Some people have a question. They understand that when they spend on money on Shabbat or on other Mitzvot, somehow they’ll get it back, but how exactly does it work? If they have a set salary and no stocks or investments, where does it come from?
Recently a man told me the following two stories that show just how this can happen in modern day.
This man, from NJ, had spent a little extra money on Shabbat and the holidays, buying a good bottle of wine and the like. He believed Hashem would pay him back, but was curious to see how it would happen. Then many weeks later, he got a letter from the gas company explaining that when they had installed his new gas meter, they’d discovered that he’d been overcharged slightly for a period of time, due to the old, faulty meter. They enclosed a check for $300.53, the amount of the overcharge, and the amount he’d used for his extra Shabbat expenses.
He also told me about an envelope he once got from Rita’s Ices. He thought it was junk mail and almost threw it out, but then he opened it and saw that it was a check for $156.00! Apparently, there had been a class action suit against Rita’s for misappropriation of cell phone data. His portion of the substantial settlement was $156. Just like that! Money out of nowhere. The lesson is, if you spend on Shabbat and holidays, it’ll always come back.
And then there’s a classic story about Mr. Davie Mizrahi ah, one of my favorites, which occurred when I was living in Deal about 20 years ago. Every Succot he would host a community-wide succah event, and invite the the entire Deal community to his succah for a sebit. They’d sing pizmonim, get together, it was beautiful. But one year his business wasn’t doing as well, and he didn’t know how he’d pay for the party. He and his wife discussed whether or not they should make it. His wife said it was a beautiful event, but maybe they should skip it. They had been trying to cut expenses, the sebit wasn’t a necessity, it was a luxury and it was quite costly. He said, no its L’Chvod Yom Tov, and they should go ahead with the party. Then, on Erev Kippur, he went into his closet to get his non-leather shoes. When he pulled them out, he found a wad of $3,000 in cash stuffed into one of the shoes! Neither he nor his wife could recall placing it there, but he saw that Hashem had sent him the money, however it came, and that $3,000 paid for the party!
These stories happen all the time to people that believe.
A final story, from yesteryear:
The Chazon Ish was once approached by a simple man, a farmer, who wanted to purchase an etrog, but wasn’t in a position to buy one. Etrogim were costly and quite difficult to get in those days.
The Chazon Ish asked the man what he did for a living. The man replied that he was an egg farmer. Egg farmers in those days typically sold the eggs, but then had to refund the cost of any eggs that had bloodspots found in them.
The Chazon Ish asked him many eggs he usually had to refund per year. The total amount was around the price of the etrog. So the Chazon Ish said, “So this year, you won’t have any blood spots!” and advised him to buy the etrog. Sure enough, that’s exactly what happened.
As everyone in business knows, we all have charge backs. There’s shrinkage on orders, and other ways that things don’t go right. It’s built into the projections. But we don’t have to have charge backs. It’s not an open miracle if you don’t have charge backs one year.
So when you give that extra Sedaka, and you wonder how you’re going to get the money back, you may see that you don’t end up have charge backs that year!