One of the hardest things for us to remember is that God has given us talents and it is up to us to use them properly.
In Good Times and Bad Times, Remember Who Gave You the Tools
Now for a quick Devar Torah.
This week’s Haftarah comes from Isaiah, and one of its great messages is: Do not despair.
Isaiah is speaking to a people who have suffered, who have experienced tragedy and uncertainty, and who might understandably ask, “Has God forgotten us?”
Isaiah answers with one of the most powerful images in the Bible: Can a mother forget her child? And even if such a thing were possible, God says, “I will not forget you.”
But there are really two dangers we face in life, and they are two sides of the same coin.
The first comes when everything seems to be going wrong.
Nothing works. We suffer disappointment, loss, or failure, and we begin to despair. We may say, “God has forgotten me,” or even, “There is no God. I have to put my faith somewhere else—in government, in an ideology, in a revolution, in something.”
Faith gives us another way of looking at adversity. It allows us to say, “I don’t understand why this is happening. I don’t know what tomorrow will bring. But I believe that my life still has meaning and that I have not been forgotten.”
Faith does not make suffering disappear. It gives us a framework within which we can face suffering without surrendering to despair.
But there is another danger, and strangely enough, it comes when everything is going right.
We succeed. We make money. We accomplish things. And suddenly we say, “Look what I did. I’m a self-made man.”
That danger is addressed directly in this week’s parsha, Eikev. Moses warns the Jewish people that when they enter the Land of Israel, build good houses, acquire wealth, and become successful, they must not say:
“My strength and the might of my hand made me all this wealth.”
Instead, the Torah tells us to remember God, “for it is He who gives you the power to create wealth.”
Notice what the Torah is saying. It does not say that you didn’t work hard. It doesn’t say that your accomplishments aren’t real. It says: remember where the ability to accomplish those things came from.
There used to be a radio talk-show host, Rush Limbaugh, who described his ability as “talent on loan from God.”
Someone might hear that and think it sounds egotistical. But there is actually an important religious idea behind the phrase.
Perhaps instead of saying that God loaned us our talents, we might say that God invested them in us.
Each of us has been given something. Intelligence. Creativity. Leadership. Compassion. Business ability. The ability to teach, to build, to organize, to make people laugh, or simply to be there when another person needs us.
The talents are different because the people are different.
And after 120 years, when we stand before God, perhaps the question will not be, “How much money did you make?” or “How famous did you become?”
Perhaps the question will be:
“I invested these talents in you. What did you do with them?”
Did you use them?
Did you use them for good?
Did you make your community a little better because you were there?
Did you help the people around you?
Or did you waste what you were given?
That is why neither wealth nor poverty by itself tells us the moral worth of a person. Success does not make someone righteous, and it certainly does not make someone evil. Poverty does not make someone righteous, nor does it mean that someone failed. Life is more complicated than that.
The question is what we do with the circumstances and abilities we have been given.
Think of Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof. He spends plenty of time arguing with God. He certainly wouldn’t mind having a little more money. In “If I Were a Rich Man,” he imagines what life would be like if God finally made him wealthy.
But Tevye keeps talking to God.
That may be the point.
When things are bad, don’t conclude that God has forgotten you.
And when things are good, don’t conclude that you no longer need God.
In adversity, don’t surrender to despair.
In success, don’t surrender to arrogance.
Remember that whatever talents we possess are an investment God has made in us.
The question is what we are going to do with that investment.
Something to think about.
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