Sermons

Shabbat Shalom,

This week’s parsha, Pekuday, marks the end of a series of readings that I often connect with various professions. Teruma is for Architects, Tetzeveh is for Fashion Designers, Ki Tissa is for Tax Collectors and, last week, Vayakel is the parsha for those in the Construction industry and for Tailors. Pekuday is the Parsha for Accountants. Moses gives a strict accounting for every ounce of gold, silver, and bronze that is being used in the Mishkan, the portable sanctuary being constructed in the middle of the Israelite camp.

That project, this week, is being completed. Thus, the accounting is necessary. As soon as the construction on the “house of God” is finished, God quickly moves in. The Torah text informs us, “When Moses had finished the work, the cloud covered the Tent of Meeting, and the Presence of the Lord filled the Tabernacle. Moses could not enter the Tent of Meeting, because the cloud had settled upon it and the Presence of the Lord filled the Tabernacle.”

It was pointed out to me that there is an odd thing about this moment when the cloud of the Divine presence fills the tent of meeting. The Mishkan, this tent, is supposed to represent Mt. Sinai and be the place where God can be found even as the people travel through the desert to the Promised Land. They don’t have to leave God behind on the mountain; they will take God with them everywhere they might travel. What makes this moment odd is that on Mt Sinai, in Exodus, 20:18, the text reads, “So the People remained at a distance, while Moses approached the thick cloud where God was.”  When the cloud of God was on the mountain, Moses was not afraid to approach it, but now, as if fills the tent at the center of the Mishkan, Moses cannot enter. Or maybe, this time, he was too afraid to enter.

It is hard to admit that Moses may have been afraid of God. The two of them, God and Moses, had a special relationship. The talked openly to each other and while even Moses could not see the face of God, they did speak frequently as good friends might speak. When God gets angry, Moses is there to calm things down. God and Moses have quite a relationship. It is just hard to imagine that Moses could not enter the cloud at the Mishkan. It would make no sense that Moses was afraid to enter.

Another option might be that there was no room for Moses in the tent once God moved in. It might help to play with an analogy about human beings when we move to a new home. It could take some weeks or even months until we feel we are ready to have company in our home. We need to unpack, we need to find a place for everything, we need to get rid of a whole bunch of boxes, before we are ready to have our friends see our new place. In the Mishkan, perhaps God was exploring the different nooks and crannies of the tent, and it was so full of God’s presence that there was no place for Moses to enter and visit with God. The bible will record many meetings between God and Moses that take place at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting. Moses stood in the doorway and was not allowed to enter. The Mishkan could only be disassembled and packed up to move when the cloud of God rose up and indicated that it was time for Israel to break camp and continue their journey through the desert. Perhaps, when God was in the Mishkan, there just was not room enough for Moses or anyone else.

There is a famous story of the Baal Shem Tov, the founder of the Hasidic movement in the 18^th century, who was invited one Shabbat, to pray and speak in a synagogue in a fairly large city. The Baal Shem Tov approached the door of the synagogue but suddenly stopped as the door was opened. “What is wrong?” asked the people. The Rabbi replied, “there is no room for me in the synagogue.” The people looked in the door. It was a large crowd that had come to see the famous rabbi but there were still plenty of seats. “There is plenty of room for you here” said the people, but the Baal Shem Tov refused to enter. “It is not that there are too many people inside that prevents me from entering,” said the Rabbi, “The problem is that while all these people are praying, they have no kavanna, they do not recite their prayers as if they really mean it. Therefore, their prayers do not rise to God in heaven. The room is so full of the words of their prayers that there is no room for me.” With that the Baal Shem Tov left the city and spent Shabbat alone in the forest.

Sometimes, when we try to pray and we can’t call up the spiritual energy to send our prayers to heaven we feel like we have wasted our time in prayer. The fact of the matter is that even if we don’t always have the right spiritual kavanna, our prayers do ascend to heaven, because when we aspire for the right kavanna it is enough to send our prayers directly to God. God knows that we are not perfect, and our prayers count as long as we put in the effort to try and have the proper spiritual feelings to send them out. The Talmud notes that even if we can open our hearts with an opening the size of the opening of a needle, God will come to our aid and pull open the door to our hearts wide enough for wagons to pass through. God meets us more than halfway.

There is a story of an atheist who befriended a rabbi in the concentration camps of Nazi Germany. One night, in the middle of the night, they were pulled out of their bunks and lined up at the edge of the camp. In front of them was a large pit. The commandant said to the prisoners, “You must jump over this pit. If you make it to the other side you will live; if not then Rat, tat, tat…” The atheist looked at the pit and at the emaciated prisoners in the line and said to the rabbi, “What is the use; it is just another excuse to kill us. We will never be able to jump this pit.” The Rabbi replied, “We have no choice; we have to give it our best jump.” The line moved forward. Finally, it was their turn. The rabbi said, “We jump!!” and both of them landed on the other side. “It is a miracle,” said the atheist, “how was it possible to make it across?” The rabbi replied, “I thought of my holy ancestors and held on to them and to God and I made it across. But you; what did you do to get across?” The atheist replied, “Me? I held on to you!”

This is why we pray together, to help each other get across the pit to find life and to find God on the other side. We make the jump and if God does not reach out to bring us to safety, then our connection to others, more spiritual than ourselves, can also help us jump with success.

One Rabbi noted that there are many spiritual keys that can open the doors to heaven so our prayers can enter. Each spiritual key opens a door ever closer to God. But there is one key that can open all the doors. The key that opens every door is an ax. Swing an ax at a door and eventually it will give way. Spiritual keys can open the doors of heaven, but a broken heart is like an ax that cuts through every door right into the presence of God.

How often do we think that we are not worthy to be in God’s presence, that we are not important enough for God to notice us? How often do we feel we are insignificant in the presence of God and that God has no reason to listen to what we say? Judaism teaches us that the exact opposite is true. God is always with us. God cares about us, each one of us, individually. God loves us because we are special. There is nobody in the world who is exactly like us and we have an important role to play in this world. What we think and say matters profoundly to God.

There are people who think that their prayers are better than the prayers of anyone else. There are people who think that just because they recite the words in the siddur, that alone gives them a special status. But just because one bows in prayer at the right time does not mean that they have a good intention when they pray. They care more that others see that they are looking pious; they care that others see them sitting in the “important” seats. They want to be seen praying with the “right kind of people.” Those are the prayers that are not able to go anywhere. They fill the synagogue with sound and fury but they signify nothing. They were the reason the Baal Shem Tov could not enter the synagogue.

If you will allow me, I would like to turn this imagery around today. Moses could not enter the Mishkan because it was full of the presence of God. The question each of us must answer today is if we are too full of ourselves that there is no way for God to enter our souls. Or maybe God is already inside of us trying to call out and speak to us, but we are so busy with mundane things that we never stop to hear that voice that is calling to us. The Rabbis teach that what happened on Mt. Sinai did not just happen one day in ancient times, but God calls to us every day from Mt. Sinai if only we would stop to listen to that voice.

We come to synagogue on Shabbat to try and slow down our lives enough so that we can hear what God is trying to tell us. The prayers and the reading of the Torah, even the Rabbi’s teaching, are all part of a path that can show us the way to find God in our hearts. The doors we need to open are not doors in heaven; they are doors inside our hearts and souls. We have all the keys we need to open ourselves up to God if only we dare to use them in the lock. Some of us are so tightly locked up that God’s voice is very faint and hard to hear.

But we ARE here. We have the tools and the time to open ourselves up to the words of prayer, to the words of Torah, and to the divine voice within us. Yes, it takes some faith to open the door not knowing what future may wait for us inside. It takes faith to believe that the voice inside is not there to destroy us but to give meaning and purpose to our life. It takes faith to believe that we can make a difference in the world if only we would listen to the call that comes from our soul. When we are together in this synagogue, we can give each other the strength and determination to open our soul to whatever may be inside.

I don’t worry here that this room is too full of prayers that have never ascended to heaven. All of us pray with enough kavanna to send our prayers beyond this room. But I do worry that we have locked God out of our hearts and souls; that we have locked God out of our life each and every day and sometimes we try to deny the voice that is calling to us from Sinai, the voice that calls from our God given souls, to rise above the common to the spiritual heights that can change us and change our world.

Don’t look to the rafters to find God. God is already inside all of us. Let us work together to find the courage and the faith to set God free, and to let our spirits soar. May we cling to God as we jump the pit of despair and cynicism and let our faith carry us to the other side. To the side of joy, life, and peace.

May we set God free so God can set us free as we say ….  Amen and Shabbat Shalom