Come Back

Moshav Band and Yom Kippur’s message of inspirAction.

‘Come Back’ by the Moshav Band has been the theme song to many of my life experiences. Whenever I fly to Israel, I replay it dozens of times. Throughout the flight, its lyrics echo my thoughts of homecoming and as the plane descends to Ben Gurion, its rhythm reverberates the accelerated beating of my heart. It’s the song I put on as I walk the streets of Manhattan, dreaming of the next time I’ll be walking the streets of Jerusalem. 

As Yom Kippur rapidly approaches I have begun to think of the words of this song in an entirely new perspective. 

I can hear my Father calling me, come back, come back to me now. Last year at this time we told ourselves we’d do this better and that better. Maybe we even had a plan for how we’d achieve this self-improvement. But just like that New Years diet we resolve to stick to, come February…come the donuts. This past year, we all made our fair share of mistakes, we all struggled to keep to our commitments. But here we are, about to enter Yom haDin, and our Father is calling us back!  Even if we did not take advantage of Elul, Rosh haShana and the Aseret Yemei Teshuva like we could have, there’s still time! Let’s not let our falls of 5773 stop us from getting up and moving forward this 5774.Whether this is the only time you’ll be stepping into shul this past year, or praying to G-d is a part of your daily routine, you have come home.  Shuvu e’lai v’ashuva aleichem, when we do return home, He is there to greet us at the door. He’s just waiting for us to knock. 

There’s a fire burning in my belly. While this can be alluding to the hunger we all experience when fasting on Yom Kippur, I have a different thought process to share. We all have a spark of inspiration within us waiting to be set aflame. On Yom Kippur, when we put all of our physical needs aside, when the distractions of our everyday lives are silenced, we are meant to solely focus on the spiritual. If we take true advantage of the day, we can be raised to the level of malachim. We are inspired to be better, our inner fire burns brightly. But inspiration fades and flickers out when not tied together with a game plan. So when we stand before G-d in shul this year, let’s take that fire and inspirACT. Choose one or two things you’ve been meaning to work on and think about how you can implement them realistically in your life. It may be tempting to choose a large goal, such as always being respectful to your mother, but one of the keys to constant growth is by taking small steps and setting an achievable goal, such as watching your words for a certain hour of the day. Setting a plan of action now will keep your inspiration alive and burning strongly throughout the year.

May we all merit for this year to be the year in which we feel the wind blowing in from the East, the year in which we hear the sound of the shofar gadol calling come back, come back to me now.