Thursday, March 11, 2010

TBE Bar/Bat Mitzvah Commentary: Corrie Minkoff on Vayakhel-Pekuday

Those of you who know me might know that I really love cars and motorcycles. I don’t drive them – YET – but I have been on my uncle’s motorcycle! Cars are interesting for me – I love the different models from different times – from the 1950 T-birds with their large grilles and tailfins, to more modern Mustangs and Ferraris. They can go sooooo fast!

Would you believe that my portion has something to say about that?

No, there were no Harley Davidsons in Moses’ time. And “Hell’s Angels” had a very different meaning in the Bible!


But the message of my portion is the same message we find in any NASCAR race: Whatever you do, just keep moving forward.


That message was expressed in one of my favorite all time movies, except not in terms of cars racing but of fish swimming. That movie is “Finding Nemo.”


In “Finding Nemo,” there is a song called “Just Keep Swimming.” Just when Nemo’s dad is about to give up, she swings to song, singing:


“Just keep swimming. Just keep swimming. Just keep swimming, swimming, swimming. What do we do? We swim, swim.


The key for Dory is always to be moving forward, never to stay still.


In my portion, that was also the key to Israel’s survival in the wilderness. They couldn’t stay in one place. They needed to keep moving.


One problem we find in these chapters is, when you keep moving forward, where does God rest? And where can you pray?


The answer was to build a dwelling place for God that was portable. They could keep on taking it down and putting it back up when they got to the next resting place.


The end of my portion marks the end of the book of Exodus. The last word of the entire book is very fitting – the word means “their journeys.” Dory couldn’t have put it better. All that mattered was to keep on moving.


God went with them on their journeys, by day as a cloud and by night as a pillar of fire.

The message here is that it’s not in a temple that we find God, so much as in our travels, our journeys, our adventures.


And that means on our motorcycles and in our cars! Maybe the main reason I love cars so much is that with a car, you can’t help but go forward (unless you are in reverse). You always have to keep swimming, as the song says.


That’s how I look at my life too. I always need to keep moving forward. That was the way I approached my bat mitzvah training too. I kept on swimming.


As I continue to grow, I intend to keep moving forward too… maybe in a brand new mustang!
For my Mitzvah Project, I’ve participated in a dodge ball tournament to help the people in Haiti and have donated money for Haitian relief.

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