The Mysterious Honk

How exact is Divine Providence?  The following true story, which happened to Mr. Cohen of Jerusalem, illustrates the incredible detailed precision of G-d’s providence over each and every one of us.

Mr. Cohen would wake up early each morning, don his tefillin, pray, and then drive one hour to work.  His day began very early, as he had to be at work by 7:00 a.m.  On his way to work, Mr. Cohen would listen to a Torah lecture on the tape deck of his car (this story takes place back at the time when tapes were in use).

One morning Mr. Cohen woke up early as usual, prayed, ate, put on his Torah tape, and started his long drive to work.  However, Mr. Cohen didn’t notice how tired he was that morning, and while driving, Mr. Cohen began to dose in and out of sleep and was unable to pay careful attention to the road.  Suddenly, he heard a loud honk. BEEEEEP!  The loud sound startled him.  When he looked up, he saw a big truck heading straight for him.  Quickly, he sharply turned the steering wheel of his car and was saved in the nick of time.  All shaken up, Mr. Cohen pulled to the side of the road and thanked Hashem (G-d) for saving his life.

After he got a hold of himself, Mr. Cohen thought through the details of the near fatal accident and the loud honk that roused him just in time to avoid it.  “That honk was not characteristic of the big trailer truck that almost hit me,” he thought to himself. Wondering where that honk came from, a thought crossed his mind.  He rewound the tape, and to his surprise he heard… THE honk.  Apparently, a car honked really loud at the time of the Rabbi’s lecture, and was caught on the recording, only to be sounded much later; at the very moment that a big truck was barreling strait toward Mr. Cohen’s car.  That was the honk that stirred him from his sleep just in time to spare his life.

How incredible are the ways of Hashem!  How precise is Divine Providence.  We are surrounded by constant miracles from the beating of our hearts to the workings of our eyes, to the people we meet and the places we go.  All we have to do is open our eyes and look around to find Hashem constantly with us, guiding our every step…

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Don’t think that the above story is one of a kind. Following the stock-market crash of 2008, a California investment broker lost millions of dollars and was so broken that he lacked the strength to see anything positive in the future. He decided to put an end to his life, but to make it look like an accident so that his wife could at least collect the money from the life and car insurance policies that he had. He’d drive his car off a cliff…

At 3 AM, he snuck out of the house. Broken-hearted, he put his keys in the ignition and pulled out of the driveway. Meanwhile, the car’s CD player began to play, with the emuna CD that his wife had left in the car the day before. The voice on the CD – that of Rabbi Lazer Brody – said: “Beloved brother, don’t be down on yourself – Hashem Loves You!” He pulled over to the side of the road and sobbed for over an hour. He listened to the whole CD, turned around, and went back home to start a new life.

Hashem surely loves us.