Nitsavim-Rosh Hashana - Prayer and Repentance

you're listening to the weekly partial podcast with our goldwag recorded with hashem's neverending assistance in roma misha's refugee 781 2021 this is the last partial podcast of the year 5781 we're coming into rosh hashanah the brand new year 5782 next week president hashem the partial podcast will begin with the year 5782 and as we come into rosh hashanah so we need to get ready we need to think about chuva repentance we need to think about tvla prayer and we need to think about sadaqa charity as our prayers say prayer repentance charity they take away from the negative from the zera heaven forbid if they're supposed to be a bad decree these have the power to remove the decree and it's certainly fitting that at the very beginning of our parsha i'm sorry to be the very beginning of of the major on our parsha there is an amazing amazing piece in the medrash which is based on this the verses in chapter 30 in our parsha verse 11. the mitzvah that i command you today it's not too hard for me it's not too distant allah more what's the mitzvah that the verse is referring to so the different explanations right before i was talking about the fact that we're to return to hashem so that those who say it's talking about shiva repentance but as you're going to see in the midrash it's really also talking about the concept of prayer and repentance praying for god to forgive us that's what we're going to see in the madrid now before we see the message it's so important to read these verses this mitzvah that i'm i'm commanding you today it's not too hard it's not too hard to repent it's not too hard to change it's not too hard to ask god for forgiveness it's not too hard to say hashem please i know i've done wrong i want to change take this away from me take away the burden of my sin take away the average the sins that i've done leyva shamayimi maybe someone else will bring this repentance someone else will bring my atonement for me the verse says it's not true you have to go up to the heavens tell somebody else to bring it back for you it's not on the other side of the sea the mitzvah the commandments generally speaking speaking about the torah itself but specifically the the obligation to repent to change to become a better person to let go of my past ways it's not something that is too far away someone needs to come and bring it for me such touching words such beautiful words it's very close to you it's inside of you already you know what to do intuitively you know what to do you know you should do and you can do it it's in your mouth it's in your heart you just got to do it okay those are the verses and i'd like to read through the madrish the measure starts off and i'm not going to read the entire piece in the match but the measure starts off speaking about the concept of prayer and it says sometimes when we miss a prayer there are certain prayers we have three times a day on a normal weekday we pray three times a day chakras one in the morning we have until the measure says we have until midday to say the morning prayer there's the afternoon prayer which is from midday until the evening and there's the the prayer of the evening which can be said all night long if you miss the prayers what do you do you can make it up god wants our prayers god desires our prayers i'll call thee the measure says everything is in its time and where we get this idea from that where do we get these different the the fact that we have all these different times for the prayers of course there are the set prayers of course we can pray whatever we want we can always have spontaneous prayer and talk to hashem anytime we need to god listens to the message brings a beautiful touching pasuk the verse says in mission in proverbs chapter 8 verse 17 i love those who i love i will love them how does hashem show us his love those who get up early in the morning they're going to find me those who get up in the morning morning to pray to god they're going to find me i will show my love says god by answering the prayers that the jewish people those who i love that they [Music] you know that they express so here's measure says just beautiful things and it's so important to understand as we go into rosh hashanah what is this prayer about what are we doing for well of course you know we've been in difficult times since the last year and a half and everyone has their own challenges that they have faced and are facing what is the idea of prayer welcome [Music] whoever prays and he has intention in his prayer you know sometimes we space out we're praying we space out sometimes we have a good prayer we we're in we're focused we're we're saying the words and we're meaning what we say so simentave should be listening a person has proper intent while he's praying it's a good sign for him that prayer is going to be received sometimes you don't know why somebody i was speaking to today told me that during their prayers this morning during the slikhas they were surprised they had focus they had focus in their in the prayer even in parts that they might say by rote they had focus and i thought it was quite reflective of what this magician's saying a person has focus they need to know you had a good davening you had a good prayer service you were focused you thought about the words it's a sign that your prayers are going to be answered the verse says the desire of those who are humble you heard hashem and the end of the verses their hearts were prepared your ears listened so you see that when if you see that your your heart was prepared you were focused and as i understood it what does kavanaugh mean it's very interesting i think means the desire of the humble hashem listens to the desire of the humble if we prayer in a contrite way we show that we believe that god answers prayers we show that it's not my line and we don't necessarily deserve it but we know that god is you know god loves us he wants to give it to us so hashem listens to those prayers the the how how does the verse express it's a verse in to him in psalm chapter 10 verse 17 has the verse expressed the concept of kavanaugh of of focus it's the taiva of the november it's the desire of the humble if we say in the in the shema we say israel to jerusalem god return there or we're going to say yes the whole entire world we talk about the future time the time of mashiach of the messiah everyone's going to join together to do your will god if that's what we want that's what prayer means promise i want something i want something god please help me i need parnassa need livelihood i need health i i need i need wealth all the things that we want all the things that we need i want i need love if the prayer becomes an opportunity for us to express our true desire we really want mashiach to come we really want the messiah to arrive we really want to return to jerusalem we really want god to return to jerusalem if it's a taivo if it's the humble's desire god listens to that now comes the part where tzfilo you know we think of two we think of prayer he's making requests but the measure says something amazing who prayer is intensely powerful in front of god prayer has the ability to bring me from one place to a different place to transport me from one reality to a different reality you know there's different ways of praying there's different context contexts persons sometimes is in a difficult situation that prayer is very powerful because they mean it they really mean it a person is part of a group of people who are praying together asking for life asking for a good year they really mean it you're with a lot of people doubting together or singing together as a prayer for song you know i've watched people have sang it comes sometimes with many people close your eyes people are closing their eyes singing i'm your servant the son of your maidservant you can feel it but what if you're by yourself as the cs of experience what if you're by yourself you don't have that the power of the sea but you know the power of many people praying together so it may not be as powerful but don't think that it doesn't do anything says the majestic every prayer does something says the major may not do everything it'll do at least half listen to the story that the measure brings kai and um we all know the story of cain and abel cayenne kills his brother havel yatsuki zero navanoti about god decreed upon him as a punishment for his sin we need to understand what is what this means because it's essential god decreed upon him you will be a wanderer a na vinod no means to move right we shake the lulav it's called the anu means a nomad someone who doesn't have a place you will be somebody who moves and shakes in the land okay so so cain saw he'd done something terrible you killed his brother you got to creep on him a terrible terrible sentence you're you're never going to have stability you're always going to be shaking you're always going to be wandering venezuela immediately he stood still and he confessed in front of god should never go to the left so he said my my sin is too great to bear it's too much i can't handle it i did such a terrible thing i feel so so terrible i see and perhaps he saw it in in what the punishment was it's too great i can't i can't do it guy i can't bear this i'm on the fun of and this is the prayer and listen carefully to this prayer because we need this prayer we need this prayer i'm on the phone revenge shalom [Music] he said to him master of the world colorado you carry right it says girl i've only been saying means it's too great for me to bear too late for me to carry he says hashem god you carry the entire world the whole world is on your back so to speak for lavonia can you not carry my sin as well because after the first murderer he says i can't bear this sin but you you could carry it you could carry it you could take it off of my back it says in the verse kind quoted him the verse which of course wasn't going to be said for many centuries said by michael micah the prophet chapter 7 verse 18. the verse says that god carries sin it means literally he forgives sin he passes over iniquity said cayenne nice which means to forgive sin also means to carry carry the sin god you carry sins forgive me for my sin it's too big for me to to carry you carry it is a powerful such a powerful mantra immediately he prayed this prayer he said these words he had the right words that he said to god and hashem listened and he said wow you just you just said the right thing half of the decree was removed he'd been told that he would be na venad he would be shaking and he would be moving she can't see vayeshavir was the verse say the verse says that he he lived in the land of node node means so it could be the name of a place but as an enforcement say there's no such place there's other places node so what's the explanation the accept says it means that he didn't move around a lot wherever he walked the ground would shake that's what he says wherever he walked the ground would shake but he didn't have to wander he didn't have to walk so half of the xero which was that he would that he would he would wander and and he would shake half of it was rescinded because of his prayer and i was reading this studying this with my son moshodov and i and i said to him what's the idea why is his punishment that he has to be a wanderer and then he has the the world shakes when he stands on it what's the idea what does it mean that a person carries a sin you know we all know we've all done things wrong and we know the feeling of guilt the guilt it weighs on us figuratively but here we see that there's something more perhaps and i and i offered that when a person does something wrong you know it's like a table a table has legs the table has legs and if one of the legs breaks so the table is is it's not sturdy it's not yet sev [Music] it becomes shaky when we sin our foundation is shaky it's an appropriate punishment that you should have to wonder because when you are yet see when you are when everything is founded you feel you feel stable you feel good you have a home you have a place you have your your makkah you have your place in shul someone sits in your spot you have to sit somewhere else you feel uncomfortable you're not in your place if you can't if you come home and the door is locked you can't get in your house you don't have the key you feel you feel you're not in your place when a person does a sin hashem is called the mukulim which means referred to god as the place when we do a sin we're not in the place we've lost our foundation we've lost our yetzivut our stability navinod to yaba'aretz the the punishment fits the crime when someone does in a vera when a person sins when a person is murdered somebody he's he's made his foundations shake his connection to god he can't stay in that place every time he touches the ground the ground shakes but when a person turns to god that's what this magician is saying i think it's amazing it's so deep it's so beautiful so powerful when a person turns to god and says god i'm shaking my foundations are shaking i can't i can't hold it up i can't do it god please take away some of this burden please take away the sin from me please forgive me i i realize i've done wrong that's ms vader i admit it i show remorse these are the three steps admit it show remorse and number three resolve never to do it again kabbalah don't ever do it again and if i do it again try again make a deeper commitment deeper commitment hashem carries it that's the measure tells us hashem carries it and i might not be able to to to clean it off completely i might not be able to dive in with its sibor i might have to be able to mean it all the way but but every every prayer every time i pray you see that kind was able to pray he was able to do chuva he spoke from his heart he carved like we saw in the verse it's very close to you it's inside of you intuitively you know what to do you know what to say and where did cayenne get the words from it's a good one it's too heavy for me to bear god you carry it he knew it intuitively and we all know it intuitively inside of ourselves the sins that we bear are too big for us but we don't have to bear them we can throw them away we can throw them on to god and say god you carry them god you carry them that's how powerful mekhana to feel if negligible you see how important prayer is in front of god because what we're doing is our foundations are weak we've we've removed ourselves from that which is stable god is forever god is stable god's the ultimate stability and we've disconnected from god through our sins that's why we feel guilt that's why we feel this heavy burden on our backs but when we say tasham you take the burden what we're saying is god i want my stability back i want to be connected to you my god so now instead of me having to wander i have a place instead of the ground shaking every time i walk on it the ground is still maybe my prayers are not gonna be enough but my prayers will do something oh i did this already how many times have i done this you know no every time you do it it's it does something it does something i think of that the words a little bit extra this time ashamed i made myself desolate hashem i rebelled against you god you matter one more time try try to mean it tai was lee boy as we saw before the desire taiwan's hashem god listen to our prayers because that's our desire i hashem i really want to be forgiven i really want to change i want to i want to wa or i want to want to change i wish that i wanted i wish i could feel something that's also that also has value i could think about i could think about how many people do we know that have lost their lives over the last year and a half how many people do we know i know people i know a lot of people the ground was shaky the ground has been shaky for us in this world how can i show god that i want to connect to him i want that stability the stability of tyra the stability of the mitzvos the stability of doing what's right the stability of having that foundation of tyra of gemara of majesh of sukim what is god's will i just want god's will i just want to read uh hezekiah his interaction with the navi lightsaber decided he's not gonna get married he knew he's going to have a child who's going to be a russia a wicked person it wasn't fulfilling the mitzvah of having children it's not your heisman what your kid is going to be in the end you have a kid so you have an avoid you know your kid's going to be somebody bad it's not it's not your husband in the end it's going to be he's going to do terrible things but he's going to have a zadok for its son you say his kyo is decreed upon him that he should die and navi told him he's going to die what did he do he turned to the wall which means that he turned to god in prayer [Music] he said god says i heard your prayers i saw your tears i'm going to cure you of your sickness another 15 years of life the desire the desire of those who fear him that's what god will do with sha'asam they're calling out there's a shavo mate says i heard it why because it was real it was real god hears it because it's real it's mitzvahs i say it's so close to you it's in your heart and it's kippur we say on rosh hashanah we say the words we don't have the words but we have the feelings we can activate our feelings there's so much to think about so many thoughts that we can have to activate our feelings i don't think i don't think there's anybody who doesn't know somebody wasn't affected i don't think there's anybody who doesn't know somebody who's looking for a shirt who can't have kids it's so many different things so many challenges we can we can turn on our feelings we can we can and to the degree that we're able to like he was supposed to die it all can change that's the power of prayer is so big it's so great it's so powerful in front of hashem we can change everything you can change everything with chuva and filo and with with repentance with prayer with charity we're showing who who is our foundation god is our foundation who is our foundation god is our foundation what is the right way the torah is the right way i don't want to be a wanderer anymore i don't want to be in gullus anymore i want to come back to earth's israel the land of israel the place where god's presence is openly manifest i want to return to that foundation to that that sense that i have everything i want to bless you and ask you to bless me hashem should bless us all to write us in that book right away a book of good life of health of joy of paranosa of livelihood of torah of keras allah came of closeness to god hashem should bless us that that the year which has passed the challenges we've gone through they should be a kappa for us they should atone for us and we should move into a new year where all we see are the many many blessings that god wants to bestow upon us thank you so much for listening have a wonderful shabbos this podcast was made possible through the gracious donations of listeners like you for more podcasts like this please visit or www.ariegoldwag.com on itunes ari goldwag [Music]