REBBE, HELP!

A chossid belonging to a different chassidic group went to Los Angeles and met a childhood friend who had become a Lubavitcher. He asked him: Why did you become a Lubavitcher? The man said, I’ll tell you what happened and you tell me what kind of Chassid I ought to be.

This is what the man said:

Shortly after I moved to California, my wife did not feel well. Tests were done and they discovered she has cancer. The doctors said she had a few months left to live. I was shaken up and I began to say T’hillim in tears. In the middle of praying, I cried out: Rebbe, help!

Naturally, I was referring to my own Rebbe, but a short while later I received a phone call from New York. The man on the line said he was R’ Chadakov and he said: The Rebbe said you should remove your wife from the hospital and take her to a certain doctor.

I was so shaken up that I did not pay sufficient attention to what he said. After I recovered from the initial shock, I began to wonder who this R’ Chadakov was and what connection he had to me.

When I met R’ Shmuel Dovid Raichik, I asked him whether he knew a R’ Chadakov. He told me this was the Lubavitcher Rebbe’s secretary. I asked R’ Shmuel Dovid for R’ Chadakov’s phone number. When I reached him, I asked: What is this about? I didn’t ask the Rebbe anything.

He said: I don’t know anything about it. I just did what the Rebbe told me to do. R’ Chadakov warned me that if I wanted it to work out well, I should do as the Rebbe said.

Considering this is a Baal-Shemsker story, I went to the hospital and took my wife out against the doctors’ orders. Then I called the doctor whom the Rebbe had recommended and asked for an appointment. The secretary told me that I should come back in a year.

As I didn’t have a year to wait, I simply went to the doctor’s office and knocked on the door and said that I needed an appointment. After the doctor tried sending me back to the secretary, I said: I want to tell you something incredible. I told him what happened. After hearing this he said: If that’s the situation, bring her in tomorrow. I brought my wife and he treated her and she was cured.

Concluded the Chassid: Years have gone by and my wife and I and my children are Boruch Hashem all well. Now tell me, whose Chassid should I be?

From Beis Moshiach Magazine