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Rabbi Yehuda {Leonard} Blank MS, BCC
Vice President of Professional Development and External Affairs
Chair of the Chaplaincy Commission
Rabbinical Alliance of America/Igud HaRabbonim
917-446-2126  rablenblank@gmail.com
***June 19, 2025, 23 Sivan 5785***

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PLEASE BE MISPALLEL FOR MY DEAR CHASHUVA MECHUTAN
NASSON BAUMANN FOR A REFUAH SHELEIMA
Nasson ben Raitz
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Everything we do as we go about our daily lives
can turn into a game changer for someone else.

One never knows how an indirect influence can have a positive influence
and change the lives of others.

The ability of bringing change and even simchos
in the lives of others with self control.
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From:  Zera Shimshon, Volume 2 

Beha’aloscha Pages 403- 405.by Rabbi Nachman Seltzer. Artscroll, Mesorah Publications Ltd.
Every action can be the catalyst for incredible inspiration for others.
Every smile can light up someone’s life, and every thoughtful action can make another person rejoice and literally alter the course of his existence.
I want to give you an example of what I mean.
I am a rav who has worked in the kiruv profession for many years. I’ve met with countless baalei teshuvah, heard their stories, provided counsel and succor, and general guidance. And although I have heard so many stories over the years, I still don’t tire of hearing of the myriad ways that H uses to draw His children closer to Him.
A while back a girl came to us for Shabbos, and I found her story fascinating. It wasn’t overly complicated, but I considered it an authentic message for what every Jew could do, because you never know who’s watching.
“So what led you in this direction?” I asked her. “Do you have anyone in your family with even a small connection to Yiddishkeit?”
“Not at all. Much the opposite. I grew up in a situation that was about as far away from Judaism as a person could get. My parents  had not the slightest interest in religion  of any kind, and in truth there was no reason for them to be interested since they weren’t Jewish.
“But in high school I had a teacher who decided for some strange reason to introduce my class to a different religion every week. One week she brought in literature and a film about Islam, the next week she introduced us to some other religion from the Far East, maybe Hinduism, or something like that. Quite honestly, nothing I heard made any difference to me at all. I was blissfully happy in my ignorance.
“And then one day she brought in some information about the Jewish religion. She showed us a clip. A little video of these men with funny hats and long side-curls. The men were standing in front of a wall-a wall she called the ‘Western Wall’- and they were praying like that, with such enthusiasm, to the point that it appeared that they were dancing. I couldn’t help it. I was intrigued.
“That day my father asked me how school was coming along and whether I had been connecting to any of the religions that my teach told me about.”
“’Not until today,’I said.
“What happened today?’
“I don’t know. She showed us this video about these Jewish people called Hassidim from Jerusalem, and she showed them praying at this holy wall and to me it looked like they were dancing.’
“And you connected with this?”
“I nodded.’ I think so. I don’t know what it is, but felt something for the first time. You know me…I never feel anything about religion, but watching that  film caused a reaction.’
“then my dad looked at mom.
“What?’ she said.
“You know what.’
“She sighed. ‘ I wasn’t planning on telling you,’ she finally blurted out, ‘but while your father is not Jewish, I was born a Jew. And even though I have not raised you with even the remotest connection to my faith, clearly there is something going on here, because this is the first time you’ve reacted this way to anything related to religion.’”
“So basically you were drawn to Yiddishkeit,” I interjected, “because you saw a bunch of chassidim swaying and shuckling while they davened at the Kosel.”
“Pretty much.”
“That is amazing!
I knew that I would remember her story for a long time to come.
Not long afterward I went away with my family at a vacation village a couple hours drive from the house. Many of the people staying in the village were chassidish and, being litvish, I clearly stood out. Before davening with our minyan, I was asked to give a dvar Torah. I told my audience about the girl who had come to us for Shabbos and how seeing a clip of chassidim davening at the Kosel had completely changed her life.
“There is a very clear message here,” I told the assembled. “We never know what we are accomplishing or who we are influencing at any given time, Those chassidim davening at the Kosel never dreamed that someone who was videoing them and that the clip would be shown to a class of English kids in some random high-school. And they certainly didn’t dream that among all those non-Jews would be one Jewish girl whose entire life would be changed because she saw them daven.
“Imagine what will happen when the people in the video arrive in Shamayim at the end of their lives and discover that it was their davening that inspired a young girl to become a religious Jew. This is a lesson for all of us. Every move we make can be a possible game changer for someone else. And that is something to never forget!”
After davening, one of the chassidim approached me.
“I go to the Kosel a lot,” he said.
“That’s nice.”
“Anyway, I remember how I was at the Kosel not so long ago, and there were these people with video cameras and they were filming the people davening.”
A pause.
“Do you think that maybe she saw a video of me?”
I smiled at him.
“I don’t know. There are a lot of people who take videos of people davening at the Kosel. But it’s definitely possible! The potential of unlimited opportunity is with us at every moment of everyday. Try to imagine that you were being watched and that you did something that inspired someone else just by the way that you are !” 

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The ability of bringing change and even simchos
in the lives of others with self control

From: 102 Stories that changed people’s lives.
“Three Precious Jewels”

By Rabbi Tzvi Nakar, Tfutza Publications. By Rabbi Tzvi Nakar, Pages 111-114. “It often happens that a daughter-in-law and mother-in-law don’t along. Even when they do, it would be unusual, to say the least, for the daughter-in-law to be comfortable enough to enter her mother-in-law’s house, clean it, and throw things our that she thinks her mother-in-law doesn’t need, without even consulting her.
But the mother-in-law and daughter-in-law this story revolves around got along unusually well. They had such a good relationship that a couple of weeks before Pesach the mother-in-law invited her daughter-in-law over to help her with the Pesach cleaning.
-and things I’m not using. I rely on you judgment one hundred percent.”
The mother-in-law went out to run errands, and the daughter-in-law tackeled the job with gusto. At some point, she decided to work on her mother-in-law’s bedroom closet. She spied some old clothing on one of the shelves. Shmattes. Antiques that had gone out of fashion fifty years before.
I’ve never seen my mother-in-law wear any of these, the daughter-in-law thoughts. They’re just taking up space in the closet. I think it’s time to get rid of them.
She grabbed the old clothing, added them to the almost-full garbage bag, and took it down to the dumpster in front of her mother-in-law’s building.
A few hours later her mother-in-law returned. She looked around the apartment appreciatively, happy to see the progress that had been made. She went into the bedroom and opened the drawers and closet to see her daughter-in-law’s handiwork. She scanned the neatly folded clothing with gratification, but something niggled at her. After a brief perusal of the shelves, she realized that three outfits were gone. Her heart clenched with trepidation. Inside those three old outfits she had been storing her three most valuable pieces of jewelry. No one would ever think to look for diamonds in a pile of shmattes long out of fashion.
She dashed down to the dumpster to see if she could find the bag of old clothing-and the jewelry hidden inside.
But the city council of Bnei Brak had stepped up its garbage-collecting efforts in view of the upcoming Yom Tov. By the time she had discovered the missing articles of clothing and gone down to look for them, the dumpsters had been emptied.
Dejected, she climbed the stairs back to her apartment, and with each step she took, her anger grew. Who throws out clothing without checking the pockets first? I’m going to have a serious talk with my daughter-in-law and explain that even if I gave her permission to throw things out, she should have looked through the pockets. Her haste has caused me a lot of damage.
Luckily, she had several stories to climb before she reached her door. It gave her time to think and calm down. A few minutes before she opened the door, she said to herself, One second, One second! Yelling at my daughter-in-law won’t bring back my jewelry back. If I scold her now, when I’m furious, I’ll only cause a fight, and she won’t ever want to step into my house again. Then I’ll be left without the jewelry and without a daughter-in-law.
I won’t say anything, she decided. I won’t say a word about it. Maybe in a few weeks, once I’ve clamed down, I’ll tell her that, by the way, when throwing out old clothes, it’s worth searching through the pockets because people always forget to empty them.
Before she entered the house, she sent up a short tefillah to Heaven: “Ribono shel Olam, You know how precious that jewelry was to me. You know how a woman feels about her jewelry. And yet I’ve decided to restrain myself and not say anything about it to my daughter-in-law. Ribono shel Olam, I still have three precious jewels at home, three adult children, two boys and a daughter, who haven’t yet merited finding their match. I beg of You, in the merit of my self-control regarding my three pieces of lost jewelry, please send me three reasons to rejoice very soon!”
She concluded her short prayer in seconds, put a calm expression on her face, and entered the house as if nothing had happened. When her daughter-in-law finished the cleaning, the mother-in-law thanked her for her help and they parted on good terms.
On Chol Hamoed Pesach, the phone rang. It was a shadchan calling to suggest a shidduch for the mother-in-law’s eldest son. It sounded intriguing.
They started looking into it and heard good things. A date was arranged. A few hours later, the phone rang again. It was another shadchan calling to suggest a shidduch, this time for her daughter. It sounded like it might be a good fit, and after a few inquiries, they agreed to a meeting and a date was arranged.
It wasn’t long before the phone rang again, someone suggested a shidduch for the other son. They checked out the suggestion, heard good things, and a arranged a date.
And so, three of her children ended up going out on dates all at the same time.
The shidduchim progressed quickly, and their mother dared allow herself to hope. In the meantime, her husband said,” I daven every day that our three precious jewels should find their match. I always thought they would get married one at a time, but it seems that everything’s going to happen all at once.
“Listen,” she responded, “I think I’m the one responsible for this. But I can’t explain right now.”
Not long after Pesach, all three of their children got engaged. The vorts were celebrated one day after the next. Since it’s impossible to dance at three chasunahs at once, the weddings took place one at a time, one month after the next over the course of three consecutive months.
After the third wedding took place, the mother realized: “For my first child to get married, I said the entire sefer of Tehillim every day for forty days. For my daughter, I said Perek Shirah for forty days, and for the third child, I said Nishmas everyday for forty days. But Hakadosh Baruch Hu showed me that with a short prayer that took all of a few seconds, one can merit marrying off three children. In the merit of one second of taking control of one’s emotions, can merit breaking three plates.”

“The Secret To A Good Life.”
“The level of happiness in a person’s life
depends on the quality of his thoughts.”

I would like to share with you a chaplain story. The self-control of the chaplain, his patience and fortitude with empathy and kindness brought calm to a patient with a big smile on the patient’s face. The chaplain was forewarned about this patient who is a very angry person letting out his feelings to others with all kinds of threating words and body movements. Whoever this chaplain spoke to discouraged him from wanting to try his best. Yet, he decided to go for it. He read the patient’s chart to learn what his diagnosis was and any pertinent information that would give him an idea where these outbursts came from. The chaplain knocked on the patient’s door and asked if he could come in. The patient already began yelling at him and said he should enter at his own risk. The chaplain entered, looked around the room  to see if there were any items that might reflect on the patient’s attitude. The patient was yelling at the chaplain with all kinds of foul language that sure sounded threatening. The patient kept raising his voice, showing his fists and continued with his epitaphs. The chaplain calmly asked the patient if he would mind if he sat down. The patient asked the chaplain why he wasn’t afraid of him and how can he be so calm. The patient was not of the Jewish faith. In fact he was Christian. With that there were more derogatory words from the patient about the chaplain not believing in his religion . Yet not once did the patient try to hurt the chaplain or throw him out of the room. The patient wanted to know why the chaplain was willing to take all that abuse and not be angry or run out of the room. He even made mention how much shorter the chaplain was compared to the patient and yet the chaplain was not intimidated or showing any signs of fear. The patient wanted to know why the chaplain was still in his room and the chaplain’s response purely that he cares and wants to hear from the patient why he was so angry and so angry at G. The patient responded that He was not helping him through his medical and emotional crises. The patient mentioned how brave the chaplain was that he was willing to stay and speak calm and gentle words. He started to cry and asked the chaplain for forgiveness. He gave the chaplain a tight hug that seemed like it would last forever. He shared his tremendous fear of his medical condition; how fearful he was of dying and that no one would ever come to his funeral or remember him. He didn’t even know if he would be able to go to heaven because of the sins he might have done throughout the years. He felt that he was a nobody with no one caring about him until this chaplain came to stay and be with him without any fear or being intimidated by him. The chaplain was able to bring a smile to his face, maybe the first smile in a long time. The chaplain discussed the patient with the medical team especially the social worker whose expertise would be of tremendous value with many of his non-medical concerns. The patient asked if the chaplain has any connection to G . He was honest and shared that both of us have a connection to G though the chaplain has a unique connection. The chaplain said a spontaneous prayer as well as selections from the Psalms.  He requested holding hands while they prayed. Before the chaplain left the patient thanked him and requested him to return or at least to request he send another chaplain and would welcome his presence. This chaplain requested a chaplain of the patient’s faith.

I shared this story to show how important it is to be a caring person and how much we are capable of bringing comfort and a smile to others, making a Kiddush H as well.

Sincerely, Rabbi Yehuda Blank