It always amazes me how quickly we shift from Purim into Pesach mode. One moment, we’re delivering mishloach manos, caught up in the energy of the day, and the next, we’re making lists, planning menus, and diving into the cleaning that somehow always feels bigger than we remembered.
But we all know that Purim isn’t just about the fun and the simcha—it’s a day when the gates of heaven are wide open. A day when tefillah carries a different weight. A different koach.
We try to grab a moment between the day’s chaos to say a prayer. If we are able, we stop everything, close our eyes, and let our hearts do the talking. And for many, there is the custom to recite the entire Sefer Tehillim—word by word, page by page, voices steady, eyes filled with tears, as we beg Hashem for yeshuos.
We all have something to daven for.
A heartfelt tefillah for a child. The need for healing. A desperate plea for strength, for peace in the home, for the ability to keep going. The silent wish for clarity in a decision that feels impossible. The deep yearning for a shidduch, for the right person at the right time. A fervent prayer for parnassah, for stability, for the weight of financial strain to lift.
And then, there are the tefillos too heavy for words. The ones said through tears—for the families shattered by war, for the hostages still missing, for the soldiers standing in harm’s way, for the protection of Klal Yisrael.
So many tefillos. So many voices reaching toward shamayim.
But how do we make sure our voices are heard? How do we make sure our tefillos don’t just rise, but break through the heavens?
The Power of Our Words
We often think of tefillah as separate from our daily conversations, as something entirely different from the way we speak throughout the day. But in reality, the same mouth that pleads with Hashem is the same mouth that talks to our friends, our family, our co-workers.
And what we do with that mouth matters.
Koach Hadibbur—the power of speech—is directly tied to the potency of our tefillos. A mouth that is used to build instead of break, to encourage instead of criticize, to uplift instead of gossip—that mouth has a different strength when it turns to Hashem in prayer.
We know this on a basic level—when we feel pure, when we’ve used our words wisely, we daven differently. But what if the words we speak every day actually shape the way our tefillos are received?
Because speech isn’t just a tool—it’s a force.
- The same mouth that can utter words of comfort can also, chas v’shalom, tear someone down.
- The same voice that can inspire can also discourage.
- The same words that can create peace can also create division.
And if words have the power to harm, they must also have the power to heal.
A Mouth For A Mouth
We’ve all heard stories of people who saw yeshuos when they were careful with Shemiras Halashon. A shidduch that finally came through. A child born after years of waiting. A sudden turnaround in a hopeless situation.
But when I heard this story from Stories to Inspire by Rabbi Meir Simcha Sperling, it gave me chills.
A woman in Israel worked as a Morah in a Gan (nursery) where there was one little boy who did not speak at all.
Day after day, she watched him sit in silence. The other children ran, laughed, and played, their voices filling the room with life. But he? He was trapped in a world of quiet.
He couldn’t say a single word.
He didn’t communicate, didn’t respond, didn’t even seem to understand what was being said to him. No matter how much the teachers tried, no matter how many specialists were brought in, there was no progress.
The silence remained.
Then, this woman took an entire month off from work. When she returned, she expected to find things exactly as she had left them.
But the moment she walked into the Gan, she knew something had changed.
Because the little boy who, just a few weeks earlier, couldn’t even say “yes” or “no”—was now talking.
Not just making sounds. Talking. Clearly, fluently, responding, understanding. Just like all the other kids.
She couldn’t believe what she was seeing. It didn’t make sense.
How?
She called the boy’s mother, expecting to hear about some breakthrough therapy, a new specialist, some intervention that had finally worked.
But what she heard instead left her stunned.
“I’m not a religious woman,” the mother said, “but I knew that Hashem is the only One who could help my child. So, I made a deal with Him. I said: Pe tachas pe—A mouth for a mouth. If I hold myself back from speaking lashon hara, then Hashem can make my son speak.”
Her voice was filled with emotion as she continued.
“It was so hard. So many times, the Yetzer Hara tried to get me to slip. The urge to speak was strong. But I held back. And just a few days later—my son began to speak.”
The morah gripped the phone tighter, struggling to process what she had just heard.
She had expected a medical explanation, something scientific, something logical. But this?
This was something else entirely.
A mother, desperate for her child to find his voice, had turned to the only One who could truly give it to him. And in return, she had given up her own voice—not in silence, but in restraint.
Pe tachas pe.
A mouth for a mouth.
How We Can Use This Power in Our Own Lives
Most of us will never make such a bold deal with Hashem. But every single day, we are given countless moments to choose what we do with our words.
We are given the chance to hold back from:
✔️ Repeating something that isn’t ours to share.
✔️ Speaking negatively about someone.
✔️ Criticizing when it won’t help.
And we are given the chance to use our words to:
✔️ Encourage.
✔️ Lift someone up.
✔️ Bring more chesed into the world.
What if the words we speak every day shape the way our tefillos are received?
What if, by elevating our speech, we elevate our prayers?
What if our words could bring the yeshuos we so desperately seek—closer than we ever imagined?
It’s not just about the tefillos we say.
It’s about the words we choose to speak.
That’s how we make sure our voices are heard.
