Episode Transcript
[00:00:15] Speaker A: Well, hey, everyone. Welcome to Love Y' All Get Out Conversations to Help youp get out and Live the Mission. My name's Chad and I'm your host. And I'm so thankful that you've joined us. I want you to know that every time you press play on Love Y' All get out, that what you'll get is something that will encourage and challenge your faith. Some weeks, we'll do a deeper dive into Sunday's sermon. Sometimes we'll hear stories of faith from people in our community. And sometimes we'll just talk church. Those ideas or those decisions that need to be made so that a community of local believers can come together and give strength to and gain strength from one another. And today I'm excited because of who my special guest is. I'll introduce him in just a minute. But we just finished a series called Influencers. It was a four week series on First John Chapter two. And we really saw three different generations, generations of people. The sage generation, the sandwich generation. And this week we're talking with the spark generation. And my special guest is someone who is in the spark generation. He also happens to be my son. This is Dawson Balthrop. Dawson, thanks so much for being here with me today.
[00:01:18] Speaker B: Thanks for having me.
[00:01:19] Speaker A: I'm so thankful that we get to do this together. And really that language of spark generation, you inspired that in me. And so thank you for giving me that word and just giving me a chance to use that. We called it the Sage generation because in scripture it says those who are a little more mature, those who have some age on them, they have wisdom and experience.
And then in the Sandwich generation, they connect. The older the spark generation with the sage generation. They connect. They're kind of in the middle with kids and then grandparents and great grandparents, they do that connection. They have vision and passion. And in this spark generation, you're kind of the youngest among us.
And. And so you are my youngest son. I have four kids. My oldest is my daughter and then I've got three sons.
What's it like being the youngest in our family?
[00:02:07] Speaker B: It's. It's awesome. It's.
[00:02:10] Speaker A: I'm gonna pay him later for that. That's cool.
[00:02:13] Speaker B: We.
I've. I've been blessed with three awesome siblings.
And I've. I mean, one of the. One of the things that has kind of been ingrained into me since I was young is kind of like the idea of being a selective sponge in the sense that everybody has some good in them and everybody has some bad in them. And you should Find that good in those people and be grateful for that.
And, and soak that in.
But the. But the bad, you should just reject that and then.
[00:02:49] Speaker A: Yeah, so be honest right now.
Who's the baddest of your brothers and sister?
[00:02:55] Speaker B: That's like an off topic conversation.
[00:02:58] Speaker A: That's smart. That's good. See, you've already learned from the sage generation how to not stick your foot in your mouth. I'm old enough now that I still don't know how to do that. So good job in all of that. That's great.
[00:03:10] Speaker B: Thank you.
[00:03:10] Speaker A: I love that.
I always, I've always had a theory that the youngest in a family is always the most dangerous because they get to watch the olders and learn all the right things to do and all the things to just kind of avoid. And so you've done a good job at that. Way to go.
[00:03:23] Speaker B: Thank you.
[00:03:23] Speaker A: That's great.
Also, your parents have had by the time you came along, a lot of practice at how to do things right and how to do things wrong. And so, Jaden, I'm sorry, we, we, we practiced on you a lot. So please forgive me, but that, that language of spark, I called it the Spark generation because that was a word that you kind of inspired in me. But I know beyond your generation, that means something specific to you.
What does that word mean? Spark. What does that mean to you? Why did you, why did you start using that word?
[00:03:56] Speaker B: Yeah, I called a Spark is a gospel conversation.
That's what I call a spark. And it means a lot because I've been working on this app for. Since January called Spark, and it brings disciples together.
[00:04:09] Speaker A: Okay, so you're been like an app, like for your phone?
[00:04:12] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:04:12] Speaker A: Like an app that you could use anywhere, anytime.
[00:04:15] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:04:15] Speaker A: And you've called it Spark.
Okay. And you've been working on it since January. What's the purpose of the app? Is it like a video game? Is it something I do in my spare time? What is it?
[00:04:24] Speaker B: Yeah. So the vision, the mission of Spark is to light the room.
Meaning to which? Meaning whichever room you walk into, to fill that room with gospel conversations with Sparks. And the app is so on your homepage you have your school schedule. And right now it is tailored towards middle schools and high schools.
But in the future, the idea is to move it to workplace and military and things like that.
But in each of your classes, you can see who, who amongst who in your class is sharing the gospel with you. You can also see the list of disciples in your school.
Spark equips you with many tools to share the gospel. And then you log your gospel conversations, your sparks, through this little form.
It just asks you some really simple questions, and then other people in your classes can see, hey, someone had a spark, and we should talk about it.
[00:05:22] Speaker A: That's really cool. So it gives you a way to. To track your gospel conversations with people in your classrooms at school. Is it dependent on which church you attend or how is it just connecting people from the same church, or is it doing something more than that?
[00:05:36] Speaker B: Spark connects anybody who just goes to Wassuh High School right now. Yeah. And so the spark is not centered around a church. It doesn't need a church to exist right now. The users are the backbone of the app or the cornerstone of the app.
And so, yeah, that's cool.
[00:05:56] Speaker A: So you don't need a church to have spark and to use Spark as an app, but maybe as believers, we need a church to encourage and challenge one another.
[00:06:07] Speaker B: Exactly.
[00:06:07] Speaker A: Is that accurate? Yeah. And. And so tell me more about how it helps you track gospel conversations and the tools that are inside that. What.
What would it look like if you and I were in the same homeroom together? What would it look like if we went to different churches but we were both in the app?
What does that look like?
[00:06:26] Speaker B: Yeah, so say we're here at FVC WASO now. And say you went to life Church, for example, and we were both in third hour math together, and you had a spark with a guy named Jeff, and Jeff's a bad dude.
And so you would, after class, you would write down, you would just go on spark, and you'd fill out this little form and it would be tracked for your account. And it would. Other people in your class could see by just like, by just logging on to Spark, by just looking at their homepage. They could see, hey, someone in their third hour math class had a spark. They wouldn't see who. They wouldn't see how it went or anything like that. They would just see someone had a spark. And so that sparks communication throughout the.
Throughout the classroom of disciples in order to talk about. So that creates community centered around the gospel.
[00:07:26] Speaker A: Okay, so I can. I could see. You could see that I had a gospel conversation with someone, and then you and I would have an opportunity to talk about that later.
[00:07:36] Speaker B: I wouldn't be able to see that it was you. I would be able to see someone had a spark, and it wasn't me. And so we should talk about it.
[00:07:43] Speaker A: But we would know that we're both in the same class together, and spark would help us see that we're in the same.
[00:07:48] Speaker B: Exactly.
[00:07:48] Speaker A: Okay. Yeah. So that really gives us.
It gives us some encouragement, it gives us some accountability, gives us an opportunity to pray for one another. Is there a. Is there a tool inside Spark that helps with that?
[00:07:59] Speaker B: Yeah, there's this. It's your My people page, and it's just a prayer page. You can. You write on someone's name and how you're praying for them and what hour they're in, and then.
And then you can, after you click Save, you see their name, and you can review. Review how you're praying for them and how many Sparks you've had with them. And in each of your classes, on the top right corner of each little box, there's a prayer journal. It's completely anonymous.
And so you can share maybe things that might be a little more personal because.
Because of the anonymity of the prayer journal. And so that kind of allows users to be a little more comfortable with sharing those things, saying, hey, I need.
This is how I could be prayed for. But no one will know it's you. They will know it's someone in their third hour, but they won't know who it is.
[00:08:49] Speaker A: Whether we go to the same church or not, we can find each other because we happen to be in the same third hour.
We can encourage one another because of the gospel conversations or in the gospel conversations we're having. And then if I want to share a prayer request, I can do that anonymously. You could still see that there is an anonymous prayer request that's there. And you could pray with me or for me about that.
[00:09:12] Speaker B: Exactly.
[00:09:13] Speaker A: That's really cool. And. And basically it's this idea that. That there are believers all over the high school. They attend a variety of churches. But how can we mobilize all these believers together for one purpose?
What is that purpose?
[00:09:30] Speaker B: That purpose is to light the room to whatever room you walk into, to fill it with gospel conversations. And that vision to light the room, it really originally wasn't Spark's mission. It was Jesus mission in the Great Commission.
And he says to go and make disciples of all nations. And it goes on. And so that Spark's mission, that Spark's purpose is to unite those disciples to go and make more disciples.
[00:10:01] Speaker A: What if I'm new to all of this and I don't have any idea how to share my faith or share the gospel with anybody?
[00:10:07] Speaker B: Yeah. So there's a tools page at the bottom left of your screen on Spark, and it's all these things. All these items are tools to Help you share your faith. There's a page, it's called your story and it asks you simple questions about how did Jesus save your life? Like what was your life like before you were saved?
How did Jesus or why did you choose to accept Jesus and how is your life different?
Simple things like that help you articulate your story better. And so when you are sharing your testimony, you can refer back to that if you need to. And then there's also things like the three circles and the Romans road and there's even a little insights page to help you see your gospel sharing trends.
[00:10:52] Speaker A: That's really cool. And you've got it inside Owasso. Right now it's available to Owasso school students. How does it become available to other schools?
[00:11:00] Speaker B: Yeah, so right now, like you said, it's only available at OASA to the next school. It for another school to gain access to Spark. It takes 30 students and three ministers to request Spark. And so right now anyone can download Spark. Anyone and everyone can download Spark. But it you have to have an adawassops.org email to create a student account.
And in the future say there's another school in the Tulsa area that wants to download Spark and there have been 30 students who have clicked sign up their school and who've done that process. I'll get a notification as the admin saying, hey, there are these people from Rejoice or Collinsville public schools that want to use Spark. This is how many there are, this is how many ministers there are. And then I can grant access to that specific school district.
[00:11:55] Speaker A: If you were at Rejoice or if you were at Collinsville and you're a student, just download the app and then have your friends download the app.
[00:12:04] Speaker B: Exactly.
[00:12:05] Speaker A: Start asking, hey, we want our school to be open up.
[00:12:07] Speaker B: Yeah, exactly.
[00:12:08] Speaker A: That's a really cool idea.
[00:12:09] Speaker B: If you're at another school that doesn't have Spark, get, get you and get yourself and all your friends to download Spark and sign up your school because that's the way that I will know, hey, we have people who want to actively use Spark at this school.
[00:12:23] Speaker A: That's cool. And you know, that's how, that's how a generation changes. That's how people change.
There's all kinds of things that can happen. Politics and there's all kinds of things that can happen with commerce and business and finance and, and you can do things with our, you know, with.
There's just all kinds of great tools out there to help people live good lives.
But there's a difference in A community, when people begin living godly lives, when they connect with the gospel and that transforming power that the gospel has, that is just better than what politics can do. It's better than what a budget or money can do. It's better than what just being a good person can do. Because it's not based on who we are. It's based on what Christ has done for us.
And the ability for us in a community like this to be able to see other believers and to know we're not alone as we attempt to share and live the gospel is just so good. Thanks so much for developing an app like that. That's, of course. That's really cool. Now your generation faces some unique challenges.
What. What's something you wish that an older generation knew about your generation?
[00:13:35] Speaker B: Yeah, for.
About my generation, maybe this is tailored more towards non believers, but this generation is quietly hungry for truth.
There have been multiple times and at school where I've shared what I believe, not for the intent of.
Of debate or just to disagree with someone, but I've.
God's graciously given me the opportunity to share the truth about him. And whenever people hear the truth, their ear just turns.
And I.
I don't know exactly why that is, but I. I think that's because they've heard so much wrong, so many wrong ideas from social media and maybe even close relatives or friends who have just treated them poorly or said wrong things to them or said their opinions about the Bible and not told the actual truth. I think for believers in this generation, I think they're ready to step up and to lead, to influence others.
I think this generation of believers specifically struggles to be that one person who does step up. I think if you had a room kind of split with believers and non believers, and until one believer would step up, nobody else would. But that when that one believer does, everyone else is ready to go there with you is what it seems like.
[00:15:15] Speaker A: That's interesting. It's what I love about Spark, because as soon as I can see in this room, I'm not alone. It's so much easier for me to speak up and say something, for me to stand up. And you're right. In your generation, there is so much information available. I'm reminded the very last verse of the Book of Judges might be one of the saddest verses in Scripture. It says, and everyone did what was right in their own eyes.
And I think that's what I see in this generation. I don't mean necessarily your generation, but this time in this era, from My generation to yours and the ones that are older than us.
It feels like we live in a generation where everyone does what's right in their own eyes. And they always have reasons and they always have arguments.
But there's something powerful about the gospel.
And if just one person in a classroom can recognize they're not alone and just begin speaking up, it's amazing how the classroom changes, but it's only changing because individual lives are changing. And as those lives change, it changes a family. And if you change a family, you change a church. And if you change a church, you change a community.
And that. That list just keeps going and going. And it all starts when you do exactly what you talked about, when you light the room. I really love that concept. I'm really proud of you. And thanks for taking your time to share with us today. Before we go, I want to ask you one last question.
If. If those of us who are watching and listening could pray anything about this spark generation, how could we pray for you and this generation?
[00:16:56] Speaker B: Yeah, I think it was Shane Pruitt who said this. I. I think so. It was a speaker that I was listening to, but he used the phrase, it might have been you. I'm not for sure you were ashamed for it.
To never graduate the gospel. Pray that this generation wouldn't lose their spark, wouldn't lose their fire to share the gospel. Because I've seen believers that it's there, that they're ready to go, they're ready to influence.
But just pray, like I said earlier, that we never graduate from the gospel, that we never just that how that right now we believe sharing the gospel is very significant.
And that belief only grows, it doesn't diminish as we get older.
[00:17:52] Speaker A: Yeah, that's a great phrase. Never graduate from the gospel. I'm pretty sure someone smarter than I said that. But.
But it's a great idea, whether you're in the sage generation, sandwich generation, or the spark generation. The gospel of Jesus Christ, the good news that Jesus died on the cross and rose from the dead, that he lived a perfect life, died a sacrificial death, that he rose from the dead, that that's the reason why we can have a right relationship with God. That's something we never graduate from. I hope we never get over. And that we're constantly sharing. And that whether you're older or younger, whether you're in school or out, that wherever you go, you keep having those spark, those gospel conversations that light the room. Well, Dawson, thanks for joining me today. I really appreciate that. Spark right now is available on the App Store, the Apple App Store. Soon it'll be available on the Play Store. It's Spark Light the room.
[00:18:43] Speaker B: Exactly.
[00:18:44] Speaker A: That's what you'd search for. And you can find that there to just kind of check it out, maybe share it with some friends or some family members. But I'm really thankful that you all have joined us today. Thanks for taking the time to do this. I pray that I hope that you'll pray for this generation, that you'll pray for love y' all get out. And just for our church and our community and the people around you, and that you would go out and have sparks, that you would have gospel conversations with people. One of the ways you can help us out is by liking, sharing, commenting and subscribing to this to this broadcast. We'd love for you to be a part of that. And more than anything, we hope that you'll light the room everywhere you go. And like he said, that you'll never graduate from the gospel between now and next time. Love, y' all get out.
Sam.
