Can You Be Nostalgic for the Future? | Parshas Vayigash

so this Jewish guy goes into business and he has some success and he wants to show his mother that he made it his mother is you know from the old country so he sends her something very lavish something very classy champagne and caviar and he doesn't get a response so he calls her and he says ah how did you like the gift she says it was very thoughtful he said yeah but it was classy right she says it was very thoughtful it's just it was really you know five-star yeah world class she says I gotta tell you I don't know you know what what fancy means but the ginger ale was sour and the poppy seeds tasted like Herrick anyways so this week Joseph is discovered alive as the ruler of mitzrayim and he sends word back to his father and he sends gifts will obvious to his father a man in this week's partial pressures for you gosh Derrick mem hey pasa cough mo 45:23 of it to his father Shalala his icy scent like this Sarika made him ten donkeys nice him carrying me to mitzrayim the best of Egypt or the goodness of Egypt what's the goodness of Egypt you know I don't know how much you guys are connoisseurs a fine you know American culture but there's a very there's a very gourmet drink called Milwaukee's best that's like I'm joking because it's like this is this beer that you get for like 20 cents a can or any place but it's called Milwaukee's best so what's Milwaukee's best it's a beer right okay so what's a specced tools mitts ryan what's egypt's best so what did he send this father I don't know what that means so Rashi tells me machinima talmud I find in the founders in the gomorian good morning become on a megillah' mashaallah la yaani ocean he sent him old wine sent him old wine okay what's that this wine why do you send him wine so that I could kind of figure out why because from last week's patient says the Pasha tells me that his brothers at the meal where they met yes even though it including yet no it was yes if they drink wine and now she tells me because they were they had abstained from wine because they were they became aware they took a Nazarite vow but then when they met him they drank wine so you could and and the case of himself had taken the same Valley also has abstained from one so maybe you could assume that just like yes when his brothers they didn't drink wine because of the pain that they experienced being separated from each other so young give their father did a similar thing so he also didn't drink wine all this time so yes if is sending wine and he's saying tada it's time to celebrate pop the champagne you we can drink wine again we're reunited we're about to be reunited so that the wine part I could figure it out but why I notion old wine how do I know it was old wine that's the question why is that we old so they're different explanations for this but I want to give you one particular approach to the question and and before we go further I want to ask another question which is sort of like a more of a philosophical question which is can you be nostalgic for the future we think of nostalgia being you know reminiscing about the past or even idealizing or romanticizing the past can you be nostalgic for the future it's a question to think about so I'll tell you a story that I remember it sounds like one of these stories that well frankly it sounds like a made-up story it happens to be I know the people had happened to and I remember I remember when it happened so I can tell you it's not a made-up story the story took place in 2001 while I was still in Kyllo in Crown Heights and I remember very clearly it happening and the guy that had happened to was the guy who I don't know if he still owns but he owned a car service I think a union car service is free free commercial for service okay a guy named Ronnie from Georgia George and Jew not Georgia like Atlanta Georgia George and Jew Grazyna and his wife Asti I think both of them came over to America as teenagers they came from the former Soviet Union at that time it was still Soviet Union when they came over and they they perhaps they still live in Queens but I remember at that time they lived in Queens at any rate the story is in 1991 Ronnie went four dollars to the llevaba chewed-up at 770 Sunday dollars ok 1991 that I was still giving dollars in total till 1992 so that ever stroke so talking about and and in the interactions on video I mean you could every everything here is documented Ronnie went to the rabbit in 1991 at that point he and Asti had been married for seven years they were married in 1984 and then they had not had children so he went to that have any asked for a Baraka for children and then Abbott told him the cutoff mamas very soon so he's very it was ecstatic because very soon from the rabbit meant very soon so is assumed it was gonna happen immediately but his wife wasn't pregnant that week so he went the next Sunday never says because of mamas you know that week so it didn't happen that week so I went the next Sunday and the rabbit told him I'm just reading cuz I have I want to make sure this is exactly accurate and did I believe him this time two dollars and told him again the card of mamas very soon and so we went home and again he was ready for it to happen right away then he went back another time that ever gave him again that ever gave him two dollars and this time said basura Stivers good news may there be good news and then then he went back a fourth time and then I became Ronnie a dollar you give him a second dollar said this is for your wife and he gave him another dollar and he said for the children that will be born okay so after this fourth time he decides I have to show that I really have faith that this is a real Bravo so he had heard of story about a hoss said who once it got abraca from a rabbit I don't know which whatever about the God ever give my brother four children and to show that he had such faith he went out he bought a stroller okay surrounding insides I'm gonna do the same thing I'm gonna buy a stroller goes to the place where they sell the stroller and that a double stroller he says good I'll take the double stroller because never sad the children who will be born children plural so double stroller so they bought the double stroller they brought it home and they're waiting she's gonna become pregnant a week goes by a month goes by a year goes by no years go by now 1994 Kimo Thomas goes by okay whoever's passing you're talking about now three years after that and then another year and then another year in another year he went to the have a 1991 they were already married seven years 2001 ten years after he got the bracha passed he gave birth meaning seventeen years after they were first married she gave birth to twins I remember very clearly it wouldn't have been they're doing the head twins and he said up the Rebbe gave us two dollars each time then ever said children Oh children doesn't just mean one after the other children right writing in one shot and then they use the double stroller it's like I'm saying this sounds like one of these made-up stories I remember I'm telling you the names of the people I'm sure now once it's posted online they're gonna get plenty of calls and use their car service if they're still in the car service I don't know right but the point is my point doesn't have to tell you a miracle story because there are thousands of stories of miracles from the world should have been that's that's not my my point here my point is not what they're ever did in the story my point is what this guy did what did he do he decided to actualize his hope in a tangible way I one time I saw a letter from their Abba about be talking that was writing to someone and says your major problem right now is the lack of be talking you need to have more be talking in the case you don't know what is be talking I'm going to tell you right now and this letter to me is gold this has been to me a guiding light in my life whether debit in one sense in one sentence explains what is be talking such a tangible practical accessible potent way never says like this you know that feeling of utter relief that you're gonna have when your situation is finally resolved we talking merely means having that same feeling now and we know be talking is a powerful tool good fit sang good that as you think positively you manifest positive results so here was somebody who said I'm gonna have children why is having children and he bought that stroller he bought that stroller to show I'm already there I already you know somebody writes you a check and you're holding the check oh now I was paid what do you mean you were paid they could cancel the jacket the check could bounce but there's a certain feeling I have to check in hand pop I can breathe I can relax I was paid I have the but off of him the time I'm paid that's it it's coming and he bought that stroller as a sign that it was real to him okay so this did not now now will answer our question what was the signal or the symbol or the the message of yes of sending yankov not just wine but old wine the old wine shows hey I've had this with me the whole time from the day we were separated I knew there would come a reunion and now it's time now it's time you know this week is hate Davis which is the celebration of the victory in court of the library of a goodness city Habad the library that the previous had ever amassed over generations and what was to be the the fate of these these holy books and we know that there ever was very very very concerned about the outcome it wasn't just about the books it was it was much deeper than that and that there was a time of great crisis I would say in Lubavitch during that the time the Proceedings of the the court case especially over a period of a year before the verdict came out and I was just I was at a falling in last year and I was hearing somebody mentioned that there was a bother what who was he no just debacle just a guy kid a young man but for a year what was he doing every time he had a little bit of pocket change you would buy a lot buy a bottle of Smirnoff you'd buy some now we did two commercials device and you put it away in a storage closet and not touch it because he knew as soon as the verdict comes out there's gonna be a father hanging so for a year he amassed a closet full of vodka whether there's a joke they say why was he famous a bigger miracle than Hanukkah because Hanukkah what enough oil for one day lasted eight days hey Davis enough vodka for a year lasted a week and that's great that's the point of being nostalgic for the future having a souvenir you know we all souvenirs to remind us of a time in the past there's also the idea of a souvenir to remind you of a time that's coming in the future so yes have had that bottle of wine with him the whole time he says Tao we're gonna have our reunion it didn't happen yet but it's going to happen and that's a teaching for all of us both on an individual level and also on the macro on the global level good times are coming and we have to have faith we have to have trust that those good times are coming and if you can already invest in a souvenir to remind you of the good times that are yet to come to show how secure and how much trust you have in a shaman and how he's going to take care of you then that itself brings us to those good times