Tuesday, September 27, 2016

The Hour of Fortune

This is a story about a king and his faithful servant called Yisroel. The King had many servants in the royal palace.........Of all the servants in the royal palace, the king favored Yisroel.....

....There was something in the way he served his Majesty the King. He did all in his power to please the king and to bring him delight and contentment. No wonder why the king favored him more than all the other servants in the royal palace....

 The king wished to promote Yisroel but to do so he had to pass a test.

....King: "Now, in appreciation for the many years of your faithful service, I am going to let you go into my room of treasures and permit you to take for yourself anything you wish." 

The king's favored servant, Yisroel, had but one hour 
in the room to gather treasures

......he passed through the two golden gates and headed for a large heap of sparkling diamonds piled up on the floor of the room.

......He reached out with both hands and was just about ready to dig his fingers in the pile of diamonds when all of a sudden something very strange happened, something very strange indeed.

For some mysterious reason, he remained standing completely motionless. He just stood there, gazing at the sparkling diamonds, without making any move at all.......

Why? 

The king knew that Yisroel loved to listen to music. He enjoyed music more than anything else. So the king appointed one of the finest musicians to come along with him into the room of treasures and ordered him to play the finest pieces of music for one full hour. And this was the test. The king wanted to see what choice Yisroel would make. Would he spend every precious moment gathering up the royal treasures for himself? Or would he waste these precious moments just listening to music?

....Yisroel thought to himeslef, "Oh what lovely music. I must listen to this. I will spend just a few minutes listening to such fine music. And for the rest of the hour, I will gather these treasures for myself".....

Well, it just didn't happen that way, for just as a few minutes passed and the violinist noticed the Yisroel heading for the pile of diamonds, he began to play another piece of music. It was even more enchanting and finer than the music he played before....

Again and again this repeated itself until the hour was up.

Yisroel sadly bowed his head before the king.......and left the royal room of treasures empty-handed.

Well (dear readers), I would like you to know that there is something special about this story. That is, this is not just another story that happened a long, long, time ago. In fact, it's happening right now, and you are in the story!

For the king is this story is HaShem, the King of all kings, the Creator of the heavens and earth. And the servant in this story, why that's you! And the royal room of treasures, that is right here on the lovely world we live in. You see, HaShem places us on this world to live for a certain amount of time, and during this time we have to gather all of the wonderful treasures that He placed here.

.......So, let us remember this story, and whenever the Yetzer Hara tries to keep us from doing anything that's good, or tempts us to do anything wrong, let's not pay any attention to him at all. Instead, let's learn more and more Torah, and do as many mitzvos as we possibly can. And for this, HaShem will surely bless us all with a long life in good health and true happiness for all of us to enjoy, both on this world and in the world to come.

A gut gebentsht yohr,” 
“A good and blessed year” 

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