I'd like to begin with a story. A story of a man whom I must admit, I don't know personally, but whose story I heard from a colleague some years ago (and to whom I apologize for not remembering specifically who shared the story) and whose impact has been felt by so many.
His name was Millard Fuller. Having lost his mother at three, Millard grew up learning early the lessons of financial and professional success, with little attention paid to helping others. Marrying young, Millard went on to complete law school while at the same time starting an entrepreneurial business with one of his law school buddies.
Everything he touched was an instant success. He sold cushions, cookbooks, and candy. By the time he reached the age of 29, he had already become a millionaire and reportedly set his next goal of ten million. He had a beautiful home, filled with nice things, living the high life complete with many of life's greatest luxuries.
One day, after years of marriage, his wife, Linda, told him she was leaving him, telling him she was miserable and accusing him of being more married to his money and career than to her.
Shocked, Millard panicked. From his perspective, he loved and he worshipped his wife and family. He also worshipped his business, his success - his things. After a year of his unfulfilled promises to change, Linda did leave him and went to New York to seek counseling from a pastor friend of theirs. Desperate, Millard followed her to New York.
Terrified and wandering the streets, Millard was more alone than ever before. He knew he was in crisis - feeling a loss so deep that his money and success had nothing to offer; a pain so raw that nothing could console him. And, in that moment, he also experienced great clarity. He knew that it was these relationships - with his wife, his children, himself and God - that really mattered. And, he realized that to find himself he needed to give to others. Reconciling with Linda, they made a choice - they sold all their stuff, gave away their money and gave themselves over to God to do God's work in the world.
Millard's story is one of a man struggling to overcome the obstacles to hear God's calling. It is a story as familiar to us today as it was in its original telling as God called to Abraham, in the opening words of this week's Torah portion: "Lech lecha m'artzecha, u'mibet avicha - Go forth from your land, from the house of your father..."
As the midrash tells us, Abraham lived in a world steeped in idolatry. During Abraham's life, everyone owned idols, including Abraham's family. One day, as Abraham stood with the hammer in his hand, he too, was in crisis and came to an important realization. His entire life he had been focused on the glorification of those very idols, fashioned and created by human beings. In that moment, Abraham knew that unless he acknowledged the emptiness of his childhood idols, there was no way he could really hear God's call to go forth. Unless he could smash each of the idols, he would never find his place amongst people within a community of God. He knew that the true way to heed God's call of lech lecha - of going to himself - was to step beyond himself.
So many of us, like Abraham and Millard, succumb to complex forms of idolatry without even realizing it. The 15th century Spanish Talmudist and commentator, Issac Arama, often referred to as Akedat Yitzchak, described contemporary idol worship this way: "Under the category of idolatry we must include a form which is particularly virulent today - the devoting of all energies and thoughts to the accumulation of wealth and achievement of worldly success". This was the idolatry of Millard Fuller who built his life accumulating money and success, whose admission acknowledged "my goal was not to solve some great problem of society. I had a burning desire to be fabulously rich."
Please don't misunderstand me - we are a people for whom financial success and security can be amongst that which we hold dear. But for Millard, his money and success had become an end in of themselves. They became more dear to him than they ever should have been, leaving him vulnerable and empty.
The Talmud tells the story of the men of the great assembly, pleading with God to subdue the inclination in the people's hearts towards idolatry. Knowing how this inclination wreaked havoc amongst Jews in previous generations, they cried out to God: "Biyah, biyah - Woe! Woe! Hainu ha d'archiv l'mikdasha - It is this that destroyed the Temple, v'kalya heychala - and burned the sanctuary, v'katlinhu l'hulchu tzadikei - and killed all the righteous ones, v'aglinhu l'Israel mear'ah'hon - and exiled the Jews from their land, v'ada'in meraked beinan ?- and still it dances among us? Klum yehavtei lan ele l'kabulei bei agrah - Did you give it to us for anything other than the reward for overcoming it?" The speaker continues, "Lo ihu b'inan, v'lo agrei b'inan - We do not want it and we do not want the reward for overcoming it. At that moment, according to the talmud, a note fell from Heaven on which was written "emet - truth".
As the Talmud teaches, Idolatry of any sort leads the worshipper astray, away from the fulfillment of the divine mission. Neither we nor God can accept idol worship for in the end, we know the truth - it will only result in individual and collective destruction.
For Abraham, smashing the idols opened him to the ability to follow his divine calling to begin the journey God intended for him, opening the door to personal fulfillment and to the success of becoming one of the greatest figures in Jewish history.
For Millard, smashing his idols allowed him to honestly say "I want to pursue God's agenda, rather than my own personal agenda." Through it, he and Linda, began working on a housing program called "Partnership housing" for local poor families and several years later, founded Habitat for Humanity, a non-profit housing organization dedicated to building simple, decent, affordable homes of those in need of adequate shelter. To date, Habitat has provided housing for over 2,000,000 worldwide expanding its reach to more than 60 countries.
Our stories - yours and mine - are no different. As the late Abraham Joshua Heschel suggests "Deep in our hearts there is a perpetual temptation to worship the imposing; to make idols of the things dear to us." We know all too well that idols come in all shapes and sizes, unlimited by time and space - a thing, a force, a person, a group, an institution or an ideal, that somehow has become more important than anything else.
This week of Lech Lecha, we are called to ask: what are the things that have become my idols and how can I conquer them? What are the things that have become so dear to me that I pursue them with a religious fervor, but are absent of God?
Each of us is called to worship and serve God. But we can only hear God's call when we confront ourselves and overcome those things that dominate our thoughts and actions - the things that have become our idols. When we challenge ourselves to distinguish those things that are no longer a means to coming closer to God, but have instead become substitutes for God. It is only then that we can be open to worship God to being at one with God.
So may we be.
Shabbat Shalom.