In Bitchoni B’Tzuri, Rabbi Mordechai Malachi shares a personal story that took place this year:
At 2 a.m., Motzaei Sukkos, Rabbi Malachi was taking apart his sukkah when his phone rang. “Who’s calling at this hour?” he muttered, picking up the phone.
On the other end was shocking news. His nephew, Reb Yehuda Moore, a young husband and devoted yerei Shamayim, had just been hit by a car while responding to a Hatzalah call.
Panicked, Rabbi Malachi dropped what he was doing and began to say Tehillim with deep emotion. He barely rested that night, his heart heavy with worry.
By 4 a.m., word came that his nephew’s condition had stabilized. He finally allowed himself a few hours of sleep before facing the next day’s responsibilities. Meanwhile, messages and robo-calls went out across the community asking people to daven on Reb Yehuda’s behalf.
Five days later, Rabbi Malachi received a call—from none other than Reb Yehuda himself. In a weak but grateful voice, he asked his uncle to share his story in the upcoming issue of Bitchoni B’Tzuri.
And then, still recovering, Reb Yehuda added softly, “Please thank everyone who said Tehillim and got others to daven for me.”
Here’s the story Reb Yehuda told:
“My friend, also a member of Hatzalah, was actually in the middle of responding to the same call that I had been going to. But when he heard about my episode, he redirected and attended to me—the more serious incident. Later, he told me what had happened a week earlier.
“Yehuda,” he said, “I had a terrifying dream. I woke up shaking. In my dream, I was told that your life would be taken in a car accident. I’m not the type to take dreams seriously, but this one left me shaken. I spoke to my Rav, who advised me that if it concerns me too much that I do Hatovos Chalom when the Kohanim duchan on Shemini Atzeres. That gave me some comfort.”
Reb Yehuda continued, “Then I had another relative of mine who came to be with me Sunday morning. This friend of mine also isn’t one for dreams or signs, but he told me that he was finishing Meseches Taanis and was starting Meseches Pesachim as a zechus for me.
“Since when do you learn Mishnayos as a zechus for me?” I asked.
“Ever since Rosh Hashanah.”
“Why?” I asked him. He said that on Rosh Hashanah, he too had a dream about an accident that would involve me. “I told myself I wouldn’t let that dream affect me,” he said. “If Hashem sent it, it must mean I have the tools to overturn it. So, I took upon myself to learn two Mishnayos a day in your zechus.”
Reb Yehuda paused and added, “The story doesn’t end here.”
That Rosh Hashanah night, he recalled, returning home from davening in the Ponovezh Yeshivah, I had wished my ninety-year-old grandfather a L’shana Tovah. The elderly man remained silent.
Surprised, Reb Yehuda asked, “Zaidy, why don’t you give a brachah back?”
His grandfather finally spoke. “Sometimes,” he said slowly, “a decree is set on a person to leave this world. But through tefillah, tzedakah, and chessed, it’s possible to reverse the decree.”
That shook me to the core, and spurred me to daven and do chessed that much more.
A few weeks later, after the accident, Reb Yehuda mentioned the exchange—but his grandfather had no recollection of it at all (it was words that Hashem had put into his mouth without him being aware of them).
“Looking back now,” Reb Yehuda concluded, “I understand what was really happening. Hashem was gathering zechusim on my behalf—nudging people to daven, to learn, to do chessed—so that when the moment came, those zechusim would already be waiting in my account, ready for withdrawal.”
Rabbi Avraham finished his story with quiet awe. “Hashem, out of His great love to us, doesn’t just answer our tefillos after we daven,” he said softly. “Sometimes, He sets the tefillah in motion before we even know we need it.”
And perhaps that’s the deepest comfort — that long before we cry out, Hashem is already preparing the answer.
