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Have you ever felt a deep longing for connection?
As someone who discovered my Jewish heritage later in life, I understand the desire to unite with the people of Israel, while also feeling connected to those living in the Diaspora.
October 7, 2023, was the day that everything changed, and we were all on edge.
This memory stands as a beacon that should never be forgotten. It is also a milestone, a day that touched our hearts and awakened our souls. It was the day that we were reawakened to our Jewishness, when our hearts whispered, “I long for unity, with G-d, with my brothers and sisters.” I long for the land where my roots lie, that gives me the right to exist.
I thank You, Hashem, for leading me on this quest. How You put the puzzle pieces in place step by step, turning my broken self, my loneliness, and my pain around, until the quest ended with the banner of victory. I am Jewish!
But now, after that terrible day of events on October 7, 2023, which stirred so much in our hearts and souls, I am floating somewhere in between. I am no longer a Christian, but a Jew, and yet I have not yet quite reached the place "where I am truly part of, where I am known and where I have found my place."
I am Yours, with all my heart and soul. But I also long for human unity. To stand together around the flag and sing the Shema. I long for friends who have been raised Jewish all their lives, who will guide me along my still slippery path, show me how it is trodden with footsteps, each step a stone that forms the birth announcement of my identity as a Jew.
I feel proud but also deeply sad, with all the events that are now taking place in my home country and worldwide with the people I now belong to. There is so much to process, so much to think about.
Finally, I can courageously see my newly set foot on the path of anti-Semitism. Hatred even cost us our home and much more. I am moved by the fact that I can actually participate in hatred. Ever since I found out that I am Jewish, I always felt guilty when I looked at images and films of the Holocaust.
On the other hand, you have to feel it, the essence of being Jewish, because even when I was not aware of it, I was already marked by 'being different, being separate' and often also by the anger that others could not explain when I asked. I have lost my home and hearth several times, with false accusations as the icing on the cake.
It does not hurt anymore; it gives me extra motivation now to continue exploring this path with my head up and shoulders straight, with my G-d, whom I love so much, as a binding factor.
I pray for Israel, my homeland. I pray for the IDF, for unity, for restoration, and for all those who have long known that they are Jewish but have also experienced that there is much more to discover than being set apart by Hashem to let HIS light shine to the four corners of this small, increasingly damaged world. But the light must become more beautiful, just as it was at Chanukah. We are crushed, just as the olive is crushed (the meaning of Gethsemane), so that oil can come, which can be ignited in the brightest, most beautiful light, when G-d gives the spark that ignites the fire of unity in diversity.
On October 7th, the match was in HIS hands to light that fire.
D'Vorah Meijer. 🐝˚ ༘ ೀ⋆｡˚Prophetic Consultant ||Coach|| Contributing Writer || Lectures || Women Empowerment || Israel ||Torah🐝˚ ༘ ೀ⋆｡˚
