Weekly Torah Portion

I remember being involved in a confusing, complicated situation and wondering, “How in the world did I end up here?!” I was fairly confident about the right thing to do, but it involved my acting in a very odd way, and I honestly could not think of anyone else I knew who had ever ended up in such a bizarre setting.

I remember being comforted when a relative pointed out it was surely not by chance that I, of all people, was placed in this situation. He pointed out a few interesting aspects of my personality that I thought were “random” and he helped me recognize that perhaps I was created this way at birth just to succeed in such unusual circumstances thirty-something years later.

This week’s Torah portion centers around the incredible beginning of our patriarch Abraham and his journey to a deeper relationship with G-d, to the point where he is able to offer up his only child as a sacrifice to G-d with joy and love. (A sacrifice that doesn’t actually take place, because it was merely a test of Abraham’s dedication.)

Our rabbis teach that the moment of the sacrifice was actually a test of Abraham’s life until that point. There was no way he could have succeeded in offering his son to G-d without the decades of effort in building an ever closer relationship to G-d.

When we come to a challenging situation, whatever it may be, we can pause to recognize that our G-d, the G-d of Abraham, only tests us when we are ready and if we have the skill set necessary to succeed. If the challenge feels strong, we can choose to view it as a testament to our internal work until this point; that G-d sees that we are now able to succeed in this area, and therefore is testing us accordingly.

Abraham was the only person ever asked to sacrifice his child in this manner, yet that was not a factor in his decision-making. He heard G-d’s message to him and immediately recognized it as something he could and would do, despite its immensity.

I imagine that if I can genuinely look at each moment of struggle as a test designed exclusively for me, my skill set, my unique style of weight-lifting until this point, my life and its ups and downs will have a curated feel. Each instance will feel designed for me by the same Designer who created Abraham’s famous test, that changed the course the Jewish people’s history.