Do more than your job

As the Jewish people prepared to enter the Land of Israel, Moses sent scouts to the city of Yaazer. Their assignment was to gather information and report back. Yet the Torah tells us that these scouts did more than observe. They actually captured the surrounding towns.

Commentators explain that they said, “We will not do as the first scouts did.” They were referring to the famous spies who, forty years earlier, returned from the Land of Israel and discouraged the nation from moving forward. Those spies saw obstacles and became overwhelmed by them. The scouts sent to Yaazer took a different approach. They understood the purpose behind their mission. They trusted in Moses and in the vision he was leading them toward.

This raises an interesting question. If Moses only instructed them to scout the area, why did they go further and conquer it?

The answer is that they understood the larger goal. They were not focused only on the specific words of the assignment. They understood its larger purpose, that their mission was to help the Jewish people move forward. Gathering information was only one part of that goal.

Many of us live our lives focused on the tasks directly in front of us. We check off responsibilities and fulfill obligations. There is certainly value in that. But sometimes we become so focused on the details that we lose sight of the larger picture.

Asking, “What exactly am I required to do?” is an important question. But an even more important question is, “What am I trying to accomplish?”

This Shabbat marks the anniversary of the liberation of the previous Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn, whose release from Soviet imprisonment is celebrated on the 12th and 13th of Tammuz. He was arrested because he refused to abandon Jewish life under Communist rule. At a time when Jewish education and religious practice were being systematically suppressed, he continued to build schools and encourage Jews to remain connected to their heritage.

What stands out is that his work was never limited to what seemed possible. He inspired his students and followers to see beyond immediate circumstances. If a Jewish school was needed, they opened one. If a community needed a mikveh, they worked to build one. If Jewish practice was disappearing in a particular place, they did everything they could to revive it.

His liberation became a turning point. It demonstrated that securing Judaism’s future needed more than preserving what remained. The future would be built by actively strengthening and expanding Jewish life, even under difficult circumstances.

That lesson remains relevant today. Most of us are not being asked to risk our lives for Judaism. We live in a country where Jewish life can flourish openly. Yet we still face a challenge. It’s easy to become comfortable maintaining what we already have. It’s harder to ask ourselves how we can contribute something more.

That means reaching out to someone who feels disconnected from the Jewish community, or learning more about our heritage, or creating a stronger Jewish home or becoming more involved in communal life.

Sometimes the greatest accomplishments happen when we stop viewing our responsibilities as isolated tasks and start seeing them as part of a larger purpose. Every one of us has the ability to influence the people around us. We can each help create a little more Jewish connection and a little more light in our corner of the world.

When we embrace a larger vision instead of focusing only on the minimum requirement, we often discover strengths and opportunities we never knew we had and accomplish far more than we imagined possible.