With me to support me, and in that zechus my tefillah would be accepted. I came to Meron and started to daven with all seriousness, doing all the necessary actions, but my heart did not open up. The davening was dry, as though closed up under lock and key. The words emerged from my mouth, but the tears did not come, although they were very necessary, considering my situation. I was left with the feeling that this was “not it.” After three hours, I got back on the bus to Yerushalayim feeling the bitter taste of a missed opportunity. I felt that my tefillah, dry as a juniper tree, had not been accepted.
On the bus going up to Yerushalayim, a Yid from Monsey settled into the seat next to mine. A pleasant conversation ensued between us, and he started stringing together stories of tzaddikim and hashgachah pratis. Among other things, he described an incredible series of occurrences. He related:
My neighbor had three children at home in need of shidduchim. The oldest was 26, the next one was 25, and then there was a 24-year-old daughter. They were all great – excellent bachurim and a wonderful daughter, but no shidduchim in sight.
One day I asked him, “Do you say Tehillim as a zechus for your son to get engaged?”
“I daven for him a ton,” he said, “but not specifically Tehillim.”
“Say Tehillim for him,” I proposed. “One perek every day.”
He took my idea seriously and started saying a perek of Tehillim every day as a merit for his oldest son. Two weeks passed and I got a call from him: “My son got engaged!”
I came to the engagement and wished him mazal tov. He poured tremendous brachos on my head, filled with emotion and joy. “What an amazing piece of advice you gave me! Amazing! From now on I’m going to say two perakim of Tehillim every day as a zechus for my second son to find his zivug.”
He kept his word. Two weeks later he called once again, happy and excited. “My second son just got engaged!” Once again we met and shook hands warmly. Once again he bentched me with all the brachos one could find in the Torah, thanking me again for my good advice, and he said, “From now on I’m going to say three perakim of Tehillim every day as a zechus for my daughter to find her proper zivug.”
Two weeks passed, and the story repeated itself a third time: His daughter was engaged. Mazal tov!
I parted from the Yid from Monsey, got off the bus, and suddenly my eyes lit up, the fog covering my brain became clear in an instant, and I said to myself, It’s not possible that the tefillah in Meron didn’t accomplish anything. It’s simply that my travel companion was a messenger of Rabi Shimon to arouse me to the importance of reciting Tehillim!
I took upon myself to say one perek of Tehillim every day for my personal yeshuah.
I started perek aleph on Sunday, beis on Monday, and so on. And my yeshuah came quickly. Three weeks later, the matter that had disturbed me so much was resolved, I emerged from darkness to great light.
