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Shabbat Shalom. The working title of this sermon is lifted from a book I read years back by a journalist named Ron Lieber. I was a new parent and I was concerned about how to teach my kids about money. And so I found this book and I found it to be quite insightful. And the title of the book is called The Opposite of Spoiled: How to Raise Children Who Are Smart and Generous With Money. Though the book wasn't Jewish per se, I thought the core concept is a very Jewish one. The opposite of spoiled. To be a Jew, I want to argue this morning, is to be the opposite of spoiled, to be generous and appreciative of the blessings we enjoy. Not to feel entitled to them, but to feel a sense of obligation, to pay whatever measure of blessing we have received forward to others. The name Jew itself, as I've taught before, comes from Yehuda, which is the same root as the word Toda, Grateful One. The first words a Jew says when waking in the morning are Modeani, Moda ani. Grateful am I. Gratitude precedes the self for the Jew. We start every single day from a posture of gratitude. Our core disposition as Jews towards the world is one of owing a debt. I didn't do anything to deserve my existence. I didn't do anything to deserve my life, to deserve this world. So I owe a debt of gratitude to the one who made it all possible. In this week's Parsha, we get the final report on the first capital campaign in Jewish history. And given what I've described, it should be no surprise to any of you in this room to learn that it was a smashing success. Here we have a group of refugee, recently emancipated slaves who are wandering through the wilderness for a period of years, and they set out to undertake an ambitious communal construction project, the building of a sanctuary, a home for God on this earth. And at the end of the parsha this morning, we read that the construction was complete and God graces the tabernacle with God's presence. In other words, mission accomplished. No labor shortages, no tariffs, no supply line issues. It's a smashing success. But one line catches my attention every time we read it. The Torah says, Ota vehoter. And the materials and the labor, all the work that they had to do was dayam, like dayenu. It was enough for them that they were able to do it. And then the text adds another word for good measure. It doesn't say it was merely enough, it says vehoter and more. There was more material, energy, resources left over. They had enough and more. The midrash adds that they had so much left over from the cut from the project of building the Mishkan that they also built a Beit Midrash, a study hall, a yeshiva. They completed the sanctuary, and they had more left over, so they were able to build a school. As a Jewish institutional leader, I was feeling a little jealous of this problem of excess. I think Jews these days feel a certain sense of vulnerability, insecurity, and have a bit of a mentality of scarcity. Just yesterday in the New York Times, following the attack on the synagogue in Michigan, there was an article, the title of which was, After the Latest Attack, Some Jews Wonder How Much More Security is Possible. The article cites a JFNA study that estimates that Jewish institutions last year spent$765 million on security. That's an annual expense, and we anticipate it only going up. The average Jewish institution spends about 14% of its annual budget on security. And yet, do we feel any safer? This is what JFNA President Eric Fingerhutt calls the Jewish tax. Think about what we collectively could accomplish with an additional$765 million every year. How many day schools could lower their tuition? How many synagogues could cut dues and make religious school free of charge? How many teachers could get higher salaries, which are commensurate with the value of their work? How much sadaka could we give if we didn't have to ask you to pay and contribute for security? How many kids could we send to Israel for free with that money? As you can tell, I'm more than a little miffed. But I wonder if the Parsha is teaching us something important about what it means to be wealthy in a spiritual sense. And it's more than a statement about our fiscal position. The Torah wants us to practice saying the words we have enough and more. We have abundance, not scarcity. However much you have, you are already wealthy beyond your wildest dreams because you are here, because you exist. Wealth is a question in Judaism of perspective. It's never been defined by your assets or the balance in your bank account, but it is defined by an internal sense of satisfaction. Our rabbis teach Izahu Ashir, who is truly rich, one who is happy with his or her portion, whatever that portion may be. But don't miss the profound message it is teaching us. It offers us a worldview as Jews that has kept us alive and kept us thriving for thousands of years. Had we been taken out of Egypt, but we had not crossed the sea, Diano, it would have been enough for us. And everybody at the table always had to say, would it? Would it really have been enough if we had been left there at the sea? Go back to the story of the Israelites at the edge of the sea, and you tell me if it was enough for them. They weren't saying Dayenu then. They were crying out for help to God. They said, Have you brought us to this wilderness to die? And yet, our tradition, when looking back, says, Dayenu, that would have been enough. That would have already been enough. Now, in reality, it's always easier to say Dayenu after the fact than it is to say looking forward at what you lack. But I think that's the point. The Torah, our tradition, wants us always to be looking back at how far we've come and how blessed we truly are, rather than looking forward and considering what we lack. Friends, we are the most blessed generation in the history of the world. You wouldn't think it by talking to some Jews these days. You'd think we have it really tough. But we have advantages that our ancestors could only dream of. I'll name a few. Antibiotics, vaccines, electricity, plumbing. This winter was hard. It was hard for me. The cold and the snow. There were times this winter when I felt annoyed and frustrated and even down and depressed. I was ready for winter to be over, and thankfully, we got a little bit of a reprieve this week. But then I thought of the twenty homeless people who died in New York City this winter because of inadequate warming and shelter. This is the kind of winter that would have been life-threatening to each of us. Our ancient ancestors for sure, and even our more recent ancestors. Thank God I have a home with heat and Netflix and adequate clothing and supermarkets whose shelves were never empty. I have a job that enables me to afford all these groceries. It allows me to afford everything I need. And more. It's enough. And more. The biggest hardship of my life this winter, other than feeling a little bit uncomfortable from time to time, was figuring out how to walk the dog. Should I go on with the many advantages we have? We have airplanes that can take you from here to Europe in five hours. Sure you have to pay a little bit for the ticket. My grandparents My grandparents risked their lives to journey from Europe to the United States. They had to forge documents. They had to escape persecution and border guards. They had to travel by ships for weeks only to be turned away from ports on this side of the ocean. And yet we complain when the Wi-Fi isn't working on the airplane. Now I know I'm starting to sound like the grandfather who says, When I was your age, I used to have to walk to school barefoot, in the snow, uphill, both ways. But as much as kids roll their eyes, that perspective of the grandparent is a really important one. Because when we look back at where we came from, where they came from, we realize how truly wealthy and privileged we are, how truly blessed we are. I share this not because I wish to diminish or minimize the difficulties of our day. I know. Yes, there's antisemitism. Yes, there's inflation. Yes, there's a difficult, costly, and consequential war happening right now. And many people we love are in harm's way, and they cannot get the flights that they need to get where they want to go. Yes, there are economic concerns. Yes, there are political concerns. Yes, there are moral concerns. Yes, there are environmental concerns. I know. These are serious issues, and I am concerned about all of them. Given all these challenges, Rabbi, are you asking us to focus on our blessings, really? Yes, I am. Because even with all of that, we are still blessed beyond belief. And I share this because I think that there are people who are trying to take advantage of our feelings that we do not have enough. Maybe they're trying to sell us something. Or maybe they're trying to manipulate us and sell us an idea or a political perspective based on some kind of grievance or some kind of magical thinking. They speak to where we hurt and they say, I'll take care of you. They may attack or scapegoat other groups who they claim are the source of our discomfort. But Jews never give in to that perspective. To be a Jew does not mean one who lacks, or one who deserves, or one who wants or craves more. It doesn't mean victim. It doesn't mean helpless. It means grateful one. And God's sanctuary is built from a place of abundance and generosity, an internal sense of having enough and more. It warns of a time when the people will be settled in their land and eat grapes to their fullness and enjoy the blessings of abundance. And at that very moment that God says, be careful, because then your heart will become haughty and you'll forget the Lord your God. Pentishkach, the same language that applies to Amalek, don't forget. It's applied to forgetting God in a time of abundance. You need to muster the same amount of spiritual energy that we're called upon to fight our enemies, to fight the equal danger of privilege. Judaism, its teachings, its rituals are meant to push us out of the natural human inclination to become spoiled, entitled, or to focus on deficits. I know it's tempting, but Judaism is the opposite of spoiled. I know for many of you, and I admit for me too, it can often feel like we are the Israelites at the edge of the sea, vulnerable, praying for a miracle. But the lesson our tradition teaches us is that when we pause to take stock, when we pause to say a blessing, when we pause to celebrate a bat mitzvah, think about how far we've come. We cannot feel anything but blessed. Dayenu, we have enough. Dayam Vehoter, they had enough to build their sanctuary and more. And so do we. May we be ever mindful of all of our blessings. Amen. Shabbat Shalom.