Shana tova umetukah.
Chaverim, a sweet and happy new year to you all, my friends.
U’gmar chatima tova, may we all be written in the book of life.

It is a sweet balm to be here in community,
a healing potion for the aches of today’s life, for today’s world.
To be here is to know that people of good conscience —
people willing to step out of their homes to gather in community —
want to come together as friends, as peers,
as Beloved to each other.

Let me give you my heart,
oh members and guests
of our humble Jewish Community of Greater Stowe.
These are dark times, oh friends,
dark as the new moon night,
dark as the long tunnel ahead.

Let me not be so bold to say
that there is not light and happiness too.
We have celebrated simchas over this past year.
Our joys have increased
in so many ways in our growing community.
Yet I stand before you today and say that
there are times when the simchas are bittersweet,
like the broken glass under the chuppah,
like celebrating a milestone
when you have a lost loved one who is no longer here in body.
The darkness is so often palpable that I feel it in my heart.

And so often, it is personal.
As your rabbi,
I often hear and see your lives unfolding,
certainly sharing the joys, thank G-d,
but also the struggles, the deep, often intimate troubles.
I cannot see the darkness through your own eyes,
but I can feel a piece of the anguish.

For some, it has been a recent divorce,
or the real difficulties of being single, or in a challenging relationship;
for others, an illness has stricken you with pain;
there are those who are overtaken by
the daily struggle to pay the bills each month for you and your kids,
working multiple jobs to stay afloat;
and there are many of us here who have experienced
the loss of a loved one or other types of loss.
Some of us gathered tonight have a loved one who is gravely ill
and do not know if they will make it to next Yom Kippur.
The grief, the loss, the struggle — so different for each individual.
This year, these past years, have been personally difficult for many,
too many distressing moments of life to name.
How do we face this personal pain and struggle day-to-day?
In what ways have we struggled
and how have we gained strength to persevere?

There is personal struggle, and for many,
there is also struggle with the world as it is in 2018.
As I hear the many personal struggles,
I also hear from our congregation
how many of us wrestle with the state of the world.
Perhaps you are torn as I am by the darkness
of a society and world that seem to function so often on chaos
and a lack of common sense, let alone wisdom.
The daily barrage of news
is so part of our lives, impacting us more than we might admit,
yet rarely bringing us a sense of unity,
rarely a sense of hope and belonging.
How do we face this collective pain and struggle day-to-day?
In this past year what acts of hope and healing have you offered our world?

Tonight I share these words for all those who have sought comfort
simply trying to survive day-to-day or even moment-to-moment.
These words are for all those
who have felt disturbed by the world we are living in.
This is for all those who are dealing with personal loss.
And this is also for all those who are looking to be messengers
of healing in dark times.

Let me say this, so clearly, so plainly
that even in the darkest moments of your own life
it might enter your hearts:
You are not alone in your suffering.
No matter how big or small you think it is,
you are not alone.
We are here to raise you up.
The solace and power of community
is here for you as you traverse dark days.
The light is in our collective sparks.

I like to think of our humble congregation as a home.
This place is a beit knesset, the Hebrew word for synagogue,
a house of gathering.
The ancient Temple in Jerusalem,
the model upon which synagogues are founded,
was known as the beit hamikdash,
a house filled with holiness, a home to find your spiritual centre.

The world around, the media, the news, the noise,
rarely offers us that experience of home.

Tonight, we sit in our sanctuary,
a sanctuary from the noise —
not setting aside the struggles,
but instead transforming them into light,
acknowledging the pain in our midst,
and then raising it up as an offering.

My teacher Arthur Kurzweil once told me a story
about Ram Dass, also known as Richard Alpert,
one of the great and many Jewish-Buddhists, or Jew-Bu’s, of our time.
During a lecture Ram Dass was giving,
someone in the audience told him about a tragic event in their life.
After the lecture, Arthur approached Ram Dass and asked him:
“How do you hold onto all the pain
that people tell you about, that people hand over to you?”
Ram Dass responded: “I don’t hold onto it.  I offer it up to G-d.”

This is our task in 2018.
Finding the places of darkness and lifting them up, offering them up.
Tonight, those who are living joyfully and those who are struggling with life,
and all those of us living in between or in both of these extremes,
we can all be messengers of hope and healing.

Let me share with you another story, this time from the Talmud:
“Rabbi Yochanan’s student, Rabbi Chiyya bar Abba חַלַש, he fell ill.
Rabbi Yochanan came to visit him, and said to him…

הַב לִי יְדָךְ  , ‘Give me your hand.’

יְהַב לֵיהּ יְדֵיהּ, (His student) gave him his hand,

וְאוֹקְמֵיהּ And (Rabbi Yochanan) raised him up (and restored him to health).

(Some time later), Rabbi Yochanan (himself) fell ill.

And (another great) Rabbi, Chanina, came to visit him, and said to him…

הַב לִי יְדָךְ, ‘Give me your hand.’

יְהַב לֵיהּ יְדֵיהּ, So Rabbi Yochanan gave him his hand,

וְאוֹקְמֵיהּ And Rabbi Chanina raised him up (and restored him to health).

The Talmud then asks: אמאי?

(If he was able to heal his student),

why (did Rabbi Yochanan wait for Rabbi Chanina to restore him to health)?

לוֹקִים רַבִּי יוֹחָנָן לְנַפְשֵיהּ?, (Why didn’t) Rabbi Yochanan raise himself up

(and bring himself back to health on his own)?

The Talmud responds with an analogue:

אֵין חָבוּש מַתִּיר עַצְמוֹ מִבֵּית הָאֲסוּרִים,

A prisoner cannot generally free themselves from prison,

(but rather depends on others to release them from their shackles).

(Babylonian Talmud, Berachot 5b)

Oh members and friends of our Jewish community,
to traverse these muddy waters, we need each other.
To experience pain and illness alone is to suffer alone.
To heal a broken home, we need community support.
To heal a broken world, we need strong communities.

What is your part in releasing yourself and others from the shackles?
How have you risen up this past year?
Where did you find the strength?
How will you rise up this year? You may surprise yourself!
How will you help others to rise up? To come out of the darkness?
Think of a time when you have offered your help to someone else
and the impact you had.  Think of a time…

The value of community and friendship
is finding and experiencing gratitude and joy, even in dark times.
“For that we have each other.”
The value of community is having a home to belong to,
a home to make meaning of it all,
a home to find purpose,
to pursue holiness and light, even in the darkness,
and to do meaningful action together for the greater good,
where no one is left behind.

In the words of Rabbi Gray Myrseth:
“I take my silence and set it to music.
I take my fear and set it to music.
I take my anger and set it to music.
I take my questions and set them to music.
I take my love and set it to music.
I set it all to music and I sing.”

Let us rise up, oh members and friends of our Jewish community.
Let us rise up, oh citizens of the world.
There is no better time than now
to pick ourselves up and answer the call, to walk unafraid.
Let us rise up, “in spite of the ache.”
“All we need is hope, and for that we have each other,
For that we have each other.”  Our community will move mountains.
Shana tova u’gmar tov; may we rise up and be written in the book of life.
Now join me in singing…

Rabbi David’s note: You may have missed as I played piano and our congregation sang “Rise Up” by Andra Day together. But you can see Andra herself singing so beautifully here.

RISE UP, BY ANDRA DAY

You’re broken down and tired
Of living life on a merry go round
And you can’t find the fighter
But I see it in you so we gonna walk it out
And move mountains
We gonna walk it out
And move mountains

And I’ll rise up, I’ll rise like the day
I’ll rise up, I’ll rise unafraid
I’ll rise up, and I’ll do it a thousand times again
And I’ll rise up, high like the waves
I’ll rise up, in spite of the ache
I’ll rise up, and I’ll do it a thousand times again
For you x4

When the silence isn’t quiet
And it feels like it’s getting hard to breathe
And I know you feel like dying
But I promise we’ll take the world to its feet
And move mountains
We’ll take it to its feet, and move mountains

And I’ll rise up, I’ll rise like the day
I’ll rise up, I’ll rise unafraid
I’ll rise up, and I’ll do it a thousand times again
And I’ll rise up, high like the waves
I’ll rise up, in spite of the ache
I’ll rise up, and I’ll do it a thousand times again
For you x4

All we need, all we need is hope
And for that we have each other x2
We will rise, we will rise
We’ll rise, oh oh, we’ll rise

I’ll rise up, rise like the day
I’ll rise up, in spite of the ache
I will rise – a thousands times again
And we’ll rise up, high like the waves
We’ll rise up, in spite of the ache
We’ll rise up, and we’ll do it a thousands times again
For you