The weeklong* menu of matzah teaches restraint.
I can’t have everything I want.
The weeklong menu of matzah teaches patience.
It took 430 years to find freedom from Egypt.
It took seven days from the final plague to the crossing of the sea.
Whether it is changing our bodies or changing our lives —
change takes discipline and change takes time.
The weeklong menu of matzah teaches us
to bring our faith into our everyday lives.
Connecting with our people’s past
can inform and transform our present.
The weeklong menu of matzah teaches appreciation
Bagels and beer, pasta, pizza, and perhaps, even sushi.
As I take pleasure in eating these first bites of leaven,
may I always appreciate the basics.
As I now savor eating without scrutinizing every last ingredient,
let me not eat blindly the food the stands before me.
Let me eat healthfully. Let me eat joyfully.
Let me bring the awareness I learned from Pesach
into my everyday living.
Blessed are you, O God, who brings forth bread from the earth.
*or “eight day” for traditional Jews living in the diaspora
