The Only One Who Knows What’s Coming Next 

The other day, I heard a song from the past. The last time I heard it was in 1982. It was on MTV in its first year on the air. Ronald Reagan was in his first term as the American president. The TV I saw the video on was as wide as a carton of apples, and I watched it with a classmate in Long Island, NY.  

The next time I heard this music was 42 years later. It was on a device the size and thickness of my hand. I was with my wife and children on a balcony in northern Israel, overlooking the Jezreel Valley. 

When I first heard this song, I could not imagine where I would be or what I would be doing the next time I heard it. I could not even know who I would become.  

Think about who you were when you were 8 years old: 

• What were the most important things to you?  

• What did your parents expect you to do with your life? 

• What did you want to accomplish? 

• Where did you think you would be living, and what would you think you would be doing ten years forward? 

Now, think ten years forward. Think about the person you were at 18 years old and ask yourself the same questions. Do you have the same answers? 

Now, think about today. How many years have passed since you were 18? As yourself the same questions. Do you have the same answers? 

Ten years in the future, do you think your answers will remain consistent? 

If your answers are different for each stage of your life, then it’s pretty hard, if possible at all, to know who you will be or even where you will be in the future. Nobody knows that. If I wanted to help a friend by taking care of his future self, I wouldn’t know how to do it.  

None of us would.  

Hashem knows. He knows who we will be in the future, and only He can guide us today to benefit who we become going forward.  

That’s the meaning of emunah: When something doesn’t feel good today, the trust is in knowing that only Hashem knows how good it really is to the you that you will become tomorrow.  

The Chassidim go so far as to say there is no bad in this world. It’s all from Hashem, so it’s all good. Instead of “good” and “bad,” there is revealed good – like a chocolate bar, and concealed good, like a pile of brussel sprouts that will make sure you have the energy to get to that job interview on time tomorrow.  

The Only One 

We call Hashem “He Who was, He Who is, He Who will be.”  

He knows the future. He knew about AI and 5G communications while He was instructing Adam HaRishon in the Garden of Eden.  When He decrees, He considers not only who we are now but also who we have yet to become and who we need to become. He acts so the person we become is a much better version.  

When something happens to us that makes no sense, on instinct we hear an inner voice saying, “Did God do this to me? This isn’t right.”  

We flex our emunah muscles when we say, “Of course He did this! He knows the future and I don’t. He just threw me 50-yard touchdown pass to me. Maybe the ball is high in the air, and I will have to run fast to catch it. It may even be painful to lose my breath and pound the pavement to catch up, but at some moment in the near future, I will be in the end zone – and it’s all because Hashem did something I didn’t expect.” 

Only God knows the future. He is doing everything in the present to make it as bright as possible. 

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David Ben Horin lives in Afula with his family, millions of sunflowers, and Matilda, our local camel. David‘s Israeli startup, 300 Marketing Solutions, is a lean marketing agency for startups and small businesses that creates and promotes SEO-optimized ROI-driven to the right audience on LinkedIn to make your business the star of the show.