“Make for yourself a rabbi, acquire for yourself a friend.”

This week I had the opportunity to attend the Rabbinical Assembly convention. Living in a city that hosts so many industry conventions, it was nice to be able to attend my own. For a host of reasons of which I will spare you the details, I have rarely attended my industry convention. But for the first time, I am glad I did. Every industry has issues that are unique to it. Doctors, lawyers, bankers, tradesmen of all kinds have certain things that only other doctors, other lawyers, other tradesmen can relate too. It is no different for rabbis. Getting together to share, commiserate, teach, learn and bond is more important than I even realized.

Over the course of the convention we heard from scholars, experts and even Cardinal Dolan, Arch Bishop of New York. We listened to the leaders of the Conservative movement and learned from some of our best teachers. I even got to take in a Broadway show. I couldn’t get tickets to Hamilton so I went to Fiddler. Watching it was the equivalent of eating comfort food. But the sessions that were most helpful were the ones were we had the chance to discuss some of the most difficult questions we deal with as rabbis. Whatever problems we deal with here in Las Vegas, demographic, educational, financial -we are not alone. We got to share life experiences with each other and to lean on each other for strength and support.

I come back renewed, refreshed and ready to continue to guide Midbar Kodesh to new and better places.

Rabbi Bradley Tecktiel has been Midbar Kodesh Temple's spiritual leader since August 2008. Rabbi Tecktiel was ordained at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America in May of 1996. He holds two Bachelor of Arts degrees, one from List College and one from Columbia University. He also holds a Masters of Arts from the Jewish Theological Seminary.

You can follow him on Twitter @RabbiMKT