Jeff Pensak went from cooking meals for over 200 congregants at Ner Tamid Greenspring Valley Congregation to becoming the chairman of its board.

As the synagogue has been growing rapidly over the past few years, Pensak, who became chairman in early June, has been thinking about its future and how he plans to lead it alongside Rabbi Yisrael Motzen.

“I think we had 60-70 families join in the past year, so it’s definitely been growing,” Pensak said. “Now [Ner Tamid] is no longer the best-kept secret in town. People didn’t know about Reb Motzen and the shul.”

Ner Tamid’s chairman position has similar responsibilities to those of the presidential position at other synagogues. While Motzen handles the synagogue’s religious affairs, Pensak takes care of its business. He runs the day-to-day operations of Ner Tamid, works with its finance committee to maintain its budget and gives the rabbi the support he needs.
Motzen has put his full support behind Pensak, describing him as “a great guy.”

A Baltimore native, Pensak, 37, is a real estate broker in his professional life. When not handling shul chairman duties, he helps clients buy and sell retail space in shopping centers. He also has four kids, ages 3 to 14 — and his children were actually the impetus for him getting involved with Ner Tamid.

As his kids were getting older, Pensak and his wife started looking for a more involved synagogue. A friend recommended Ner Tamid, and Pensak’s family enjoyed its environment.

“I came here with my wife and two kids at the time, and found it to be very welcoming and diverse,” he recalled. “Everyone gets along real nice, the people here are from a good mix of backgrounds and we just really liked it.”

Pensak soon became president of Ner Tamid’s brotherhood, which hosts social events for male congregants. Around this time, in 2020, he started cooking for the synagogue. Pensak noted that he has always enjoyed cooking, and has a great deal of experience in the culinary world. Prior to becoming a real estate broker, he and his wife, Ayala, owned and operated two candy stores: the former Chocolate Publishing Company, which focused on printing logos and images on chocolate; and Shay’s Confections, which created caramels and popcorn that were sold in nationwide retailers.

Cooking for a crowd of 200 people is a far cry from making chocolates, but Pensak enjoys it just as much.

“They used to hold dinners at Ner Tamid where they would just get catering or buy from restaurants. One time, I suggested that we cook in-house because we have a kitchen,” Pensak said. “I was only going to do it once, but then I got dragged into it. We have dinners open to the community at large around once a month. I’ve been doing it since 2020, right before COVID.”

Pensak plans to continue cooking these group dinners as chairman, but he now has additional responsibilities. Currently, he is facilitating the remodeling process for Ner Tamid’s lobby, a project that has been ongoing for the past few years. It actually started when Pensak was serving on the synagogue’s board as a member.

When Ner Tamid raised enough money for these renovations in 2022, the synagogue turned to Pensak to oversee the project due to his construction knowledge.

“I found an architect, worked with them to design [the lobby], got approvals for construction from the city, selected the contractor and, now that we’re building it, I’ve been keeping an eye on the project and making sure we’re sticking to the budget and keeping on top of the architect and builders,” he explained.

Pensak noted that he does not plan on making many significant changes to the synagogue as chairman, but as Ner Tamid approaches its 70th anniversary in February 2025, he has started to think about how the historic synagogue could be modernized and how to bring in new members while continuing to engage the families who have been with Ner Tamid for generations.

“Certain fundraising events were popular years ago, but now people don’t want to do them,” he explained. “Now, there are different ways to bring people together, raise some money and have fun. We try to understand what our current congregants want, how to stay relevant and how to get new members to join. … It’s nice to go from meeting in groups to running the groups.”