This week we continue our Jesus Masterclass series with Nick speaking on Transforming your relationships with Trust.

We are also experimenting with generating a transcript of the talks – this is done by automatic speech to text software, so there may be some inaccuracies in the translation.
Transcript
Oh, man.
Good morning.
Good morning.
Thank you, Izzy.
It’s really encouraging to hear.
Oh, somebody’s in there.
Hello.
My challenge this morning that I’ve chosen to accept is to continue the Jesus Master Class series.
Knowledgeable, that the children are here.
Young people are here.
Everybody’s here together as a church family.
So we’ve got a different, obviously, a different type of approach.
You know, obviously it’s more interesting when the children are here because otherwise you just get me as a talk in head.
But so we’re going to, our theme this morning is transforming relationships with trust.
Sounds simple, doesn’t it?
So what we’re going to do in the true spirit of all age services is we’re going to have an illustration.
There’s no sermon ever preached about trust that doesn’t include some sort of illustration, is there?
So, sorry.
Oh, we can sort that out in a minute.
I do need a volunteer.
But just to help the choosing process is just going to throw up a prayer and see what happens.
I think it’s Harrison.
So, if we could come…
…to round the applause.
Let’s take a seat.
How you feeling?
Good, good, good, good.
Do you feel like you can trust me?
Oh, that’s encouraging.
Trust is important in all relationships.
It doesn’t negate the need for a risk assessment.
So, here we are.
You don’t need this because you can trust me.
But just in case anybody was feeling nervous, it’s for them.
It’s not for you, it’s not for me.
I’m completely confident in what I’m going to do.
All right, so now what I’m going to ask is, I’ve got some plastic bags behind me there.
I’m going to fill them with water.
And we’re going to hold them over your head.
And then we’re going to just stick things in the bag, like sharp pencils and things like that.
And, you know, how do you feel about that?
I mean, are you confident that everything’s going to be all right?
I’ve seen quite…
Say anything with confidence, you can get away with it, can’t you?
Right.
So, I’m going to need some assistance.
Josiah, will you come, please?
All right, is he coming as well?
Right.
What’s the bag here? Can you see what we’re doing?
Hold the bag on there and you hold the bag that side.
Don’t let go, whatever you do, because that will ruin the…
It’s not a trick, it’s a…
Here we go.
All right, here we go.
This…
Oh, look at that. That’s brilliant.
Right, then what I’m going to do, we’re going to zip it closed.
Can you zip that? Can you pull that zip across?
Or is he or whoever? There we go.
Brilliant.
Just reminded me of a goldfish I once had.
Gone but never forgotten.
Right. Okay, here we go.
Right, how tall are you?
Can you hold it over like… how has it said like that?
No? Who can help me then?
Who’s tall enough?
We need some tall, but howard.
Oh!
Thank you.
That’s a big ask in it.
Howard’s trustworthy.
So they say. Right.
Right, anybody want to say a prayer?
Right, so the whole idea is to prove that you can afford to trust me.
All right, so we’ll take the first pencil and we’ll push it through.
Woo!
It’s amazing there.
I’m actually even though I feel like I could trust the process.
I’m also slightly nervous.
Look at that!
Yeah, let’s try a skewer.
Did you vertical this one?
Let’s go through there, look at that.
Look at this, this is amazing.
He doesn’t need a towel, look!
Complete freedom from witness.
Keep going, keep going.
I haven’t actually thought this through to the extent what do we do with the bag now.
But that’s it.
Put it in a… All right, put it in.
Give me a round of applause, go on.
Howard and Harrison as well.
Congratulations.
No, we’re not going to pop it on anybody’s head.
Put it in there.
I was told I could trust you, put it down.
Right, how does it work?
Well, there is a science of…
I had got in my notes that Graham Ins would come and explain the science of polymers,
but there’s no time, sorry.
Yeah, there’s some science behind it somewhere.
It’s not witchcraft, honestly.
Right, thank you guys, very good.
You see?
You wish that the kids were cancelled every week, no?
So the challenge for Harrison was to trust me and to believe that he wouldn’t end up being soaked
because I was going to be true to my word and everything ended up good.
But the problem is he could have trusted me and he could have got completely soaked.
So it wasn’t about the power of his trust,
but the thing that made the difference was that I actually turned out against the odds to be trustworthy.
That there was a point to it all that I could actually put him in that situation knowing that
nothing was going to happen or hoping for the best that nothing was going to happen that was bad.
He could have just…
And so when we say we’re transforming our relationships with trust,
that can be a bit tricky because what you hear often, and it feels true, doesn’t it,
is that I even heard somebody say to me this week, you can’t trust anyone.
In this world, it seems like you can’t trust anyone.
And so what point is there in a sermon standing up and saying,
I see when we’ve been hurting our lives, when we’ve been damaged,
when we’ve been betrayed, or we’ve been people have disappointed us,
or let us down, or whatever say, well, you know,
being part of the Jesus Master Class is just trust everyone.
It doesn’t work.
So how do we transform our relationships with trust?
What is the power that we have in our hands?
If we struggle to trust the world around us,
how do we have to be agents of transformation or change?
And the answer is simply to be trustworthy.
That’s how we change the world.
That’s how we change our relationships.
Not by holding people to say, you know, I need to be able to trust you,
but saying, whatever happens, you can trust me.
And that is the benefit that Harrison has gleaned this morning,
knowing that he can trust me completely and absolutely.
And he can trust the science of polymers.
So the power to transform relationships with trust comes from us being trustworthy.
And that then takes it, we’re not just hoping for the best.
We’re not just throwing our trust out there and hoping that we get some return,
but we’ve actually got the power to change our hearts,
our lives, our relationships, our outlook in order to be trustworthy people
that can demonstrate the gospel through the way that we relate to one another
and the way that we relate to the world around us and the way that we relate to God.
Now, I’ve got a few bullet points that we’re going to go through about trustworthiness
and to introduce these to us, I’ve got Yoda on video.
So please do have a look at the screen.
Respect leads to trust.
Honesty walks along with trust.
Consistency reinforces trust.
Carrying for other fields.
Trust.
Retitude is an expression.
Trust.
Positive actions.
Planseats of trust.
Its selflessness is an act of trust.
Can we put the screen shut up?
I don’t know what this church has done to me.
It’s not gone full multimedia.
Oh, there we are.
Trustworthiness.
Some points that we want to make.
And all I want to do is just go through very briefly through these points
and looking at some scriptures relating to them.
So in trustworthiness, being trustworthy, being worthy of people putting their trust
and their faith in us, we need to know number one that respect leads to trust.
Now, I want somebody that can help me with a reading, please.
Oh, just while I might come back to you in a minute, is he?
Janet, would you be able to do this for me?
There we go.
I hope this one.
Hello.
Oh, well, hello.
Sorry.
That works.
Okay.
Oh.
I’ve been burned, Pete.
I’ve been burned.
Sorry, Janet.
Carry on.
Honour the lives of all people.
Love the brotherhood of believers.
Reverence God and honour the King.
On Peter to 17.
Yeah.
Thank you very much.
Honour the lives of all people.
Love the brotherhood of believers.
Reverence God and honour the King.
Being agents of transformation goes to the heart of how we respond to everyone in every sphere of life.
If someone knows that fundamentally, if I fundamentally, environmentally disagree,
that we have completely opposite points of view, but yet I will treat them
and I will speak of them with dignity and honour, then I build trust.
I build a sense that the world is a safer place.
Because, you know, everybody is at each other’s throats.
There’s argument, there’s division, there’s hatred, there’s bitterness.
Jesus himself predicted it.
But yet we, a salt and light in the world, can change the way that we relate to people,
even those that we disagree with.
So when it says honour the King, it’s not just about standing up and singing God save King Charles.
It’s about, you know, respecting the government.
Now that doesn’t mean that we agree and we love and we support and we honour everything that they do.
But we will speak with dignity and with honour.
Love the brotherhood of believers, so many churches that are torn apart by division and mistrust.
And yet we choose, we make a choice in our own hearts to love the brotherhood of believers,
honour the lives of all people.
Treat everyone with dignity and respect and that will lead to trust.
Trust is a slow growing thing, but it will lead to it.
Secondly, honesty walks along with trust.
It’s a bit of a longer passage here.
Let’s go around.
I am going to come to you in a minute. Malachi, are you good at reading?
Yeah, you are.
Can you read that long passage?
Lord, who dares to dwell with you, who presumes the privilege of being close to you,
living next to you in your shining place of glory, who are those who daily dwell in the life of the Holy Spirit.
They are passionate and whole-hearted, always sincere and always speaking the truth.
For their hearts are trustworthy and they refuse to slander or insult others.
They will never listen to gossip or rumors nor would they ever harm with their words.
They will speak out passionately against evil and evil workers well.
Commending the faithful ones who follow after the truth.
They make firm committees and follow through even at great cost.
They never crush others with exploitation or abuse.
They would never be brought with a bribe against the innocent.
They will never be shaken.
They will never stand firm forever.
Brilliant. Well done.
That was a real test.
So all the way through the point about the choices that people make.
They will never, they will never, they make firm commitments.
They will be honest, they will be open, they will walk in integrity.
Those are choices that we make.
That is the process of transforming our relationships with trust.
It is building trust amongst those that we walk with and those are the ones who dare to dwell with the Lord,
who presume the privilege of being close to Him.
There is a price tag to those who want to be close to the Lord.
It is about the decisions that we make, about our hearts and about the way that we deal with Him and the way that we deal with other people.
Number three, consistency reinforces trust.
Go on then, Izzy.
You can do this one.
Your faithfulness follows from one generation to the next.
All that you created still sits firmly in place to testify of you.
Of you, brilliant. Well done. Thank you.
Your faithfulness flows from one generation to the next.
All that you created sits firmly in place to testify of you.
Our model, our example of consistency and faithfulness, we sing it every week.
We sing it, we sing it this morning, is the Lord God Himself.
That He is faithful and consistent from generation to generation to generation.
And so because we can look at the history, because we can look,
that’s why God Himself said, put up stones, put up memorials, remember what I’ve done for you.
And that’s why we need to do that in our own lives, to remember that even though we’re in a struggle at the moment,
if we look back, we see that actually we were in a worse struggle five years ago and God brought us through.
He is faithful and he is consistent and so therefore he is trustworthy.
And so then we also model that in our own lives and in our relationships towards others,
that in order that we might transform our relationships with trust.
Next one, caring for others builds trust.
Who have we got? Let me.
Jonathan, would you read this for me?
Thank you.
Love is large and incredibly patient, love is gentle and consistently kind to all.
It refuses to be jealous when blessing comes to someone else.
Love does not brag about one’s achievements nor inflate its own importance.
Love does not traffic in shame and disrespect nor selflessly seek its own honour.
Love is not easily irritated or quick to take offence.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
So love, caring for one another, looking out for the best interests of one another builds trust.
When we know that people are not looking out for our best interests or they’re looking out for themselves only,
then it breeds mistrust.
It undermines that connection and that belief that somebody is actually going to do the best for us.
But if we can demonstrate biblical love and these things are not easy,
these are a life climb into making sometimes and these are things that take discipline and take development
and take focus and take concentration and take prayer and take seeking after God in order to be this type of person.
But yet that is the challenge that Jesus puts before us, not just to say come to me and just do whatever.
But actually become part of my masterclass if you like in terms of developing discipline and character and trustworthiness,
caring for others builds trust.
Gratitude is an expression of trust.
So I’ve got some more verses here. Greg, are you feeling full-froated?
It’s two verses for you.
Give thanks to the Lord for He is good, His love endures forever.
Psalm 106, 1.
Always be joyful, never stop praying.
Be thankful in all circumstances for this is God’s will for you who belong to Christ Jesus,
1 Thessalonians 5, 16-18.
Amen. Thank you very much.
Gratitude is absolutely key. It seems like the simplest thing.
But yet it’s the hardest thing to in order to consistently be thankful for everything.
You know, we were brought up in school saying, when we all got into the dining hall at school,
we would all gather around our tables and before anybody ate anything,
we would all chant out together for what we are about to receive.
May the Lord make us truly thankful.
Amen. I mean, looking at what was on offer, it was a challenge,
but it taught us the discipline of thankfulness, not about just what pleases me,
but also thankful that we have got food in front of us.
Even if it’s dodgy food, we have got it.
And that breeds trust, and it reminds us of what our source of things is.
And so being thankful to God breeds trust in Him and being thankful for our lives,
being thankful for our friendships, being thankful for our relationships,
appreciating one another, not taking one another for granted.
All of those things build trust and transform our relationships.
Gratitude is key in fostering trust.
Positive actions plant seeds of trust.
Number six, Roland, go on, we’ve heard a bit.
We’ve forgotten what your voice sounds like.
Make no mistake about it.
God will never be mocked.
For what you plant will always be the very thing you harvest.
Galatians 6, verse 7.
Yeah.
You reap what you sow.
Positive actions plant seeds of trust.
So if we want to trust and to experience the benefit of consistency,
if we have to plant seeds of trust, we have to plant seeds of positive actions towards one another.
We have to make sure that our words match up with our actions,
that our promises are kept, that our word is our bond.
All of those things are so vital when it comes to our character.
Because if people are left scratching their heads thinking,
you know, if Harrison had sat here and we just put this pencil through
and all the water dropped on his head,
what was the point of all of that?
And he’ll remember that for the rest of his life.
Probably need counseling and therapy and all of that.
But as it is, he’s delighted and will leave this place with a spring in his step,
knowing that he can trust the pastor.
Positive actions plant seeds of trust.
Conflessness is an act of trust.
One final one.
Where are we going?
Ah, you’ve already done one, is he?
Oh, do you want to do one?
Go on then.
Be free from pride-filled opinions,
but they will only harm your cherished unity.
Don’t allow self-promotion to hide in your hearts.
But in authentic humility,
put others first and view others as more important than yourself.
Abandon every display of selfishness,
possess a greater concern for what matters
to others instead of your own interests.
Philippians, two, three, two, four.
Thank you, Mercy. Thank you very much.
That simple words, simple concept,
is a massive challenge to us,
to do everything without selfishness.
Abandon every display of selfishness.
Possess a greater concern for what matters to others instead of your own interests.
When do we see that?
In our world, the world is self-centered,
has been from the fall and is getting worse and worse and worse.
There is a self-obsession that goes on in the human heart,
and yet we have the power to transform that
by learning what it means to consider the needs
and the concerns of others before ourselves.
Selflessness is an act of trust.
Selflessness is something that builds trust.
Selflessness is something that is so vital in our world
and we don’t have to think of ourselves only first and foremost.
So we’re going to transform our relationships
with trust by being trustworthy.
We’re focused on the scripture very much this morning.
Erick is going to come and help us with a memory verse.
Do you want the microphone?
Guys, just, um…
Hi, how’s the most yours coming out with?
What do you want me to know? Do you want some help?
No.
Come on in, you’re right.
Thank you for coming out with.
Under the line,
we’re going to test the…
Come over here. Can you all…
Can you guys…
Oh, look, look at that.
They’re just great.
They’re just awesome people.
Do you want some help?
Okay.
Do you want some help?
No?
Yes.
Do you want some help?
Anybody else wants some help?
They here coming out,
I see that hand.
There’s a hand, eh?
There’s a hand on the back.
Yes, come on, darling.
I need one more.
Any body?
Yes, yes, yes.
Come on.
Well, we’ve got one minute.
Come on, Jeremy.
Why do you need to hold it up high so that everybody can see?
Oh, sorry.
Come on, darling.
Hold it really up high so that everybody can see.
Okay.
So.
So.
So.
Okay, folks, this is your memory verse for this morning.
If we want to see our relationships changed with trust,
then it is down to us and the way we treat others.
So, repeat after me.
The way you want others to treat you is how you should treat everyone.
Luke, chapter six, verse 31.
Say that again.
The way you want others to treat you is how you should treat others.
How you should treat everyone.
Luke, chapter six, verse 31.
And just like summer club, we’re going to put some down.
Really, really quickly.
This is my favorite one.
This one.
I drew a smiley face on that one.
Okay. Are you ready?
Okay.
The way you want others to treat you is how you should treat everyone.
Luke, chapter six, verse 31.
Okay.
That you is staying.
That you is staying.
Okay.
All right.
Are we ready?
The way you want others to treat you is how you should treat everyone.
Luke, chapter six, verse 31.
Sammy, do you want to pop yours down, please?
Kendrick, do you want to pop yours down, please?
Jackie, you can keep holding yours up.
Are we ready?
Okay.
The way you want others to treat you is the way you should treat everyone.
Luke, chapter six, verse 31.
Jackie, can you pop yours down?
Okay.
The way you want others to treat you is the way that you should treat everyone.
Luke, chapter six, verse 31.
So when we’re thinking about transforming communities, transforming relationships through trust,
who does it depend on you with a smiley face?
Guys, well done.
Thank you very much.
Give them a round of applause.
That’s how you do it.
Simple.
Roll them.
This is how you do it.