Divine Encounter at Hopkins Airport
Have you ever stood at the crossroads of a small but potentially huge decision?
Last week at Cleveland Hopkins airport, I handed my driver's license and boarding pass to the TSA representative and was about to make my way to the x-ray machine on my left when something caught my eye. It was the sight of a man sitting in a wheelchair being led by an airport employee. Out of the corner of my right eye, I noticed that the man in the wheelchair had a kippah on his head, his face shone with an olive complexion and he was clutching a bag with Hebrew lettering on it. Clearly an Israeli fellow tribesman.
“What was he doing in Cleveland?” I wondered as my body followed its inertia away from him, towards the security x-ray machine. But a voice inside my heart recommended that I go over to the man sitting in the wheelchair to see if he needed some help. Perhaps he needed someone that could speak Hebrew and act as his interpreter to the African-American gentleman pushing the wheelchair?
It all happened so fast. Inertia pulling me to the left, fighting against the spiritual pull to the right. I followed my heart, and turned right. The TSA representative said, “Hey, where are you going? You have to move to the left.” I almost listened to him, but then I thought of my father.
My father had just had surgery, and I was on my way to New York to visit him. My father is a man of action. He’s not the type of person to call first and say, “When is a good time to visit?” He just goes and visits. (I am not like that. My natural inclination is to follow the protocol and keep moving to the left when the man in the uniform directs me there.)
So I explained to Mr. TSA that I was going to help the man in the wheelchair, and I walked to the right. It turned out that this small gesture made a huge difference to both the man sitting in the wheelchair, as well as to Travis, the man pushing it. They appreciated having someone help wheel the suitcase, as well as someone there to act as interpreter.
As we walked together to the United airlines gate, Travis asked me for permission to “ask a religion question.” “What’s the difference between a prophet and a reverend?” asked he.
I said that a prophet is someone whom G-d communicated with, and a reverend is someone who teaches God’s word to others.
Travis liked those definitions and says to me, “I used to be a prophet; now I’m a reverend.”
“Really now!” I said.
“Yes, when I was a teenager I was in a very serious car accident, and the doctor said that I would never survive. I had a near death experience and saw nothing but darkness behind me, and the glow of G-d’s divine light in front of me, when suddenly I regained consciousness and came back to life. It was then that I was like a prophet, seeing and connecting with G-d’s divine light. Then I got into some trouble with the law, and wound up in prison. I learned my lesson and now I am like a reverend, dedicating my life to helping others whenever I can.”
Travis and I continued talking, but I won’t bore you with those details. Instead, I’ll share with you the three important lessons that I learned from that short encounter:
1) The Torah tells us that because Moshe took the effort to go against his inertia and to walk towards the burning bush, that small action catapulted him to greatness. You never know which small action, pushing against your inner grain, might just be your ticket to greatness.
2) It was fascinating for me to hear that someone, in his own words, “saw the light of G-d,” and then shortly afterwards acted in a way that landed him in prison. But in reality, I was reminded that we are all on a unique journey, with our body and soul competing for supremacy, locked in a lifelong struggle between the angel and the animal within. We can never judge anyone else’s actions or journey.
3) That morning I learned from an unexpected source what the true definition of being a reverend truly is. It is someone who dedicates his or her life to help others. We are charged with the divine mission to be a nation of reverends. That is what it means to be a “light unto the nations" - to connect with the divine light and to shine that light into all corners of darkness throughout the rest of the world!
Shabbat shalom,
Rabbi Koval
