Daily Chizuk #1168

The Shomer Emunim said about himself that he had times in his life when he experienced tremendous amounts of physical pain due to illness. During those times, he didn’t have enough strength to even sit up in a chair. Yet, with his steadfast bitachon in Hashem, when it came time to pray, he would push himself with a great deal of sacrifice and pray with all of his might. In the natural way of the world, that should have caused him much more pain. However, in every single instance, Hashem helped him. Most of the time by the middle of the Amida he felt like a new person. Sometimes only after he finished the Amida and sometimes not until after his Amida, plus reciting Tehillim. Each time he felt like he received a new body. He said he is not telling us this to brag, but rather to teach us of the awesome power of tefila and the wondrous abilities of Hashem to save a person in an instant.
Tefila is so powerful, the yetzer hara works overtime to try and ruin a person’s tefilot, especially by putting all different types of thoughts in his head, trying to distract him from doing it properly. It could be thoughts about business, or something he has to do that day, or sometimes it is even thoughts about Torah and mitzvot. All of them come from the yetzer hara, trying to ruin his tefila. A person may think that a thought in Torah, perhaps an answer to a difficult question, or a pshat in a pasuk or in a Gemara is something pure. In fact, however, it is nothing more than the plays of the yetzer hara, getting a religious person to stumble.
A focused Amida is so powerful, do not let the yetzer hara ruin it.