He Is the Lord Our God

Good morning everyone. Welcome back to Learn to Daven - Day 53.

Still in Hodu. And today I want to slow way down on just the first three words of the verse, because there's a whole world folded inside them. Hu Hashem Elokeinu - "He is the Lord our God."

Listen to that little word at the end. Elokeinu. Our God. Not "the God." Not "a God." Not even just "God." Our God. And I want to make the case to you this morning that that one suffix - that little "einu," that "our" - is one of the boldest claims a human being can make.

Here's why. The first name in the verse is Havayah - the four-letter name, the one we don't pronounce, the one we read as "Hashem" or "Ado-nai." That name points to God as He is beyond the universe - infinite, timeless, utterly above and outside of everything. The One who was before there was a world and will be after. That God is, by definition, unreachable. How could the infinite have anything to do with you, a person who'll be late for an appointment in two hours?

And then, right next to that impossible, infinite name, David places Elokim - Elokeinu. Now, Elokim is the name of God as He shows up inside nature, inside the world, running it, judging it, present in it. And David doesn't just say Elokim. He says Elok-einu. He grabs the God who fills all of nature and says: and He's ours.

This is the great Jewish paradox, and it's hiding in plain sight in two names sitting side by side. The same God is both completely infinite and completely intimate. Totally beyond us - and totally ours. We don't pick one. We say both, in the same breath. You know where else you say these two names together, every single day? Shema Yisrael, Hashem Elokeinu, Hashem Echad - Hashem, who is beyond, and Elokeinu, who is ours, are Echad - one. The transcendent and the personal are the same single God.

Let me make this real. There's a difference between knowing about someone and being in relationship with someone. I can know every fact about a famous person - their birthday, their whole biography - and they don't know I exist. That's information. But the moment I can say "my friend," "my father" - that's not information anymore. That's a relationship. It's a claim that goes two ways.

That's what Elokeinu is. When you say "our God," you are not reporting a fact about the universe. You are claiming a relationship. You're saying: this infinite One - He's mine. He knows me. I matter to Him.

The Alter Rebbe has a stunning teaching on exactly this. In Shaar HaYichud, he explains that the name Elokim isn't only "God of justice" out there somewhere - it's the name for the divine life-force that is flowing into you right now, keeping you in existence this very second. Your koach hachiyus, the energy that animates you - that's Elokeinu, personally, in you. So when you say "our God," you're not pointing up at a distant sky. You're pointing at the very life pumping through your own chest. He is that close.

That's why the verse can end b'chol ha'aretz mishpatav - "His judgments fill all the earth." Because this isn't a God who set the world spinning and walked away. He's in every corner of it. Including the corner where you're standing right now.

So when you reach these three words today - Hu Hashem Elokeinu - don't rush them. You're saying the most intimate thing a person can say to the Infinite: You're ours.

Tomorrow: we finish the verse - b'chol ha'aretz mishpatav - how the judgments of the Infinite fill every inch of the earth, and what that means for the ground under your feet.