In today’s world, we are totally obsessed with titles, fame, and visibility. We scroll through social media and think that if something isn’t being filmed, applauded, or paid well, it doesn’t matter. This mindset creeps into our daily lives and makes us feel incredibly bogged down by our routines. We start to resent the “grunt work”, making school lunches, answering emails, doing the dishes, or driving the carpool. We feel like these chores are just distractions keeping us from doing something “important.” Parashat Pinchas can teach us something about attitude…

When Moses finds out he is not going into the Promised Land, his first thought is about who will take care of the Jewish people next. Naturally, we would think one of Moses’ own sons would get the job. They were smart, capable guys. But instead, God tells Moses: “Take for yourself Joshua the son of Nun, a man in whom there is spirit, and lay your hand upon him.” (Numbers 27:18)

What was this special “spirit” that Joshua had?

Why did he get picked over everyone else?

The Midrash (Bamidbar Rabbah 21:14) adds an incredible detail about Joshua’s daily life in addition to the main text. God tells Moses that his sons did not really get involved in the day-to-day needs of the community. Joshua, on the other hand, was the ultimate behind-the-scenes guy. The Midrash says that Joshua used to show up early and stay late at the study hall just to arrange the benches and sweep the floors. God basically says: Because he took care of the small things, he deserves to lead the nation.

Joshua’s story completely flips that script. It teaches us that true greatness isn’t born on a stage; it’s built in the dark when nobody is watching. There is a famous line in the Talmud (Berachot 7b) that says: “Greater is the service of Torah than its study.”

What the Sages mean is that studying a book is a great intellectual exercise, but serving, taking care of the physical space, helping others, and doing the unglamorous work, is a test of character.

Being smart is easy, being humble enough to clean up a mess is hard.

When you look at life this way, the daily grind completely changes.

The parent who gets out of bed in the middle of the night to comfort a crying kid, the coworker who quietly fixes a mistake on a project so the team looks good, or the people who stays behind after a synagogue event to fold up heavy tables, collect the table clothes for washing or cleaning up after the Kiddush, they are not wasting their time. They are doing holy work.

 Joshua didn’t arrange those benches because he was trying to build a resume or win an election. He did it because he genuinely cared about the space and the people in it. When we stop complaining about the small, boring tasks in our lives and start doing them with love and care, we are walking in Joshua’s footsteps.

 We are proving that we have that same special spirit, the kind that knows you have to be willing to take care of the benches before you can lead the people.