The Divine Portfolio

There are many similarities between stocks and mitzvot.
 
What is a stock really? It has no immediate worth. On its own, you can’t even buy a stick of bubble gum with it.
 
Don’t get me wrong, there is great value in owning a piece of a company. However, it's never guaranteed. Today the stock can be worth a hundred dollars and tomorrow it can be worth fifty. We can get a little cash from these stocks when the company pays out dividends, but as long as we hold the stock itself, we are holding nothing more than a theoretical claim to something. It is only when we actually sell the stock and exchange it for cash that we truly have something of immediate use.
 
The same can be said for a mitzvah.
 
We don’t gain immediate “payment” from a mitzvah. Every mitzvah is a pure act of faith. It is a statement before Heaven and Earth that Hashem rules over mankind at every moment, He created the world with a purpose, and we are fulfilling this purpose by following His Commandments. It is an affirmation that G-d rewards those who perform His Will with good.
 
Like a stock, there are no immediate guarantees in performing a mitzvah. Hashem created the world in such a way that we rarely receive the good at the very moment we perform a commandment. Someone once joked that the height of Divine Service is when you spend two hours volunteering to help the poor, only to return to your car with a parking ticket attached to the windshield!
 
Like stocks, we do receive a small “payment” for our mitzvot. Hashem blesses the world with sustenance. He blesses us with functioning bodies. He graciously gives us the joy of family, the beauty of His world, and the opportunity to perform more of His mitzvoth.
 
Compared to the abundance of the Next World, all the rewards we receive in this physical existence are exactly like stock dividends. They are a miniscule percentage of the true value of what we are holding.
 
We accumulate mitzvoth all of our lives. Every prayer, every line of Torah, every act of chessed is one more addition to our Divine portfolio. It is a guarantee that we possess something that will be exchanged for immediate value at a later date.
 
For stocks, that later date comes when you sell the stock and receive money. For our mitzvoth, that later date is after 120 years and all of the mitzvoth we performed in this world are exchanged for our portion in Olam HaBa – the World to Come.
 
On a simple level, we gain wealth when we accumulate shares of physical assets. There is no limit to how much we can acquire, and we spend our lives trying to acquire as much as we can. On a higher level, we strive to accumulate shares of Olam Haba. There is no limit to how much we can acquire, and we spend our lives trying to acquire as much as we can.
 
The Lubavitcher Rebbe reminds every Jew of the greatest opportunity our Father in Heaven has given us:
 
We are all finite holders of the Infinite.
 
There is one special benefit which a mitzvah offers over a share of stock. If you buy a stock and it goes down, you lose money. Once you sell the stock at a lower price the loss is irreversible.
 
With a mitzvah, no loss is final. As Rabbi Nachman tells us –there is no problem that is so bad that you cannot fix it. We learn that inhitbodedut, confessing our sins every day mitigates the judgment that hangs over us. We learn that teshuva not only atones for the past sins we committed throughout our lifetimes – it can transform them into mitzvoth! Our "losses" immediately become spiritual gains.
 
When we perform heartfelt teshuva, working to improve ourselves at our weakest points – especially in the areas of personal holiness – Shmirat HaBrit, EVERYTHING GOES UP! It’s like a banker knocking on your door and telling you that in recognition of your acts of kindness on behalf of the community, he is retroactively buying the Enron stock which you sold for pennies 10 years ago at $100 a share. He then hands you a check for five hundred thousand dollars.
 
Our generation has been more fascinated with buying and selling stocks than any before it. What an act of Divine Compassion that we can learn the important lessons of life through this international obsession. We get a taste of Torah inside many of the top stories we see in the newspaper and hear on CNN each day.
 
May it be Hashem's Will that we all merit great wealth in both this world and the Next.