Redemption Does Not Wait for Perfection

The Sfas Emes points out something striking about Pesach. The Jewish people were not redeemed because they had already perfected themselves. The redemption came while they were still in the middle of their struggle.

The Torah says:

וּפָסַחְתִּי עֲלֵכֶם

“I will pass over you.” (Shemos 12:13)

The Sfas Emes explains that Hashem sometimes “passes over” the gap between where a person is and where he hopes to be. Redemption does not wait for perfection. It begins even when a person still feels far from where he wants to be.

Sometimes a person looks at his own efforts and feels that what he does is too small to matter.

A simple Jew once cried to the Baal Shem Tov.

“Rebbe, I feel like I accomplish nothing. Other people learn so much Torah and serve Hashem with such greatness. I feel like whatever I do is so small.”

The Baal Shem Tov answered him with a question.

“When a small candle is lit in a dark room, is the light small or is the darkness large?”

The man said, “The candle pushes away the darkness.”

The Baal Shem Tov replied, “In heaven they measure differently. They do not measure how large the act is. They measure how much darkness it pushed away.”

Pesach reminds us that redemption does not come only through great acts. It comes through every small light that pushes away a little darkness.

Sometimes the smallest act changes far more than we realize.