LIGHT IT UP with Rabbi Moshe Bamberger | CHAZAQ

Good evening. Thank you all for joining us tonight. It's very special this year. I thank of course the Nisonian family Rabbi and Rabbitson and all the family for being here tonight. This year, we have a great honor to hear from our Moshe and Shlita. We're hoping to hear from him momentarily. We're invited by the Chazak organization. We thank all Simcha, Rabbi Weitman, Rabbi Elbaz for opening their doors and partnering up to this event. A shul which is a place of Torah and chesed in the community. Baruch Hashem. And a quick word about the We're here We're We're here of course with the special topic tonight, lighting it up and preparing for Chanukah. And we'll hear momentarily from Rabbi Nisonian a word from the word of the Chazak organization, which is spreading so much light in the community through shiurim and events and and for men and for women, young and old, everybody in between. And a special um um influence through the public school outreach with afterschool programs in 15 different locations. And since 2017, transferred over 1,500 children from public school to yeshiva. And of course, anyone knows someone who has a child in public school that they give a Jewish education, they should reach out to the Chazak organization. And of course, we're preparing for Chanukah, but of course, our hearts, our minds, and our souls are with our fellow brethren in Eretz Yisrael in the land of Israel. And I think one message that we can take upon ourselves is I heard I heard recently that there was a rabbi got up in front of the in front of the shul members and he said, "Yes, I'm three questions." And he said, "If anyone If If anyone could please raise their hands if they know of anyone who was If If they have any relatives who were who were killed in the in October 7th attack." And no one raised their hands. Second question he asked was, "Does anyone have any relatives If they If they If anyone have any relatives who were who were taken hostage?" And no one raised their hands. The third and final question he asked was, "Does anybody have any relatives who who are in the who are in the Israeli army and they're about to maybe go out and and and fight in the war?" And a few people raised their hands. And he said, "The issue is the problem is is that every single person in this room should have raised their hands for every single one of these questions. We would If you If we would take to heart these aren't these these are not just people These are not just um um it's a news article. No, it's our fellow brothers, our sisters, our relatives. And if we realized that, we would daven differently, we would speak differently, we would listen differently. So of course, that's what we're here doing tonight. And um without further ado everyone please rise for Rabbi Nisonian. You sit down. Good evening, everyone. Thank you very much for coming. In reality, this is not the real yahrzeit. The real yahrzeit is right after Yom Kippur between between Yom Kippur and Sukkot. Unfortunately, this year it was so close to the holiday itself that nobody would come. We planned it to do that right after Sukkot. And right after Sukkot, we are in October 7th event. And Baruch Hashem we decided to make this to lighten up just before Chanukah to see what we can do for ourselves for the entire Am Yisrael that basically right now with all the soldiers that we have in the combat field and all the hostages that still remain there. And of course all of us all around the world that we are arevim zeh lazeh. We must feel that we ourselves we are there and therefore try to lighten up our action our deed to Hakadosh Baruch Hu. And bezrat Hashem, I hope that all of us will get something from Rabbi Bamberger that we know him for so many years the mashgiach in Lander and Baruch Hashem bracha v'hatzlacha to all of us. Bracha v'hatzlacha to all. I'd like to thank all Simcha and the wonderful Chazak organization and of course, Rabbi and Rabbitson Avraham and Ciporah Nisonian shlita and family. I feel like I'm a part of the family through uh through Avi and uh and his Rabbitson and his children and and we've known known each other indeed for many, many years and it's a big zchut to be uh speaking here this evening on this special occasion. Uh although it's not the actual yahrzeit, but it is an honor and it's l'zecher nishmas um their wonderful son, their beloved son, Yair Netzer zichrono livracha. On the 20th yahrzeit of Yair Netzer they uh the Nisonians came up with a beautiful idea, a beautiful initiative called Light It Up. I don't know if there are brochures in the shul. There are over there in the corner actually, I see them. Uh it's such a wonderful idea that they had to inspire people every single day to do very small things, very small actions, deeds that would uh really change a person's life, really change the world. Sometimes we think that in order to uh to change the world, we have to do these tremendous things. We have to be like a senator or president or prime minister. And anything short of that or a gadol hador. And if we don't meet that bar, then you know, we're just regular people. The truth is that the greatest people are the people that understand that the small things in life are so important. And that's what this initiative Light It Up is all about. And I I would really encourage everybody after the shiur to take one of these brochures and study it well and really try to inspire every single day uh to just a few examples that that are brought over here um to greet three people with a simple hello or hi and a smile stop rushing for something think of at least three things to thank Hashem for, big or small. Just every day, little little ideas, little little actions that really will increase the quality of your life and it'll change the entire world. Small things change the world. There's a story about Rabbi Salanter the great founder and father of the Mussar movement. The Mussar movement was a movement uh in Europe about 100 years ago that basically every yeshiva and every baal bayis should study every day a certain amount of Mussar. Mussar is uh there are texts that we have like Mesillas Yesharim and Shaarei Teshuvah and many other books that really uh are designed to make a person think about how to change, how to improve. When Rabbi Salanter was a young man, he would say about himself that he wanted to change the world. He said, "When I was a young man, I really thought that I could change the entire world and I tried to do it. And I went to different countries and I would try to inspire people and to shake things up and really be somebody that could change the entire nature of the planet." He says, "But I wasn't successful. I was not able to do that." And then he says, "You know what? Maybe I just was shooting too far. Maybe I should uh lower my expectations. So I tried to change my country. And I spent a long time. I went from city to city and to different parts of the country and I wasn't able to change them." He says, "You know what? If I can't change the country, let me change the city that I live in. And I went to different people and to different shuls and different battei midrash and it wasn't working. Nothing that I was doing was working." He says, "Let me change my family." And he tried to change his family, tried to improve their uh their davening and their learning and everything. And he says, "It didn't go. Nothing that I was doing was able to succeed." Until he said, "One day, I looked in the mirror and I said, 'Let me try to change myself.' Let me try to change myself." He says, "So I really worked hard and I changed myself. And then a remarkable thing happened. As soon as I changed myself suddenly my family began to change, my city began to change, my country began to change, and the entire world changed. What does this mean? That changing a world really starts with changing ourselves, with doing little, small, simple things that we tend to not even think is important. But those little things are really things that could change an entire universe. To do small acts of kindness, to learn a little Torah, to forgive. Sometimes we have people in our lives that we we have tynotes on, we have uh we're upset with, they did something wrong to us and they really did do something wrong to us. And we have a grudge in our heart and we don't want to let it go. And imagine if we would just let it go, our lives would be better. Those things that are seemingly small, but they're not small, they're really huge. It's all part of this wonderful initiative. And I think that it would be wonderful if we would be able to really start bringing this into our lives. I had a rebbe in one of my yeshivas, his name was Reb Shimon Alster, and he was nifter exactly a month ago. His shloshim was just is this week. And he was a a very very uh beautiful man, a a a very uh inspirational figure, a tremendous talmud chacham, but he was known for his thoughts, his ideas. And in fact, in this week's paper, in one of the Jewish papers, they have an article about him in honor of his shloshim and and it gives a whole like uh sidebar of quips and different lines that he had. And one of the things that he had that he used to say was that the defining character of an adam gadol, a great man, how would you define a great person? What's the defining characteristic of being great? He used to say that it's his small maasim, the little things that he does, that he takes care to do, that very few people do. Smaller people care only about the big things. Smaller people care about the, you know, the banner headline things. When you have to do something really big, that's when they get excited. Big people care about the little things in life, the very small things that everybody sweeps under the rug, that people don't think is important. That smile that you give, that friendly hello that you give, the uh the little Torah that we might learn. Maybe we take out a Tehillim while we're in a doctor's waiting uh room or on an airplane or those little things that you don't get any uh there's no newspaper articles going to be written about you. You're not No one's taking your picture at those moments. But it's those little things that we do that make us great. The greatest people were the people that cared about the little things in life. I'll tell you a story that I remember about Reb Shimon Alster himself. And I remember very clearly in downstairs, the beit midrash was on the second floor, sort of like here, and on the first floor, there was like the lobby of the yeshiva and sometimes, like maybe a few times a year, there was a poor person that came in and he would sell different little things like Parker pens and a little like keychains and different small trinkets that he would uh that he would sell to make some money for himself. And one day and they were a little bit more expensive than you could buy in a regular store. So, if let's say a Parker pen was uh you could buy in a store for $3, he charged $5. And of course, people passed by the yeshiva bachurim and said, "Why should I buy it from him for $5? I can get it in the store for $3." Reb Shimon Alster one day came up to the beit midrash with like a whole pile of pens, a whole bunch of maybe 30 pens and he put it out on the table. He says, "Does anyone need a pen? Take a pen." So, the bachurim said, "Why did rebbe buy all of these pens?" He says, "Don't you understand? This man, he could have easily just come and collected, gone from person to person and asked everybody for charity. But he has too much pride. He didn't want to do that. So, he tries to make a living. The way that he makes his living is he charges a little bit more for a pen. So, if I would give him $50 as a as a charity, he says, "Why Imagine how much how great the reward would be if I would be able to buy his pens, make him feel good about himself, and give him charity that way, with dignity." Most people didn't think that way. Most people say, "That's that's you know, he's charging too much and criticizing his business uh you know, he has to rethink his whole business plan." Reb Shimon Alster was a great man. And because he was a great man, he cared about the little things. He saw things for what they were. He understood the human psyche, the human condition, and he made sure to to express that in in action and indeed. This past week's parashah, yesterday's parashah, I think is the best illustration of this concept, how small equals big, that the smaller the things in life, the bigger that they are. And perhaps a lot of us might know what I'm about to say, and that's good. Vayivater Yaakov levado. The pasuk says that the day before the encounter that that Yaakov had with Esav, he remained alone. Vayivater Yaakov levado, he he moved his family across a river and then he came back that night and he stayed alone for some reason. We don't know why he was alone, but you look in Rashi and Rashi of course tells us why he was alone. Rashi says, shachach pachin ketanim, the chazar aleihem. He forgot little jars. There was little jars that he had that he had forgotten about, he had left on the other side of the bridge and he came back to fetch them. He came back to retrieve them. Now, I ask you a question. Why would Yaakov Avinu do this? Yaakov Avinu was not a poor man. Yaakov Avinu was a billionaire. He came out of Lavan's house and he had a tremendous fortune of money. He had many, you know, maybe thousands of cattle and he had silver and he had gold and he had diamonds. He had so much. Why would Yaakov Avinu go back to get the pachin ketanim? Why was that important for Yaakov Avinu to do? And the answer that our rabbis teach us is because for a tzaddik, for somebody that's a righteous man, his money is precious to him. Every little thing is precious to him. There's no such thing as, "I'm not bending down on the floor to pick up a nickel. Well, that's that doesn't that What do you mean? You got it honestly, you got it fairly, Hashem gave it to you, then it's chashuv, it's considered to be important. Every little thing is important. We don't consider that. We don't think about that. If we were, let's say, driving and we left the hotel and we forgot our toothbrush back in the hotel room, would anyone go back to get it? It's a few dollars, we'll get Yaakov Avinu felt that it was important to go back because he understood that every little thing, even if it's seemingly small, is very important. There's no such thing as something small to a great person. And that's why that night the sar shel Esav, the angel of Esav, started fighting with Yaakov. And who won? Yaakov Avinu wins and we forever are called Yisrael. Am Yisrael, why? Because ki sarita im Elokim v'im anashim vatuchal. Because Yaakov fought against an angel and against men and he won. He was victorious. This wasn't a coincidence that it happened the very same night that he went back for those little jugs. You know why? Because that's what the fight was about. As soon as the malach of Esav, which is really the yetzer hara, saw that there's a man in the world that appreciates every little thing, that nothing is trivial, everything is valuable, everything is important, he realized, "This is somebody that I have to fight with. I can't let this man just walk around because he's going to change the world. If you change a little bit, if you're able to understand the power of changing a little bit like Reb Yisrael Salanter, you start changing yourself because you realize how every little small thing, how valuable that is, you're going to change the world and the sar shel Esav cannot have that. So, he fought with Yaakov Avinu. Yaakov Avinu won because he understood how important every little thing is. Tonight's drashah is called lighting it up, which is I guess a play on the on the name of the initiative, which is lighted up, but it's also, of course, the week of Chanukah. This Thursday night we're going to light the first night of the first candle of Chanukah. And I want to share with you a remarkable historical idea. And that is that we know that besides for the miraculous victory that the Jewish people had over the Syrian Greeks, which was Robin B Adam was a lopsided victory, but we were able to to come away victorious. There was a second miracle, and the second miracle was that we were able to find a little jug, a little jug of the base in the base on mikdash that was not defiled by the Greeks. It had the the seal of the on it, and we knew therefore if it was sealed, that means it was not defiled and we could actually light the menorah for a week. And that is why we celebrate the menorah every night. We light the menorah in celebration of this great miracle. Did you know that there's a direct connection between the little jug of oil, those jugs that went back to fetch that night, and the jug of oil that was discovered in the mikdash, which is why we celebrate Hanukkah? The Midrash says, I'm says to you, you I tell you went back to find that one little jug of oil, and because of the I'm going to pay you back. I'm going to reward you with a jug of oil that will be discovered during the time of Hanukkah. Isn't that amazing? I'll tell you something even more amazing. The holy right, some write that the actual jar of oil that was found in the mikdash that night of Hanukkah that the miracle happened because of, guess what that exact same jar was. It was the jar that went back to find that night. Same jar. Many, many years later, same exact jar. The miracle of Hanukkah is also a miracle of appreciating something small and understanding how great that could be. A light is something that it's a very small thing, but you know how much light could be brought to the world from one little candle? If I have one candle, and everybody here in the room has a candle, you could just take from my candle and we'll spread, and then you could take it to your neighbors and to your family. We could we could make thousands, millions of lights from one little light, and you don't lose out. That's what Hanukkah is all about. It's the concept of taking something very little and understanding its value. That's what a Jew does. That's what he is does. We understand that when we have little things in our lives and we appreciate them and we really try to do them on consistent basis that we can change the world. We can become great people as a result of this. You know, I want to speak a little bit about that little seal that was on the on that jug that was found on Hanukkah that showed that this oil is pure. You know, a seal is something that's very insignificant. What is it? It's a little piece of paper, a little sticker. But a seal is very important. Even though it's so small and seemingly insignificant, it's huge. It's It's It's It's enormous. I'll give you an example. If let's say you order from a store, let's say some takeout, and you have it delivered. You have a Chinese restaurant deliver deliver food to you tonight. If it doesn't have a seal on it, if the delivery person who wasn't a Jew didn't seal it properly, there wasn't a seal that showed that it that it that it was from the and it was was rabbinically approved, you can't eat it. What's the seal? The seal is just another It's a little sticker. But with it you have everything, without it you have nothing. You can't eat it. There's a story that's told about a man that was sitting on a plane, a Jewish man, and he was about to sitting next to a non-Jewish man, and they were talking and they got along, and I think the non-Jewish man was from Texas, and he was a very burly, very you know, he spoke a lot and he was very friendly, and they were having a lot of conversation. Finally, the food comes, and the the non-Jew got his non-Jewish deli sandwich, pastrami sandwich, and the Jew, of course, had his kosher meal wrapped in cellophane with a sticker and everything, and and he was about to enjoy his sandwich, and they were pretty much similar sandwiches. And I don't know if you have this. I don't know what your rabbis say, but you know, it's not so clear even if it says on the on the bread that it's throw, it's not so clear if you make a Some people say there is no such thing as throw. You have to really always wash on it. I'm not getting into the discussion, but this particular person felt He kept remembering his rabbi say, you know, you you have to wash even on the plane. You have to do and you can't assume that it's you have to Okay, so but he had already opened up his sandwich. He was about to bite into it, and then he felt guilty. So, he basically went and he and he he started He was about to eat, and then he says, "You know what? I have to go wash. I have to wash my hands." So, he excuses himself for a second. He goes to wash his hands, and he comes back, and all of a sudden he realizes that, you know, I left my sandwich alone for a while, and that's called You're not allowed to eat a sandwich if you or meat that was not under Jewish supervision for for for period of time that somebody could have tampered with it. Somebody might have switched the meat even though it seems like it's not really, you know, that common for it to happen, but that's what the says, and he started like, you know, he was upset. He was hungry. He really wanted to take a bite of the sandwich, but he he held back. So, he's just basically picking on the bread maybe a little bit, and this Texan was looking at him and saying, you know, "Hey, buddy, like why aren't you eating? You look so hungry before, and now you're not eating." He says, "That's a long story. I can't can't start I can't explain it." He says, "No, tell me. We have time. We're on an airplane for another couple of hours. You could explain." He says, "Okay, I'll tell you." He says, "I'm an Orthodox Jew, and we have a system of laws, and one of the laws is that if meat is not under Jewish supervision, meaning there's no the sticker is not on it. It has It might have been tampered with. It seems far-fetched, I know, but that's the that's the law, and therefore I can't have the meat anymore." The Texan started like turning colors. And the man says, "Is everything okay? You look a little sick." He says, "I cannot believe how smart your sages, your rabbis are." He says, "What do you mean?" He says, "When you went to the bathroom, he says, "I always wanted to see how kosher meat tastes. It's always curious, you know, is there They say, you know, it's a little salty or it's not so I I had this very big interest in in trying some of your meat. I have the same sandwich. So, when you went to the bathroom, I switched the piece of meat from my sandwich to yours, and I took a piece of of your meat, and here we are." He says, "And your rabbis knew thousands years ago that you know, that this might happen on an airplane." He says, "I'm I'm amazed." That's what the power of a little seal is. If you have a seal, a seal is able to hermetically seal something so that you know that I can eat this. I can I can engage in this. I can enjoy this. Without a seal, you can't. It's something that we learn from the miracle of Hanukkah. Hanukkah had a little seal, a little, you know, insignificant seal of the stamped it, approved it, and because of that we were able to use it. We were able to light. We have the miracle, and we have the celebration, the glorious celebration every year of Hanukkah. Without that seal, we wouldn't have Hanukkah. A little seal. I want to share with you another story. This one is very personal. About the power of a seal. My family from both sides, my father and my mother, come from Germany. My father's mother was from Denmark, from Copenhagen, Denmark. Denmark is a is a country in Scandinavia. It's a part of the world that's idyllic. It's where Hans Christian Andersen, if you know who that is, lived. It's It's you know, now it turned a lot very Muslim, unfortunately, but back in the day it was a beautiful country with very fine people, you know, just the nicest, sweetest, kindest type of people. And that's where my grandmother was from. My father is from My grandfather was from Germany. They got married, and they moved to They lived in Würzburg, which is the city that I that my family has been living in for, you know, hundreds of years. And then when Hitler came to power in Germany, my grandmother was very smart, and she told my grandfather, "Listen, you know, we have to see the handwriting on the wall. You don't have to be a rocket scientist to see that this is not a good idea. It's not a good place for us to be. And and he says, "But I have my business here. We can't you know, how could I just pick up and leave this my partner says she says, "Listen, if you want to stay here, you stay here, but I'm taking my kids and I'm moving I'm moving to my parents' home in Denmark. You want to come? It's up to you. You can come, but I'm not staying here. Because at that time my my my uncle, my father's older brother was walking back from school and they were already throwing stones at him and calling him dirty Jew. It wasn't It was clear that they had to get out of of Germany. Denmark was was a a country that was a little bit safer because for whatever reason the Germans needed the Danish people for dairy products and other other other natural resources. They were a little friendlier at least at that time with Denmark. So, they moved to Denmark. There was they owned a large my family owned a large apartment building in downtown Copenhagen. Inside of that apartment building there were stores there were retail stores. There was a lot of apartments and then there was also a shul that was a few hundred years old with many sifrei Torah in it and many old sefarim hundreds of years old sefarim very very valuable library. All of that was in this was housed now in this building Copenhagen. My grandmother on Rosh Hashanah Arab Rosh Hashanah 1943 which was already late into the war was preparing for Rosh Hashanah night. She had set her table a beautiful Yom Tov table for the chag with all of her finest China and silverware and cutlery etc. And she was cutting up vegetables in her kitchen to make soup to make salad for that night. My grandfather went to shul that morning and the rabbi gets up and says that we have word we heard that the Nazis are about to invade. They're going to come in tonight the night of Rosh Hashanah and they're going to round up all the Jews that they find they're going to take them to the concentration camps. You go home you tell your wives and your family that we have to get out right now and you're going to go into hiding at different places. And then you're going to be picked up by some by the Danish underground and they're going to eventually get you to the to the shore and then you're going to be ferried across the shore to safety in Sweden. Sweden was a neutral country. There's a little body of water not very wide that separates Denmark from Sweden and everybody is going to hopefully be safe. My grandfather comes home that night at that that that morning rather and tells my grandmother, you know, we have no time you just take anything that you have. We're going to pack up. We're going to leave. We have to go into hiding right now. The Nazis are about to come. So, she left the whole kitchen with all of her with all the vegetables that she was peeling and slicing and and the soup on the on the stove everything. She shut the stove, but she and my grandfather had a friend who was the chief of police of Copenhagen. And he goes over to him and he says, "I want you to do me a favor. Okay, we're going into hiding now. I don't know when I'm coming back, but please you know that there's a lot of valuable possessions in this in my in this apartment house that we own. Please put a seal on the front door of the house after we leave that by order of the Danish police no one is allowed to come into this on onto these premises." And he did that. He was says, "No problem. As soon as you leave I'm going to do that." He sealed up the door. They went across Arab Yom Kippur to Sweden. They stayed in Sweden till the end of the war which was a few years maybe two years and then they came back. And the Danish by the way it was an anomaly in all of Europe. The in Denmark they were mesiras nefesh. They literally risked their lives to save their Jewish citizens. There were a few thousand people I think 6,000 people if I'm not mistaken that were that were put into hiding and and sent across to Sweden to safety. And after the war they were embraced on the way back. It's one thing maybe they wanted to get rid of the Jews and this is a nice way of doing it, but you know, what what happens after the war? After the war they took them back just as nicely. And the miracle was that they came to their home. That seal of the Danish police was still on the door. The Nazis for some reason respected it even though they didn't respect it anywhere else. They they went into other people's homes, but my family's homes home stayed intact. Everything was exactly the way that they left it before they left. They went into the kitchen. There was a jungle of vegetables of like of greenery that was growing from all the vegetables that were being cut on Arab Rosh Hashanah. The table was still set for Rosh Hashanah. And this is the power of a seal. A little seal. How a little seal is able to protect something so perfectly. Because it's the little things in life everybody says. These small little things that we don't even think about that really are able to create things that are so great that they're beyond our our ability to imagine. Want to tell you a story. I said this over once at the Agudah convention couple of years back. And while I was telling the story the person that I'm telling the story about happened to have walked into the room. It was a little It was a little uncomfortable. But there is a man by the name of Sol Werdiger. Um he's a very wealthy man. He's the CEO of a company called Outer Stuff which makes um it makes like a sports clothing. So, he has like contracts with every sports team whether it's a every basketball team every baseball team every So, if you if you ever buy like jackets or jerseys or sweatshirts with a with a team label on it, it's probably from him. The all the baseball hats and the everything. A lot He has basically a monopoly almost on every sports clothing item that's sold. He happens to also be um the chairman of the board of trustees of the Agudath Israel of America. He's very involved in askanus and in in reaching out to political figures and trying to you know, do good for the Jewish people whether it's in Eretz Israel or whether it's in America or wherever. And he is he's very politically connected. So, I was once telling over this story and he happened to come into the room of my speech when he when I was giving the story over. This is the story. He was politically connected to the United Nations um general secretary. Secretary General. The name his name was Ban Ki-moon. For a while he was for maybe a I don't know 10 years he was a very prominent um secretary general of the United Nations very powerful man. He was from Korea. And he had a kesher he had a relationship with this Sol Werdiger from Bal Bayit from Flatbush. And he called him up one day. He said, "Sol, I have a favor to ask you." He says, "What can I do for you?" He says, "I have a a young girl Korean girl that I know. I know her father pretty well and she's looking to be a summer intern in a clothing company. She wants to get some experience with with fashion. She's very into fashion. So, would you be able to like give her some sort of summer internship?" He says, "I don't think it should be a problem. Have her call my you know, my head of human resources." And he gave him the number and that was the end of it. He put it out of his mind. He forgot about it. And that year was the Intifada. Intifada was sort of like what we're going through now obviously not as crazy, but the Arabs were protesting in Eretz Israel and they were creating a terrible terrible um it was it was a terrible time in Eretz Israel. A lot of people were murdered. Buses were blowing up. Rachmana litzlan. And but of course the nations of the world as is represented by the wonderful body called the United Nations was constantly condemning Israel. Israel is always This isn't a new thing. It's always been this way and always will be this way. That the United Nations instead of trying to make peace and trying to see things rationally they're they have they have a terrible terrible hatred towards Eretz Israel and most of the votes that are being taken in the United Nations have nothing to do with anything else in the world but Israel. It's a big world out there. There's there's atrocities taking place in every country in in in Africa between tribes in in in in in Asia in in in in Middle East, but everything is about Israel. The whole United Nations is all focused on condemning Israel one vote after another vote and this was no exception. One day Sol Werdiger is in his office, he gets a call and it's the ambassador to South Korea, the South Korean ambassador to the United Nations. He says, "Mr. Werdiger, I'd like to take you out to lunch." He says, "Because I really appreciate all that you've done for me." He says, "What have I done for you?" He says, "Come out with me to lunch and we'll talk about it." So, they meet a couple of weeks later in in a very fancy kosher restaurant in Manhattan, Prime Grill. And and they're sitting there and Mr. Werdiger is a little bit, you know, curious, like, "What did I do for you?" He says, "You don't know what you did for me?" He says, "No." He says, "My daughter, um, loves fashion and she came to America to get some experience here and she didn't know where to go, so, uh, you know, the Secretary-General called you and asked on my behalf if my daughter could get a a job." Now, Mr. Werdiger had no idea this was this girl was the daughter of the ambassador, uh, of South Korea. He had no idea. He says, "My My wife and I," says the ambassador to South Korea, "were very concerned when we sent our daughter to America that she should be in a nice work environment. We're afraid of, you know, we're very similar to Jewish people. You're You're very overprotective of your children that they should be in a good wholesome environment and we're very overprotective of our children and we didn't know where to go, so thank God she landed up in your firm and every night she would call us and she'd say, 'You have no idea how nice it is to work here. The people dress nicely here and they, uh, and they're fine people, they're friendly people, they're modest people, they give a lot of charity. Every day these rabbis come to the office to collect money for their institutions and and they give so generously.' And then they have they even pray every day. There's a They They pray in the middle of the work day, busy work day, they stop everything and they pray. It's the greatest environment that I could be in." And he says, "For that, I owe you so much gratitude." So, he said, "It's my pleasure. I I had no idea even that your daughter was working for us, let alone that you're that she was a daughter of the ambassador to South Korea." He said, "I want you to know something. I don't know if you're aware, but I have a seat on the, uh, on the Security Council of the United Nations, right? And you know, they have like these rotating seats in the inner Security Council. South Korea happened to have been, uh, and and we were supposed to vote and South Korea's always voted against Israel, every vote, vote after vote. And I called my wife and I said, you know, before this morning's vote against Israel, you know, are these Israelis Aren't they the same like religion as as the the nice people who our daughter works for?" She says, "Yeah, Jews, they're all Jews." So, he says, "So, why am I What's wrong is How bad could they be already these people?" She says, "I don't think they're bad." So, he says, "So, why do we keep voting against them? What did they do wrong? Like what what, you know, what's going Why are we so against them?" So, he said, "I called up my, uh, you know, my my the person above me in, uh, in South Korea in the government and I said, like, 'Are they so bad these Israelis we have to vote against them? They're nice people. My daughter vote My daughter works for them. They're fine people these Jews. What are we so condemning them for?'" So, he says, "You know what? Do whatever you want. Doesn't We're fine. Whatever you want to do, do." And that morning was the first time in history that South Korea abstained. They didn't condemn Israel. And he says, "It's all because of the way you treated my daughter." And Sol Werdiger's head was spinning. He goes out of the restaurant after he says goodbye to this guy and he calls his friends who are like very politically connected in the Agudah and he says, "Are you aware of anything about, you know, what happened this morning?" And they said, "Yeah, everybody All the diplomats are going crazy about why South Korea abstained in a vote against Israel. They've never done this before. Every single year after year, vote after vote, South Korea's just been on board with everybody else piling on against Israel, except this year. Something changed. We have no idea what it was." Sol Werdiger called Israel. He called like Knesset members. He spoke to the prime minister. Everyone was baffled why South Korea all of a sudden had a change of heart and only he knew the answer. Because he treated this young girl with menschlichkeit. He made her feel His company made her feel good and special and honored and treated her kindly and treated her well and the ripple effects of that changed the course of history first to a certain degree. You say that small things are nothing, small things are meaningless. Small is huge. Those small things are not small at all. Those are the things that change the world. Tonight we davening that Yair Natsar his neshama should have a great aliyah. Tremendous aliyah in shamayim. He has wonderful family. He has wonderful community and we're all davening for him and we miss him. The word Yair, the name Yair means to give off light. And look some 21 years later, look at the light that he's spreading. One little soul, how it's able to touch so many other souls forever and ever. Netsar, what does Netsar mean? There's a pasuk that says, "Netsar matai ma'aseh yadai." That it's, uh, it's a blossom. It's something that blossoms. Rav Shamshon Raphael Hirsch says a beautiful idea on a pasuk, "Notzer chesed la'alafim." Which means Hashem preserves kindness for thousands of years, for thousands of generations, Hashem preserves kindness. Netsar. He says that word netsar is the same word netsar as a bloom, as a blossom. What does that mean? What is a blossom? A blossom means I plant a seed and then it starts blossoming. What Hashem does is you do an act of chesed today and maybe you expect some instant repayment, but you don't get it. Sometimes you give some charity, it's okay, "Where's the I thought the payoff is right away. I thought I give charity all of a sudden I I should get wealthy." I thought I do an act of chesed, I do an act of kindness and all of a sudden I should get some some major act of kindness returned to me and it doesn't always happen that way, unfortunately. Because Hashem takes that seed of chesed that you planted and he allows it to bloom and blossom, but in the right time. It's la'alafim. It's thousands of years. Hashem has a system of thousands of years. So, the chesed that you do today, it may blossom in a in a month, a year, it may blossom for a grandchild of yours, a great-grandchild of yours who might need chesed at a certain time and it's being held in an account for him until that moment of time comes when he needs it. When a child needs it, a great a great great great-grandchild in a thousand years from now might need it. Hashem is so perfect in the way that he saves things, he preserves things forever and ever and he allows it to sprout forth at just the right time. This is what the name Yair Netsar symbolizes, the ability to take small seeds, seeds of light, seeds of goodness, seeds of kindness and plant them and just wait for Hakadosh Baruch Hu to allow them to be nurtured and and he he He could not have had a better family to nurture those seeds, to create such initiatives as Light It Up, to be able to really care about him and love him and want to make sure that his neshama has constant dividends. And we could all help that cause and help ourselves at the same time by just reading these pamphlets and and taking them in and really allowing it just by little small seeds that we're planting every single day. Not overdoing it, not overreaching, not something that's too big because too big is not going to happen, it's not going to work, but the smaller the better. Just a nice smile to somebody, a forgiveness to somebody, a a hello, a trying to find a shidduch for somebody, a job for somebody, but just little things that are not little, they're huge. And when we're able to do this, we're not just changing our day, we're changing the entire world. Thank you very very much for coming and Hashem the neshama should have an aliyah.