Home

It can be a challenge to find yourself in a new place, trying to make a new life. We all know this. And let me tell you, there can be culture shock going from a place like, say, north Jersey to, oh. I don’t know, the High Country of North Carolina. These are very different vibes, but I don’t need to tell you that.

I’ve been here for three weeks now, and I’m beginning to get a sense of the place. Learning how to get from here to there and back again. Figuring out where to get the good coffee—which is apparently “everywhere”!—and learning the best places to park. Seriously, where are you supposed to park at some of these places? But if there’s one thing I’ve learned in these three weeks…you have to place the order for unsweet tea.

One moment, I was in New Jersey, packing up my office of twenty years, and the next moment, I was unpacking all of it right over there, setting and placing and nesting and building…an office.

And just two weeks ago, I stood on the bimah here for only the second time — the first was at my audition last December. I didn’t dare think it then, but two weeks ago, despite the whirlwind, the newness of all of this, and having never spent any other time here…this felt right. Could this be home?

Funny thing, that. Home, I mean. What is it really? What makes a home a home? And how do we continue to grow and nurture a vibrant spiritual home here in the mountains? 

Let’s start with a synagogue, that’s easy. A synagogue is sanctified space. Synagogues, study houses, and even our homes are called a mikdash me’at, a small temple. According to the Talmud (Megilah 29a), God will dwell in the holy spaces we create, for they are the Temple in miniature. 

The term “mikdash me’at” comes from a passage in Ezekiel. As he was busy prophesying sometime around 592 BCE about Jerusalem’s eventual destruction, a wicked leader of the people named Pelatiyah, son of Benayah, dropped dead. Ezekiel, cried out (11:13), “Lord God, you are wiping out the remnant of Israel.” God responded that He “removed them far among the nations and scattered them among the countries, and I have become to them a mikdash me’at, a small sanctuary.”

Some rabbis saw this phrase as a comfort, a promise that God would go with the Jews into exile in Babylon. The Indwelling Presence of the Shechinah would rest once more on their synagogues and study halls. Even outside the Land, in their new synagogues by the waters of Babylon, they would retain a remnant of the glory and splendor of God’s Presence. 

To ensure this sanctity, the rabbis of the Talmud created rules around behavior in the synagogue — no eating and drinking, no foolishness or silliness. You cannot just “hang out” in a sanctuary, you can’t even duck into a synagogue simply to use it as a shelter from rain or snow. 

This is a holy place. A sacred space where we pray, study, and gather together as a kehillah kedosha — a holy community. 

Okay, so what makes it holy? What makes it a home?

We have a Torah scroll. Gorgeous stained glass. A Ner Tamid. Prayerbooks and Bibles. We have plaques and memorials. We have the tree of life. Everything set, everything in its place. We are surrounded by the gifts that you brought to build this mishkan, this sanctuary in the mountains. 

Like the Israelites in the desert, you created this space from scratch. That is an incredible feat! You used what you had. Wood and stone and heart and determination. It took chutzpah and hard work. It took ignoring naysayers. It took love. Those with vision, chazon, saw the need to move beyond church walls and borrowed spaces and construct this incredible mikdash me’at, this holy space just for us. 

Now I know that many of you here tonight also belong to temples elsewhere with sanctuaries that seat thousands, that have a dozen torahs, grand arks, and lofty ceilings. They may have chapels and draperies and courtyards. Temples much like the one I just came from.

One particular thing I learned having sung on a high and fancy bimah for thousands with an organ loft and a full choir — none of that guarantees a mikdash me’at.

We are in the period of the Three Weeks, the time between the 17th of Tammuz — commemorating when the walls of Jerusalem were breached by the Romans — and the 9th of Av — the date when the First and Second Temples finally fell. It is a time when we enter into mourning and reflection. We wonder, how could these incredible edifices, these marble and golden courtyards disintegrate into dust? 

Chazal, our sages, teach this: The reason the Temples fell was that they were not built by Jews. You might not know this, but they were largely built by non-Jewish laborers who did not have in their hearts and minds the desire for holiness. They were glorious in design but weak in spirit.

By contrast, the Mishkan, the simple, humble sanctuary they schlepped around the desert for 40 years, was never destroyed. It was never taken over by the enemy, never ransacked or defiled. Tradition teaches that it’s still here, yes, even today — it was hidden away by the righteous to reappear when the Moshiach arrives. 

Why did it survive? Because it was built by those with chacham lev — wisdom of the heart.

A home built with such love and wisdom will stand the test of time.

Here’s another thing to consider. It’s hard to leave a home behind.

When I got divorced, I had to sell my dream home. It was a three story, seven bedroom, seven fireplace Victorian home from 1883 with a huge covered porch, servant’s stairs, and inlaid floors. I raised three children there for 12 years.

In some ways, selling that house was the hardest thing that I’ve ever done. Not because it was a beautiful house — and it was — but because of what it had represented when I first moved in, all the hopes and dreams of a family. A home, surely.

After everything was gone, moved to other houses, the girls and I sat and wrote little one-line notes. 

“Please take care of this house.” 

“We hope you have good times here.” 

“Be kind to one another.”

We hid these notes in the walls and the floorboards. In the light fixtures. In the crevices — we placed our farewells and blessings as if into the stones of the Kotel. 

It was difficult in the moment. And yet, at the last, it was just a house. It was not home, not for me or my girls in the end. And that’s when I realized that they were the home, not the building.

A house, a building, may become a home. But home is not fixtures and floors, antique spindles and marble fireplaces. Home is not scrolls and stained glass and books. These are merely the context, the setting. They are important, but they alone do not make a home.

It is the people that build and decorate and create that context, set that stage, and fill that space with life, love, and laughter. They — you — are home here.

Because home is where love lives. Home is where you are embraced, cared for, protected, and cherished. Home is where we give kavod to each and every person who walks through that door. Home is where you are accepted, understood, and lifted up. 

Standing here tonight, with all of you — your voices, prayers, hopes, and dreams for this mountain country mikdash me’at m’od, this very small holy space — I can tell you one more thing I have learned in just these three weeks.

Here, I am home.

---

Click to watch this sermon on YouTube.