One Motza’ei Shabbos after Maariv in Eretz Yisroel, the people gathered outside the Shul to say Kiddush Levanah, but the moon was covered by clouds. As the Baba Sali was also standing there, everyone turned to see what he would do. The Baba Sali raised his cane and pointed it to the right, and called on the clouds to move to the right. He then did the same thing to the left. And suddenly, the moon became visible between the clouds!
Later, when the Baba Sali was asked if he was able to control the moon, the Baba Sali replied that what had happened was the result of something that had occurred years earlier when the Baba Sali lived in Lyon, France.
One month, the sky was completely overcast, and on the last night to say Kiddush Levanah, the people informed the Baba Sali that if he wanted to say it, he would have to travel to Marseilles, which was a distance of 230 miles away!
The Baba Sali did exactly that, and rather than giving up on the once-a -month chance to say the Brachah on the new moon, just as one who had no choice, he travelled the distance so he could do the Mitzvah.
The Baba Sali explained that when one is Moser Nefesh for a Mitzvah with self-sacrifice, he receives some type of small control over what is involved with that Mitzvah. He said that it was because of that Mesirus Nefesh years earlier that he was able to direct the clouds away from the moon!
Reprinted from the Parshas Chukas 5784 email of Rabbi Yehuda Winzelberg’s Torah U’Tefillah.
