We take snapshots of our lives. How many of you have one of these? I am holding a digital camera. Most of you either have one of these or there is one of these on your phone and you might not even know it.

It wasn’t that long ago that we were careful how many photographs we snapped. Remember, we had Kodak rolls of film: 24 pictures or 36 pictures and the film was expensive, and developing it was even more expensive. And it took a week or so to get your pictures back.
Well now, with one of these, you can take a hundred pictures in a minute and download them to your computer; start looking at them seconds later.

Amazing, isn’t it? The problem is: you can take a hundred pictures in a minute, which means you end up with thousands of them. It would take me days to go through all of these pictures I have on my computer. So, of course, I just leave them. Never look at them.
But, if you are lucky like me, you have a spouse like Tammy. She goes through all the old print pictures and the ones on the computer. She picks out the good ones and puts them in an album. We have about a dozen of these albums on our shelf. They are great to look at. They tell the story of our family.

Here’s a picture I found in one of those albums. Dollin family on the couch. There is Tammy, with her arm around Shai (4 years old), Kivi in the middle, 2 years old holding a teddy bear, Yoni (6) next to him with Vivi a few months old, on his lap.
But behind us……behind us, our Moms are there. But right next to them, are our two Dads, standing right there. Our Dads, may their memories be a blessing.

I saw that picture in the album and flood of snapshots came into my mind. Snapshots of an album of me, not on the page, but in my mind. Now Tammy pregnant with Yoni. Now Bruce and Tammy under the chuppah. Then a young perplexed rabbi in his first pulpit. A way too serious student at Seminary, New York. Then a young man in college, California. High School, The Albuquerque Academy, hot shot prep school.
But now, I go back further in my mind. Now in my mind, there is a little kid in his father’s paint store. Mary Carter Paint. I remember this store like it was yesterday: I see it: I can even smell the store, even the soap in the bathroom: it was called pumice, to scrape the paint off your hands. I am looking at my father: he’s big, very strong. This is what he used to do as I watched him there. He takes a gallon of house paint, pops open the top, puts it under tinting machine, turns the machine to the right until he gets the right color. Pulls a lever down, squirts the tint down into the can. Puts the cover back on, the rubber mallet, hits the rim all around, bang, bang, bang. Always three times. Into the shaker machine. Now stay back, he would say every time, this thing’s dangerous. It will hit you in the head. Takes the paint can out of the shaker machine, gives it to the lady, thank you so much for your business, please come back soon.

I saw this a hundred times. Pop the top, tint; bang the rim, three times. Shaker machine, please come back, ma’am, to see us soon,, you hear?.

One day in that store. I was chosen. Chosen, by my father. Here’s what happened. Dad brought me into the office in the store. He closed the door. The workers couldn’t hear or see us. This was the inner sanctum: an important and magical place where my dad did important and magical things. He said: “Bruce, you are going to say a prayer tonight at dinner. So repeat after me: borei (borei), peri (peri), ha gafen (ha gafen). Again. Borei, (borei), peri (peri) ha gafen (ha gafen).” He said, “do you have it? Start from the beginning. Do you have it?”

Secret words, shared just with me. Not with my mother, not with my sisters. They wouldn’t say these words at the table. These words were just for me. These words meant something special to my Dad, and now he gave them to me. I didn’t love Judaism then. But I loved my Dad and he loved Judaism. I became a Jew that day. That day, I was given a mission to be a Jew and do what Jews do.

We tell ourselves stories just like this one. We choose from a million snapshots in our minds and make an album; in our minds. These albums tell our stories. They tell a story of who we are and how we got here. But these stories do more than that. Good stories inspire us. Good stories determine the person we will become.

A psychologist at Northwestern University, named Dan McAdams studies peoples’ stories. He’s in a subspecialty called “Narrative Psychology.” He believes, that if you really want to know someone, you have to listen very carefully to the story they tell about themselves. He’s been at this for 20 years. He did an experiment once which he describes in his book called, “The Redemptive Self.” He found a group of people who you and I would call: superstars: of giving. These people are wonderful and unusual human beings. In his words, these people show an inordinate “concern for and commitment to promoting the welfare [of others].” You don’t forget a person like this. They are the great teachers, the mentors. These are the people most involved in the community, involved with their churches or synagogues. They seem to be on every committee. They are everywhere, always positive, always helping. They rarely think of themselves. If it is a good cause, especially if it helps children, the next generation, they are there, first in line to help.

Well McAdams searched these people out and he found a group of them. And he sat with each one individually and he asked them about themselves. He asked them about their personal life story. Where did they come from? What happened to them as children? How did they get to where they are today?

He asked each one in this group these questions and he was astounded by what he heard. They all came from different places. Different backgrounds and so on. But he found that they all told him, essentially, the same story. The details were different, but the story was the same. In each case, it was a story with four chapters. Here’ the story.

Chapter 1. When they were young, they felt special. They felt that they had received a particular gift that others around them didn’t have. They felt chosen, if you will. This gift however didn’t make them arrogant. They weren’t special, better; they were just special, different, and it made them grateful. It made them more sensitive to the needs of people around them that weren’t as lucky as they were. That was chapter one.

Chapter 2. They suffered. Bad things happened to them. Unexpected obstacles, challenges. Some were even victims of abuse. Bad people did bad things to them. In one way or another, life broke their hearts. This was their Chapter 2.

Chapter 3. They prevailed. From every challenge, every obstacle, they pulled through. They found the courage to go on and they did go on. They were, in a sense, in McAdam’s word, redeemed. Going from the worst of times to better times. And most often, they recounted, their courage and perseverance in life was an inspiration to others. They prevailed. They were redeemed. This was their Chapter 3.

And here’s the last chapter. The fourth part of their life story As they were able to pull through the bad times, so it was now their responsibility to help others do the same. This fourth chapter projected into the future. They now had a personal mission. It was their mission to make a positive and lasting difference in the world for their having lived in it.

McAdams was surprised. He heard the same 4 part story, told over and over again by this unique group of people. People who would be described by anyone who knew them, to be unusually kind and compassionate and giving. Their stories in four chapters: Chosenness. Suffering. Redemption. And now a lifelong responsibility to do good things and make a difference in this world.

So I ask you all: do you recognize the story? Read McAdams, and you will recognize the story.
Because it is our story. It is the story of the Jewish People. Same story, same four chapters.

The story of our people, Chapter 1: We are chosen. A special gift: a special awareness of the One God, who called our ancestor, Abraham, out of a land of spiritual chaos to go to a Promised Land. In that land, things would be different. A land where people cared about each other and were obligated to aid the poor, the orphan, and the widow. We were a fortunate People because of all the people in the world, God chose us.
Chapter Two: We suffered. We were forced from our land and were enslaved in Egypt, a land of tyranny. We were humiliated by our enemies. We returned to the Promised Land for a time, but not for very long. Two destroyed Temples, exile, dispersions, expulsions, persecutions: even genocide. Part two of our story: we suffered. And Chapter Three: We prevailed. We prevailed, mostly, because we never gave up hope. We yearned to prevail. We envisioned it. In our prayers: Oh Lord, “behold our affliction and redeem us” “Sound the great shofar to herald our freedom.” “Restore our judges as of old.” “Have mercy… and return us to Jerusalem, Your city.” For 2000 years, we recited those prayers of hope and redemption and in our own day, in our own day, we returned to that Promised Land, the Land of Israel. Part three of our story: we were redeemed from our suffering. We returned to Jerusalem. We are in Jerusalem now. We prevailed.
And Chapter 4: We now have a special and unique responsibility to the world. Israel is not just any country and the Jewish People are not just any people. In our day, Jews have attained power in the world, the likes of which we’ve never had at any time in our 3000 year history. And we must and we will use that power to bring some good to the world. It’s now our responsibility. We still have the same, ultimate, perhaps one would say, messianic goal: “L’taken olam b’malchut shadai:” to use our new power in the world, to fix it. Tikkun: to make this world fit for human beings to actually live in it. We must now be what our tradition has always hoped for us. A light unto the nations.
Choseness. Suffering. Redemption. And now, Responsibility.

It’s the story of our People. A very good People. A People with a mission.

More snapshots. My father gave me the prayer that day to say at dinner that night. My mother has a photo of me at that dinner. A little blond kid at the table, his face looking into a big picture book. On the cover of the book, it read: Passover.
I’ve seen books like that. I’ve read them to my own kids: I’ve read them to kids in our preschool.
Big colorful picture books. Pharaoh, Jewish people in rags. Sad people. Frogs, Moses with his stick, chariots, the splitting of the sea. A big bearded face in the clouds handing over the Ten Commandments.

I must have said the prayer that night. “ borei peri ha gafen.” There were sad people in the book. A wicked Pharoah, Walking through the sea. A face in the clouds; the Ten Commandments. Smiles all around: freedom. The Promised Land just ahead. We are almost there.

I ask myself this question. Perhaps you can ask this question of yourselves as well. How much of that story in the picture book with the themes of closeness, redemption and the pursuit of the Promised Land and a perfect world, is my own personal story?
The best people are the people who feel they have something unique to give. The best people are those who have suffered and somehow pulled through. The best people feel fortunate despite all that life has thrown at them. And because of this good fortune, they feel responsible to do some good for others in this world. I ask myself, is that my story? Is that our story and if it isn’t our story right now, can it become our story?
You know, I go to that shelf where Tammy has put all the picture albums of our family. I go to the last album on the shelf. The pictures in that album are already arranged nicely. They are put in their plastic covers, the captions are there. I am not going to change those pages. They are finished; that story has been told.

But I flip through and I come to the end of the album. And there are all these blank pages. And I wonder how I am going to fill them up with new pictures? And with those new pictures, what new story will they tell? Will the story that I create in those new pages tell a story of a life that made a difference? Will the story written in those new pages, be of a life that made a difference? I guess that is up to me. I guess that is up to you too.

On Rosh Hashanah, God opens the book of our deeds and if we merit, He inscribes our names there. And if we repent, and we pray and give some tzedakah, on this day, Yom Kippur, God will seal our names in that book. Then tomorrow night, the gates of forgiveness will close. But just before they do, just a moment before those gates close, God will open a new page for us in His book. He’s going to open a new page for us in that Book of Life.

Rabbi Bruce Dollin