Dean's Speech

Dean Milner!

Dean’s Bar Mitzvah Speech

Shabbat Shalom everyone and thank you for being here on my special day.

Today’s Parsha, Shemos, is about Moshe (Moses) and about overcoming challenges

Nine year old Menachem, was asked by his mother what he had learned in Hebrew school.

"Well, Mom, our teacher told us how God sent Moses behind enemy lines on a rescue mission to lead the Israelites out of Egypt. When he got to the Red Sea, he had his engineers build a pontoon bridge and all the people walked across safely. Then he used his walkie-talkie to radio headquarters for reinforcements. They sent bombers to blow up the bridge and all the Israelites were saved."

"Now, Menachem, is that really what your rabbi taught you?" His mother asked.

"Well, no, Mom. But if I told it the way the teacher did, you'd never believe it!"

Moshe who was the greatest Jewish leader didn’t always have it easy. In fact Moshe had a great obstacle to overcome to lead the Jewish people. From a young age Moshe had a terrible speech impediment because when he was a young child he kept playing with the Pharaoh’s crown. The Pharaoh thought he was going to lose the throne to Moshe. To see if this was true he put a bucket of jewels and a bucket of coals to see which one he would pick. Moses was about to reach for the jewels when an Angel from Heaven moved his hand and he touched the burning coals and immediately put his hand in his mouth burning his tongue. This was the cause of his speech impediment.

His speech was so bad that he needed a translator who was his brother Aaron. But this challenge never stopped Moshe, never deterred him from accepting his task to lead the Jewish people.

We all face different types of challenges that from time to time we need to overcome. Moshe’s lesson to us is that we all have the ability to overcome any challenge and that no task is too hard to overcome.

I believe it takes courage, bravery and the will to never give up to overcome challenges.

Even though some challenges are not major, for that person it is a difficult situation to handle and he or she needs to find a way to cope with the challenge and overcome that obstacle.

When I was in 6^th grade, I was put in a math class that I found to be too easy and not challenging. I decided to find a way to move to a higher level math. I approached the principle and he informed me that I would have to study the first 40 lessons of math on my own, do all the exercises in these lessons and then pass an exam.

I decided to dedicate my entire fall break to this challenge and achieve my goal of moving up a math class. I worked for about 6 hours a day, taught myself all the lessons and did a total of 1,200 math problems. After the break I took the exam, passed and moved to Algebra 1. I achieved my goal and was proud of myself. This year I am in Algebra 2 and feel this is the right math class for me.

I would like to give a special thanks to Rabbi Bryski for spending countless hours teaching me and preparing me for this special day. I would also like to thank Rabbi Levertov and his wife Dina for providing this wonderful Shul and for the amazing Hebrew school program which I went to for 7 years and enjoyed every year. I would like to thank everyone who came from out of town Saba Yakov and Yona for coming all the way from Israel, My Aunt Ann from New York, Jeff and Paula who came from Toronto, my cousins Eran and Lisa from San Francisco. Gloria, Nicole and Susie from California. I would like to thank my siblings Tyler, Kirby and Jordan for always being there for me and helping me when I need help and to welcome Tori, my new sister in law into our family.

Most of all I would like to thank my parents because I would not be here without them. Thank you for raising me to be the man I am today and for always doing your best to make sure I am happy and healthy.

I would like to invite everyone to join us for Kiddush lunch after the service.

Thank You Shabbat Shalom.