Life is a three-part experience.
The first part is a gift; childhood. You didn't have to work. You didn't have to do anything other than be home. Hopefully your parents were able to provide food, clothing, shelter, and love. They were simply given to you.
At some point, as a teenager or young adult, you started to pave your own path. That path came with bruises and bumps. You had to work through things. You had to show up and do the work.
And hopefully, eventually, you find yourself. You recognize what makes you you. You become comfortable living in the oneness and awareness of who you really are.
This is exactly the experience of Passover, the Omer (the seven weeks between Passover and Shavuos), and Shavuos itself.
On Passover, we were redeemed from Egypt as a gift from G-d. We didn't deserve it. The matzah, made from wheat, flat and simple, represents that humility and unearned kindness.
Then comes the Omer period. The offering brought during these 49 days is made from barley, animal fodder. It represents the work we do on our animal self: the self-absorbed, reactive, impulsive part of us.
On Shavuos, culminating the Omer counting, we bring a wheat offering. The very thing that's forbidden on Passover, leavened bread, becomes the mitzvah on Shavuos. Why? Because by then, we are so in tune with truth and with who we really are that our ego and our intellect are no longer selfish. They become a conduit for G-d and G-dliness.
We get to experience this same three-part journey every single day.
We start the morning with saying Modeh Ani; thanking G-d for gifting us another day. A pure gift, before we've done a thing to earn it. A Passover moment.
Then we say the Shema, the contemplation, the internal work, the soul-searching. That's the Omer offering.
And we end our prayers with the Amidah, standing before G-d in complete oneness with Hashem. That's Shavuos.
Three times a day. Every day.
When we read about the sacrifices and offerings in this week's Torah portion, don't think of them only as ancient rituals that haven't been experienced in thousands of years. Think of them as a guide for life; ways we can sacrifice our internal instincts, our ego, our animal impulses, in order to become one with Hashem.
The Temple may not be standing. But the three-part journey? That's available to each one of us, every single morning.
Good Shabbos,
Rabbi Kushi Schusterman