Let everything that has been made know that You are its Maker (Rosh Hashanah Shacharis Prayers)
I remember not feeling well one day and going to the doctor. The ENT proceeded to prescribe a medicinal gargle that, he warned, “Tastes terrible.” I smiled and said, “Thank you.” And I meant it.
Why?
Because if I want to heal, I need the medicine. If I want to get better, I need to embrace the discomfort that comes with the cure. Now imagine I had said to him, “No thanks, I don’t want it. It tastes bad.” What sense would that make? I came for help, and help sometimes comes in bitter forms.
But here’s the message. What if the tests in your life—the nuisance, the discomfort, the pain—are the medicine? Have you ever considered that the struggles you face may be exactly what Hashem is giving you to wake up? So how can we come before G-d and say, “Please, take away the test,” when the test is the treatment?
What Hashem wants from us is not to ask for an easier life, but to ask for clarity, for direction, for the strength to say: “You are the King, and I am Your servant. I will stand when You say stand, sit when You say sit, and jump when You say jump. I am here to serve You.” And when we live that way—when we accept Hashem’s malchus, His Kingship—we begin to heal.
That is what Rosh Hashanah is about. That is why we blow the Shofar. It is about coronating G-d as our King. As we recite in our Rosh Hashanah prayers: “V’yeida kol pa’ul ki Atah p’alto—Let every creation know that You created it.” Once we accept Hashem as King, we stop trying to control life and start living calmly.
Now, let’s expand upon this idea.
To understand any concept in Torah, we must return to its first appearance. So let’s ask: what is sin? Where do we first find sin in the Torah?
Gan Eden. The nachash (serpent) approaches Chava and says, “Did G-d really say not to eat from the tree... because if you do, your eyes will be opened, and you will be like G-d” (Bereishis 3:1-5). That is the core of sin: the desire to be G-d, to be in charge, to declare, “Don’t tell me what to do.” I’ll decide what’s good and what’s bad. I’ll choose. I’m an adult, and I am intelligent and autonomous. Get off my back.
Sound familiar? Thousands of years have passed, and nothing has changed. The serpent’s whisper still echoes.
So Chava eats, and she gives to Adam, and then suddenly, they feel exposed. Why? Because when we sin, we are stripped of truth. The illusion fades. What then do we say? Where do we go from there?
“For this? For this I gave everything up?” We realize our error. For this lobster... I gave up my covenant with Hashem? For that shopping spree on Shabbos... I desecrated the holiness of time? For that moment... I gave up my marriage? For this ball game, that golf course... I walked away from davening? Suddenly, we feel exposed, empty and regretful.
So what do Adam and Chava do? They hide behind the very tree they sinned with. Just like we do. We sin... and we sink deeper. We fail... and then say, “It’s too late for me.” We scream, swear, lash out, and then say, “That’s just who I am.” We make our sin our identity.
But then comes the voice. Suddenly, we hear it. “Ayeka—Where are you?” (ibid. 3:9). G-d calls out to Adam, as if G-d doesn’t know where he is. But of course G-d knows. It is Adam who doesn’t know. We don’t know.
So Hashem calls to us, “Where are you?” Not to accuse you, but to reach out to you. To say, “I love you, I’m still here, I want a relationship, I’m calling. Will you pick up?”
“Ayeka” means something else too. Not just where are you, but how did this happen?
How did you fall? How did you abandon Shabbos? How did you walk away from tefillah? How did anger take over your home? How did you lose sight of who you are? Hashem knows, but we need to know. Because when we realize how far we’ve drifted, we finally understand how desperately we want to come home.
And that’s what teshuvah means. Not repentance or guilt, but homecoming. Hashem, in His infinite wisdom, paints a divine portrait of your potential before you’re even born, and it hangs in the Heavenly Gallery. That is your truest self. One day, you’ll see two portraits: the one Hashem envisioned and the one you lived. And in that moment, you may say, “How could I have wasted my potential? ” But Hashem says, “It’s not too late. I’m calling you. Come home.”
There is no greater privilege than this. As Chazal say: “Ashreichem Yisrael...—How fortunate are you, O Israel, before Whom you are purified” (Yoma 85b). How fortunate are we that we were given this gift of teshuvah, the gift of second chances, the gift of a loving Father who still calls to us, even when we’ve tried to hide.
Don’t ask Hashem to take away the medicine; instead, acknowledge the healing it can bring. Stand before your Father in Heaven, and say: “I am Yours. I’m not here to command You what to do. I’m here to listen to what You want me to do.”
When you do that, everything begins to change.
May we have the courage to answer the call when Hashem asks, “Ayeka—where are you?” Because the greatest answer we can give is simply...
“Hineni—Here I am.” I’m coming home.
