Where is G-d?
Wherever you let Him in.
The Kotzker Rebbe

In this week's Torah portion we read about the Revelation at Sinai, the giving of the Torah. The Midrash elaborated on by the Chasidic Masters defines the moment of revelation as a shift in the spiritual cosmos.

Until that point the spiritual didn't descend in the physical and the physical couldn't ascend to the spiritual. That meant that while one could engage in spiritual and G-dly activities, the result was not a real transformation of the physical or earthly experience. I imagine that physically one couldn't feel the full relationship with G-d. The physical couldn't ascend to the spiritual; we were somewhat stuck, there was a ceiling.

Then it all changed; G-d descended onto Mt. Sinai Moses ascended to Heaven. Now even the most physical experience can be permeated with holiness.

I've been thinking about this this week as the emotional roller coaster continues with the absolutely psychological terror that is being perpetrated against our People in Israel and abroad. The tormented state of the hostages, the game playing with the negotiations and all that an actual deal would include that makes yet another terror attack this time inside each of us.

How many tears have been shed? How many sleepless nights? It's truly difficult to function as a productive normal human being these days.

And yet, this is precisely where the cosmic shift took place at Sinai.

In the human experience, emotions are the most animalistic of our conscious characteristics. Emotions are just that, feelings. They can connect us or disconnect us. They can drive us to destruction and they can drive us to the most amazing heights. But they are just emotions, just feelings. You might say they are as physical as the earth, as just a thing.

And yet, when Heaven descends into these emotions they become the most holy. When emotions are guided and harnessed by the Torah's teachings, we are able to take these feelings and use them in powerful G-dly ways. They become empowered to be a driving force in making a transformative difference in the world.

So while on the one hand they feel deeply with pain for the suffering, our job is to guide that pain and harness that pain into something positive and holy utilizing the Torah's teachings.

Easy? Far from it. But who signed up for easy?

Where is G-d?
Wherever you let Him in. Even in your most base emotions.

Good Shabbos, Am Yisrael Chai!