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RABBINIC REFLECTION BY RABBI michael berk
Counting
Our Blessings
November 2007
I have a lot to be thankful for right now. I have a wonderful new position as CBI’s senior rabbi, which is daily giving me enormous satisfaction. I have a wife of 30 years whom I love and have the highest regard for. My children are both in good places and heading in good directions. We live in one of the most beautiful communities in the world. Our health is good. And, while pained at the loss of life and the enormous loss of property from the fires that are ravaging Southern California as I write this message, I am grateful that of the hundreds of CBI members who had to evacuate their homes, we know of only one who lost their home.
It’s hard to say, "My health is good,"
without adding, "thank God." Somehow it’s
almost instinctive. And in truth, I think that
feeling gratitude, even in difficult and trying
times, is key to a spiritual life and a
significant part of feeling a closeness to God.
Gratitude is, I believe, crucial to Jewish
spirituality. If you consider the Exodus out of
Egypt to be the starting point of Israelite
history, then you can say that the first thing
done for us as a people was to put us in
"debt" to God. God’s first gift to us was
liberation from bondage, and we are
constantly reminded of that in the Torah and
our prayers. Time and time again we are told
to remember that we were slaves in Egypt
and that amid miracles and wonders God set
us free. But God set us free for a specific
purpose: so we could be free to serve the
Divine Will, which was revealed to Israel
shortly after our liberation. Out of our
gratitude to God for that saving act we chose
to enter God’s eternal covenant. We obey the
mitzvot not only out of loyalty to the covenant,
but out of gratitude to God for our liberation.
On a personal level, I think the same idea
applies. Our liberation from Egypt inspires in
us a kind of national sense of gratitude. If
you look at your own life as a gift, you feel
gratitude for it. That gratitude might be
expressed towards your parents who are
responsible for your life, and it might move
on to God, who is the Creator of all life. If life
is a gift, and if you stand in awe of the
manifold miracles which surround you, I
think you will feel gratitude to God. And that
gratitude can inspire you to feel a kind of
debt to the Creator of all life. It can prompt
you to ask the quintessential Jewish
question: What does God want from me?
Gratitude, then, can put you on a spiritual
path searching not only for God, but for a
godly life, a life lived in such a way as to
show you feel grateful for the gift of life
which has been granted you.
Gratitude is unquestionably an integral
element of Biblical faith. King David
appointed certain Levites to "invoke, to thank, and to praise" God (I Chronicles
16:4). And gratitude is an ingrained
American value. The Jewish
thanksgiving, Sukkot, was the inspiration
for the American holiday of Thanksgiving
we celebrate this month. I hope you will
take the time at your Thanksgiving table
to talk about your gratitude for the
blessings of your life and the food you
are privileged to eat. Certainly this
Thanksgiving, coming so shortly after the
fires will have been finally put out, God
willing, it will feel very appropriate to
talk about your blessings.
I also hope you will join the clergy
and other temple members as we gather
for another of our great annual traditions,
the community Interfaith Thanksgiving
service. CBI’s custom is to join with our
friends at the First United Methodist
Church on the Wednesday before
Thanksgiving. This year the service is at
the Church (see page 16 for details). I
have been told that Jewish attendance
at this annual service has been sparse. I
hope this year we will put an end to that
tradition and that I will see many of your
faces as I deliver the sermon.
This year, please make expressions of
gratitude a conscious part of your
Thanksgiving holiday. In the words of the
psalmist, "Give thanks to God, who is
good, for God’s steadfast love endures
forever."
Rabbi Michael Berk
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