How TeShuva Begins (Bitachon #4)

1:45Can't tell the difference. Hashem gets embarrassed with this because, look, this is my daughter. This is my daughter. So, a woman who is not modest already has a very, very big disconnect. Why? Because she's not valuing the gift that Hashem gave her. The second thing is she causes his other children to sin. Now, there's a very important halacha when it comes to a yeshiva, and... They came to Rav Steinman, alav ha-shalom, and they told him, Kvodo HaRav, there's a boy in the yeshiva that's causing, you know, he's really not from the right family. We really want to take him out of this yeshiva. He says don't take him out of the yeshiva. No, nobody. He's not this; he's not that; he's not learning. He's slow. He's this; he's that. The Rav says don't take him out of the yeshiva. Yeah, but you have to understand, he's this and he's that, like they're fighting against this kid, this little 13-year-old kid. It’s like a whole coalition was formed against this little kid. He says, listen, is he hurting other kids spiritually? Is he telling other kids that...

2:54To get off the day, I said no, that he's not doing. He says they're not allowed to take him out of yeshiva. If he's hurting other kids, then yes, but everything else, he's slow. He's from this family, from that family. He doesn't know; he knows all that stuff. You're not to kick him out of yeshiva because he's not endangering anybody else. So, when a woman is immodest, she's endangering Hashem's other children, and... When she's endangering Hashem's other children, that puts a very, very big gap between her and HaKadosh Baruch Hu. Why? Because Hashem says, "You are putting the rest of My kids in danger. I can't really listen to your prayers. I can't really give you special privileges. Why? Because you're causing harm to everybody else." It's not that you're sinning by yourself. Same thing goes for a man. A man that wants Hashem to listen to his prayers cannot make these major sins that cause a chilul Hashem. He cannot be one of those people that goes against rabbis publicly, goes against the Torah publicly, acts arrogantly, steals, you know, things of that nature. But also, a person needs to know that they have to keep the basics. It starts with Shabbat. There's no Judaism without Shabbat. There's simply no Judaism without Shabbat, from the beginning of the Torah all the way to the end.

4:14A person needs to keep Shabbat like the halacha, with no excuses, no nothing, and you’re only going to start feeling the enjoyment of Shabbat once you keep Shabbat like it's supposed to be kept. A lot of people say, “Listen, I keep Shabbat, but I hate it.” Why? Why do you hate it? Why do you hate Shabbat? No, I don’t know. It’s this, it’s that, it's the... and little by little, you start finding out he’s not even keeping Shabbat. because he doesn't know how to keep Shabbat. He doesn't know all the halachot. So he's doing things that are actually violating Shabbat, but he doesn't know because he doesn't learn the halachot of Shabbat. So he's violating Shabbat, so his neshama doesn't even get to enjoy it. Why? Because he's sinning, but he thinks he keeps it or she thinks she keeps it. So the reality is, Rabotai, is that when you keep Shabbat like you're supposed to and... But it's a pleasure of all pleasures. It's a small piece of the feeling I'm talking about. If you're not feeling that piece, there's something wrong with your Shabbat. So now, if a person wants to feel all of this joy in this world and live a life where they have literally no worry whatsoever, then...

5:31They first and foremost need to start taking on mitzvot more seriously. They can't just think that if they meditate a certain way, or if they put a red string around their arm, or if they read, I don't know, certain books, even if they say Tehillim 500 times a day — if they don't keep the mitzvot, it's a waste of time. Where does Hashem say this? He says to the Prophet: Be piva u'v'sfata y'kibduni, v'libam rachak mimeni. their mouth and their lips they gave me kavod, honor. But in their hearts, they were far away from me. They were far away from me. Why? Because they gave me lip service. They said, you know, they sang songs, Hakadosh Baruch Hu, Mishamayim. I mean, all the nice songs that people like to sing. But when push came to shove, they didn't really fight for me. They didn't really fight to protect my religion and... music music

7:14Thank you.