What a YouTube Video Taught Me About Bitachon
Do you have a favorite video you like to re-watch every once in a while for a laugh or inspiration? There’s this one video I keep going back to whenever I need a little boost.
I’ve written emotional video scripts, and there is a formula to follow. The story needs suspense, high-quality footage, and dramatic background music that builds tension.
This video has none of that. They ruin all the suspense right in the title, “Na’ama Rachel Glassman’s Miracle Story”. We already know what’s going to happen. The video opens with Na’ama singing, clearly, she recovered from whatever issues she had faced.
Then the music starts and the story begins. Na’ama slipped and fell, causing a severe life-threatening head injury. She was airlifted for emergency surgery.
We then see footage of the air ambulance landing. But instead of professional stock footage with nurses and doctors running in dramatic slow motion, we have amateur cell phone footage with the following text clumsily scrolled on the screen:
“When Dr. Nachi Levine was asked why he was videoing the helicopter landing at Watercliff hospital, he answered, ‘So they can play the video at her seudas hoda’ah.’”
We read how the doctor informed Na’ama’s parents that there was a good chance she would not survive the surgery, and even if she did, she may never regain consciousness, and even if she did, she would most likely “not be the same Na’ama.”
Yet Dr. Levine, a medical doctor who understood that reality, also knew that Na’ama would be fine.
During my grandfather’s first yechidus, the Rebbe asked if he understood what emunah was. He answered, “belief, faith, trust.” The Rebbe then asked if he knew what bitachon was, and he answered no.
The Rebbe explained: People think that bitachon is a higher form of emunah, but it is not. Emunah is when one has belief, faith, trust that everything will be ok. Bitachon is when “you don’t countenance that G-d gives you problems, only challenges.”
Bitachon is not that you believe things can be ok, or that you hope things will be ok, bitachon means that when you see a baby girl flying into the hospital with bleeding on her brain, your only thought is making sure you capture footage for the inevitable seudas hoda’ah video!
I started writing this piece a few months ago after reading some of Sarah Dukes’ updates about her husband, Yudi. I was blown away. She exemplified this level of bitachon, and then some. Reading her words made me think of Na’ama Rachel’s video. I knew that Yudi would also recover.
It wasn’t just the bitachon, it was the tidal wave of good that Yudi and Sarah inspired across the world. In Na’ama Rachel’s video, we see people from across the spectrum of the Jewish community in every part of the globe uniting in doing mitzvos, davening, and saying Tehillim - so much Tehillim! And so it was for Yudi, we would read about the ladies who began lighting Shabbos candles, the countless people who started chavrusas on Jnet, and the davening and Tehillim - so much Tehillim!
G-d, in His infinite wisdom, threw problem after problem at Sarah. But she overcame each insurmountable challenge. Day after day, week after week, month after grueling month, she gave us a glimpse into how she met each new and daunting challenge.
Sarah brought Yudi back to life, again and again, and again. It was clear to us that it was her courage, bitachon, and support that brought Yudi off the ventilator, that enabled him to speak, to farbreng with us, and even sing!
It was Sarah’s tefillos that escorted Yudi home ever so briefly, and it was her supreme confidence that made us all believe Yudi would recover fully. We had seen so many miracles. Sarah had met every challenge with the grace and dignity of the most righteous of Jewish heroines.
There was no doubt G-d would heed her prayers.
Seeing the words Baruch Dayan Haemes next to Yudi’s name was surreal. It couldn’t be true. It can’t be true.
This is not how scripts are written. Where was the happy ending? Where was the picture of the joyous Dukes children welcoming their father home for good? How could G-d be so cruel?
I don’t have any answers. But judging by the past months, Sarah and her children will somehow, someway, find the strength and ability to overcome this unfathomable challenge.
When I sat down to write this last night, I hesitated to share it because I didn’t have an ending. “Really?” I thought to myself, “two pages about bitachon and it ends with “how can G-d be so cruel?” I should have known that once again, it would be Sarah who would provide the words and wisdom I lacked.
Dear G-d, enough with the challenges! Please give those who have shown such unfailing trust in You the comfort and solace they so surely deserve.
Please bring back Yudi’s ever-smiling face and reunite him with his adoring family, now!
P.S. If you can, please support the Dukes family https://www.charidy.com/dukes/97154
