Recommended Price $60.00
New! Seder Gems 5783-2023
Make your Seder relevant and inspiring!
These messages will connect with your crowd (maybe even your own kids:) and help them see how Torah and Chasidus speak directly to their challenges and will encourage them to up their game in Jewish observance.
Here’s a short preview of this year’s all new Seder Gems First Night:
Welcome to the Seder -- The Most Important Moment in Jewish History
Let us consider for a moment this unique and remarkable evening which is now set to unfold before us. Imagine if 110 of us lined up outside, arms linked. How far down the sidewalk would we stretch? Now imagine that each person represents one generation since the Exodus. That chain represents how many generations of Jews have been sitting around their Seder tables, telling this very story (a generation is 30 years. 110 x 30 = 3300)…
The Jewish Home: Hidden Forces that Shape Behavior
Unlike in other religions, the primary spiritual institution in Judaism is not the house of worship, the synagogue. It is the home. The synagogue is certainly important but it is a spiritual accessory to the home. The strength of a nation derives from the home, its foundation and its core…A good illustration of how home is an unacknowledged but decisive life-shaping place is illustrated by an experiment conducted by Yale University using a simple cup of coffee…
דַּיֵּינוּ - Richard Nixon Didn’t Sing Dayenu
President Richard Nixon was reelected in 1972 by a landslide — 17 million votes, the largest margin of the popular vote ever recorded in American history before or since. He strode across the political arena like a colossus….
אִלּוּ נָתַן לָנוּ אֶת מָמוֹנָם - Give Me Your Jewelry, Please?
Before the Jews left Egypt, G-d commanded them to ask the Egyptians for gold, silver, and jewelry…. G-d told them what to do with the gifts they received: “You are to dress your sons and daughters in this jewelry and fine clothing.” It seems peculiar that G-d would want them to dress their children in finery just before going on a long journey through the desert. One would imagine sneakers, not stilettos, would be appropriate garb. And yet, we know this was no inconsequential request because G-d repeated it twice….
וַיַּאֲמִינוּ בה’- You Can’t Be Neutral About G-d
…G-d parted the sea, and the Jews crossed to safety. At that moment, the Bible recounts, “The Jewish people believed in G-d… and they broke into song.” It is not by accident that the first time the Jews sang was immediately after they first believed. Faith turns life into song…
מָרוֹר עם חֲרוֹסֶת -Sweeten Up Life’s Bitter Moments with One Ingredient
Reb Mendel Futerfas was one of the heroic Chabad Chassidim of the 20th Century. He was sent to a Soviet Gulag for eight years by the Communists for the ‘crime’ of teaching Torah and strengthening Jewish life. When merchant ships arrived at the camp to pick up logs, the strongest prisoners were required to load them. The antisemitic foreman gave Mendel the most dangerous tasks…
אֲשֶׁר פָּסַח עַל בָּתֵּי בְנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל בְּמִצְרַיִם - Hyssop: Small Herb, Big Impact
…Today, we worship idols of bigness: the famous, the powerful, the wealthy – the bigger, the better. Celebrity is our Golden Calf. We think for a person to be valuable they must be a “huge success”, a “giant personality,” a “big influencer,” a “superstar.” We are impressed by the number of followers someone has on social media. The more someone is liked and tweeted about, the greater their worth. Everything is data driven and everyone is number obsessed.
The problem with worshiping the gods of bigness and giving free reign to our desire for fame is that we run the risk of forgetting the significance of the little things which really matter. Visiting a friend who is fighting to get well might seem a little thing to do, but in G-d’s eyes — and in your friend’s eyes — it is big…
