Episode 201 - Measuring Wealth By What You Trust, Not What You Hold

What if your demand for certainty is the very thing blocking trust? We take on a bold idea: many of us hold the Divine hostage, promising to commit once money and success feel guaranteed. Using a crisp analogy of ordinary versus extraordinary debtors—plus a timely thought experiment about asking a billionaire for collateral—we reframe faith from a risky leap to a response grounded in memory and evidence.

We start with a quick preview of our upcoming guest, Rabbi Glenn Black of NCSY Canada, whose work with teens offers a window into how values form during the most malleable years. Then we dig into the “sixth response” from classic teachings: collateral makes sense with fallible people, not with a Provider who keeps paying out kindness with interest. From food that goes far beyond bread and water to shelter, relationships, and everyday comforts, most of us live with abundance that exceeds need. The senses themselves become a daily audit of gifts we didn’t earn yet rely on constantly.

This conversation is practical, not preachy. We outline a simple daily inventory—where did I grow, where did I drift, what can I repair today—and show how repentance is a reset, not a punishment. The payoff is clarity. When we acknowledge we’re often the late payer while the Source is unfailingly generous, the habit of bargaining for guarantees loses its grip. Gratitude becomes the engine of trust, and trust becomes the fuel for decisive action: give now, help now, build now.

If you’re tired of waiting for perfect conditions before doing what matters, this one’s for you. Listen, reflect, and then try the inventory tonight. If it shifts your perspective, share the episode with a friend who needs the same nudge. Subscribe for more conversations that turn big ideas into everyday practice, and leave a review to help others find the show.

Chapters

• 0:25 Welcome And Guest Tease
• 0:34 Why Rabbi Glenn Black Matters
• 1:06 Setting Up The Sixth Response
• 2:01 Security, Debt, And Human Frailty
• 3:04 The Extraordinary Debtor Analogy
• 3:28 Wealthy Figures And Collateral
• 4:20 Turning The Tables On Favour And Trust
• 4:25 God’s Provision Beyond Our Needs
• 6:08 Sensory Gifts And Daily Gratitude
• 7:34 Honest Self-Inventory And Repentance
• 8:50 Trust’s Secret Ingredient: Gratitude
• 9:09 Closing And Next Steps

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:25

Good, everybody, and welcome to the Trust Factor, the only podcast that guarantees your success when you implement its Divine Age All Teachings. This coming Friday, the guest speaker that we're going to have, that we're going to interview on the podcast, is none other than Rabbi Glenn Black, NCSY Canada, the CEO, the big guy at NCSY Canada. Glenn's been a personal friend for many, many years. He and his entire family have been very close to my family for many years. And it's going to be a privilege to give us some insight into where the next generation's head is at. We talked to Rabbi Blackman. He's the guy who's dealing with the university students and graduates. Rabbi Black deals with them when they're in the high school system, when they're teenagers, when they're still being fashioned and molded in some of the most critical years of their lives in terms of their futures. Rabbi Black, Glenn, is going to give us some real insight into what they are dealing with and maybe what they've been dealing with over the last couple of years since the war broke out. Let's get into the sixth response that we give to an individual who is holding Hashem ransom. He's holding his life ransom, really, to say to God, I need money, I need success, I need wealth, I need to be stable and secure before I commit to doing the things that I need to do. What do we say to somebody who thinks so foolishly? And we've gone through five, and there are two more. And I want to assure you, I just read that right now before I started the podcast, I did not read this before, I did not read ahead. But you'll see that we already addressed this just a couple of days ago. He says the sixth response to such a person is that when one takes a security from his fellow to whom he extends credit, he does so only because he considers the debtor to be an ordinary person. This is a guy of flesh and blood. This is a person, even if I'm a, you know, I'm a I'm a spiritual guy, I've learnt my Torah, I know that there's a God that runs the world, and yet, you know, I'm failing in this department. So I see this individual as just another human being, and I know his frailties, and I understand that he may not be able to pay me, and it may even be out of his control. There's a whole question that comes out of that is to say, where's God in this, right? Because if you've lent the money and he's not paying you, there's no coincidences in this world. So that's a different conversation. But right now, he's saying that the reason we as human beings take debt or want to get security, I should say, from an individual who we are lending to is because we know that they are frail and susceptible to the forces of humanity, right? So we expect it in a security from them. From that perspective, it is normal to request a security. But if the debtor were an extraordinary individual, such that the creditor was certain that he would pay him even before the due date, and that in appreciation for his waiting to receive payment without asking for security, the debtor would out of a desire to reciprocate the kindness, he would pay double the amount owes. Does that sound familiar? I promise I did not read forward. A few days ago we were talking, and I gave the example about President Trump, Elon Musk, important, well-established, very wealthy, very influential people are coming to request from you. Are you going to have the nerve to ask them for a security? You know that these people is a drop in the bucket. They don't even see it. It's not even a question. The money is not an issue. Obviously, you have to make sure that you just have something in writing to demonstrate that the transactions occurred. I'm lending you something. But to request a security deposit from somebody like this, it's it's an embarrassment. It's something to be ashamed of if that's where your head is going to. That's what he's saying over here. The creditor, he says, would not take security from him under any circumstances. Now, the rules are reversed. What happens when you come to this wealthy, powerful, influential individual and say, I need a favor? You think he's gonna take security from you? How is he gonna do that? He's gonna repay your kindness with kindness. Now, with respect to the creator, Hashem, we know how kindly he treats us, providing for all of our needs, and how lavishly he bestows his goodness upon us by granting us even more than we need. I'm gonna add to that, not only more than we need, more than we deserve oftentimes. We more than we need, that's obvious. What does a human being need in order to survive, right? Because as a parent, bringing children into the world, the basics that I need to provide for them are food and shelter, clothing, keep them warm, be able to give them the minimum human requirements to give them an ability to thrive. Not every parent has millions or hundreds of millions of dollars that they can lavishly give their child everything that they want and need, and that is not necessarily a healthy thing. But clearly, even the most poverty-stricken individual can bring a child into the world if they have the means to provide them with their basic needs. But here he's saying he provides us so much more than our needs. Obviously he does. We don't just have bread and water. Man is made to survive on bread and water. We have wonderful, beautiful, tasty, delicious foods. We have restaurants that are producing some of the best foods in the world. We have all these wonderful opportunities just with regards to the food that is a basic necessity. What about the house? We just need a roof over our head. We need a place to keep us safe from the elements. It doesn't need to be lavish, it doesn't need to be palaces, but look at what we have. Many of us, in most cases, we're living in middle to upper class, if not super elite status. We're not lacking. He's giving us plenty of what we need, not just to survive, but to thrive, because that is what a loving, capable parent who has the means does with his child. And by consistently bestowing upon us new gifts in addition to the earlier ones, and furthermore, we know that he rewards us for charitable deeds and mitzvahs performed in his service with compassion that cannot even be imagined and surely cannot be described in words. The gifts and the consequences and the rewards that we get from our creator just for having been created are immeasurable. You can't measure them in this world. You can't put a weight, a size, any form of limit on the spiritual goodness that we earn as a result of our actions. We also benefit in this world. The point is that God overcompensates us, not just dollar for dollar. In other words, we know that we're always at a deficit when it comes to him because he's constantly showering us with more opportunities and more goodness and children and experiences and all kinds of wonderful things that we deal with. Like I said, just look at your senses. Do you know what it's like? God forbid you should never know to live without one of your major senses. It's a massive, massive loss. And there are people who live without one or more of their senses on a daily basis. If you have all your senses, how grateful do you need to be? Just to be able to experience this world with the sensitivity of your senses, right? And if you don't have all of your senses, you just have a few, be grateful for the few that you have. Oftentimes, if we really do an introspection and we're honest with ourselves and with our creators, and we really try to figure out, which, like we've said many times, we need to do on a daily basis. Our own personal inventory. Where am I holding? Am I doing good? Am I doing bad? Am I growing? Am I digressing? I don't know. I need to do an analysis every day because today is different than yesterday. And yesterday was different from the day before. I had new experiences, I met new people, I interacted in different situations. How did I respond? Do the analysis. If you've done the analysis, you and you're being honest with yourself, you will recognize that if I'm trying to figure out how much of his work I'm doing in this world and how much of my work I'm doing in this world, I need to be doing a lot more of his work. We need to be honest because we're not. And sometimes we even go against the decrees. Oftentimes we find ourselves doing things we're not supposed to do. We're all guilty of it. Nobody's perfect. We have this thing called chuva, repentance, where we can pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and move forward. But nonetheless, we still do these things. We're still frail and faulty. Bottom line, he's perfect. By definition, we are faulty. So we are always going to be indebted to Hashem. That's the bottom line. So if you're constantly thinking that way, what does it build? It builds the secret recipe to having trust and to enjoy and to succeed and to thrive, and that is what? Gratitude. It opens up your eyes and you recognize that Hashem is giving you even more than you need, and even when you're not deserving. When I say you, I say me, because this is everybody. That's it for today, my friends. I'm your host, Jesse Revivo. Thank you again for tuning in. It's been my pleasure. We'll pick up again tomorrow.