bit older, he could come along.
“I think you should stay home tonight,” said R’ Avraham Chaim. “Maybe next year.” Planting a kiss on his son’s head, R’ Avraham Chaim closed the door slowly and headed out into the dark streets of New York City.
As he walked, R’ Avraham Chaim was bothered. Why had he refused his son? The young boy wanted so strongly to stay up so that he could learn Torah. Even if he would learn for only a few minutes, what was wrong with that? Why deny him that opportunity?
Though he had reached the beis hamedrash, R’ Avraham Chaim made an about-face and headed right back home.
As he opened the door to his house, he was surprised to encounter his young son standing there, dressed in his suit, all ready to leave.
“How did you know I was coming back?” asked R’ Avraham Chaim.
“I davened to Hashem,” the boy said simply. “I knew you would come back.”
Hand in hand, father and son departed, heading out for a night of Torah learning. That little boy’s name was Shimshon. Years later, he became known as Rav Shimshon Pincus, rav of Ofakim, whose tzidkus and hashpaah have impacted Jews across the world.
Rav Pincus, even at that tender age, knew — and believed in — the power of tefillah.
Rav Moshe Tuvia Lieff, rav of Agudas Yisrael Bais Binyomin in Flatbush, who told me this story, added an insight from Rav Eliyahu (Reb Elyah) Lopian.
The Gemara in Maseches Rosh Hashanah states that there were two people who were struck with an identical illness. One patient recovered, while the other did not. Why, asks the Gemara, was one spared while the other wasn’t? The reason, the Gemara says, was because one of them prayed and was answered and the other prayed and was not answered.
And why was one answered and one wasn’t? Because this one davened a tefillah sheleimah, a complete prayer, while the other did not daven a tefillah sheleimah. Rashi explains that davening a “tefillah sheleimah” means “niskavein,” that the person concentrated properly.
How are we to understand this Gemara? Both people were struck with serious illness. They both begged for mercy. They both davened to Hashem to heal them. Is it logical that one of them did not concentrate? His very life was hanging in the balance. How can it be that he didn’t have kavanah?
Rav Lopian explains that what the Gemara means is that one individual truly believed that his tefillah would be answered, while the other did not. It was the zechus and power of believing, in his heart of hearts, that his prayer would be effective that spared the first person. The other’s cries were tears of futility because he did not genuinely believe in the power of his prayer.
Use the power of prayer and believe in it. It could be the secret to your yeshuah.
