Andy Mason (00:01.061)
Hey, welcome to the conversation. I'm Andy Mason, and you're listening to the Heaven a Business podcast, where we help you navigate the messy intersection of faith, family, and business. And talking about messy intersections, have you ever been in a situation where the metrics that you are measuring don't seem to line up? And it's not because you've sinned, it's not because the system is broken, it's not because there's some other weird thing going on.
But it's possibly because God is trying to do something deeper. Well, I got Jonathan and Kara Sparks, great friends of ours, in this studio right now. And we can unpack their story and the tools. And so for you, listen up, not just hearing about their story, but how did they make decisions in the middle of it when it confronted what everyone on the outside would have said, what it should look like to be a Christian business and successful.
What do you do in recognizing when God is leading you to something different? How do you hear his voice? And how do you make the changes and what is possible when you do? So, Jonathan and Kara, thank you so much for joining us.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (01:10.648)
Wow, thank you for having us, Andy. Very excited to be here.
Andy Mason (01:14.359)
Yep. And we're gonna just dive straight in. So you guys are in real estate development. Is that your background?
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (01:22.786)
Well, it it has been. Or I should say it was for about twenty three, twenty four years. That's kind of what we had done. We had a construction company that evolved into a development company and then doing the commercial real estate and the brokerage. No, we still do that, but God had much bigger plans in store.
Andy Mason (01:24.848)
Yeah.
Andy Mason (01:42.212)
So go back a bit because we want to hit this. The success metrics that everybody thinks they want, you guys are living it. I I've stayed at your house. We've got toys, we've got fun. Tell us a little bit about that because you are walking this with generosity and integrity and godliness, but just give us a little bit of a snapshot w what the standard success metrics that you were walking in.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (02:08.545)
You know, I think that was this is a story we would have liked to heard two years ago because we, you know, we'd had different success in business, but we had really got dialed in. We had joined you know, business leadership groups, we had mentors, we'd really begin to delve into what is it to make a kingdom impact? How do you how do you serve your clients? How do you make a global impact through missions and different things? And our companies had been blessed by any measure you want. Now, Dallas is very competitive, right? And Frisco and so.
I mean, I think it is important. First of as business owners, we do need to measure those metrics and KPIs, right? They're important, but sometimes the things that we put all the focus on isn't the same thing God puts all the focus on. So, you know, we were we were growing what our company had grown twelve hundred percent over six, seven years. We were getting ready to double again. God was simply blessing everything we did. And it wasn't just financially.
No, it was also our employees, you know, our team that we got to work with. It was amazing. God was setting people free. We were seeing healings on job sites. We were seeing people come to know the Lord. We became known amongst our subcontractors and vendors as the people who cared and the people who prayed for them and came to visit them in the hospital. So we were doing all the Christian things. We were doing good things. We really, really were. And we'd begun we even had we had in-house missionaries. We had actually paid.
For full-time missionaries to go on behalf of our company to different projects and initiatives we are doing around the world. So we were thinking, okay, Lord, we are hitting on all eight cylinders. We're doing what you called us to do. We have systems and processes. We have KPIs. We're making an impact. We're more generous than we've ever able to be. And we're growing. So surely God must be happy with what we're doing. This is it.
Andy Mason (03:42.051)
Let's go.
Andy Mason (03:51.942)
Yeah. This is it. God, this is it. And and just for those watching, you you've never met Jonathan and Kira, we've walked with them for a few years right now to the point where our son, we deployed him as an intern, paid intern for one summer, working for them. Now he he worked hard and they looked after him. But the biggest gain is he came back a Dallas, Texas man, and
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (04:17.581)
Come on.
Andy Mason (04:18.509)
He had both grown in character, but also grown in the wisdom and integrity and love for Jesus because of what he saw in their lives. So this is not just a skin deep external metric of what success might feel or look like. I've known them enough to see the character, and my son has lived with them for what two, two months? So yeah, you can't fake something that long. So it's it's real. So okay, so we've got on every
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (04:40.651)
Yeah, yeah.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (04:46.007)
Okay.
Andy Mason (04:47.819)
measure of seeming success from an external point of view, it it looks like it's going really well. You're doing deals, transactions, money's flowing, your employees employees are thriving. You've seen God do stuff. And then what happened?
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (05:02.411)
Well, here's here's the exciting part of this. We probably still don't know. But I I gotta liken it to when the prophet, you know, said, Let there be no more rain, and that was it. Because it seemed like Yeah. Yeah, we we didn't ask for this, but we did actually ask. We said, God, we want to make a global kingdom impact. And at that time we'd probably done projects in half a dozen different countries. We'd visited lots of countries, but
Andy Mason (05:06.786)
Yeah.
Andy Mason (05:13.583)
Except the prophet didn't tell you that ahead of time.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (05:30.017)
We said, God, we want to make a global kingdom impact. And I think he asked us, What does that look like to you? We said, All two hundred and forty one nations, all hundred and ninety-five countries. And we said, Lord, whatever that takes, we want to make a massive impact. And we assumed, I think this is where we messed up. Yeah, this is where expectation comes And and we assumed that meant he would just bless what we were already doing a hundred X because that was easy. Yes.
Andy Mason (05:53.638)
Ex yeah. 'Cause you can you can see where you've come from and you see what where you're going and what he said. It's like it's a it where it's a straight line or a logarithmic increase. Let's go.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (06:03.522)
Yeah. Let's go, Lord. I mean, we're Lord, we're pretty good at this. Let's be honest. You've gifted us in this. We like it and we're pretty darn good. Our our clients like it. So Lord, let's just do more of this. Yeah. This thing we're comfortable in.
Andy Mason (06:08.907)
Mm-hmm.
Andy Mason (06:15.749)
Okay, so pause pause on that. How do because this is this is the craziest thing. If you follow the ways of the Lord, things go well. And so, and you know what you're doing, you know it's the grace of God, but it's like, hey, I'm I'm loving the favor of God, the goodness of God, and the disciplines that I'm applying. How do you not let that shape and form your identity rather than
God himself.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (06:46.37)
Well, I think oftentimes it like I said earlier, the expectation, we get so wrapped up in doing the good things that God has something a little different that He wants us to do. And when we leave him out of that process and we're like, Okay, God, thanks for the guidance and I appreciate that you showed me that scripture, you you whispered that to me. I've got this, let me go on. And then we we leave God out of the rest of the story.
Then that's when the things will he'll go, no, no, no. Let let's go back to the beginning. Let's go back together and write the story like it needs to be written. And then you move from the good to the God things in life. But who he purposed us to be didn't change. Like what God anointed us for and who he called us to be didn't change. The vehicle that we're utilizing right now just looks a little different. and so sometimes in the process,
You have to lay down something that seems like, wow, this just why would we lay this down? but it's not, it's the good thing and not the God thing. I would say it's moving expressions of what it looks like. Yeah. So we had kind of we had pigeonholed God into boy, we can really bless the the world, Lord, if you bless us through our very limited skill set. Yeah. You know, bless what we're doing. Yeah, yeah. Here, Lord, we're really good at this. So bless this one little thing and then we'll bless everyone else. And he's like, Yeah, no.
Andy Mason (07:58.639)
Yeah, it didn't.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, like this is awesome. Look at this. Yeah.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (08:11.874)
That's not scalable. Right. And now we look back and we laugh, but what we were building was very good and it was a blessing. But you know, any anybody who had looked at us said, Man, what a blessed life. But it wasn't scalable to a global kingdom level. Which we had asked for. Yeah. That was
Andy Mason (08:11.93)
Yeah, yeah.
Andy Mason (08:25.179)
Yeah. And okay, so talk to me about that. So some contracts didn't follow through, people were didn't do their commitments. How did you navigate like did you did you say, this is God just shaping us? Or did you like, what am I doing wrong? Have I is there sin in the camp? Is there like did you go through any of those things to try and work out what is going on? I need to pray more?
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (08:46.465)
And then
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (08:52.34)
All of all of those things and a hundred more. Yes. We we were actually it we we'll never forget, we were overseas. Actually, we had just seen you in South Africa, and then we were meeting up again with you guys in Brazil to to minister all those business and churches. We all got to meet down there. And we were coming out of there and we were in Chile, I think, and we we'd been gone for roughly two months. We're like, Lord, this is so amazing. Our company's thriving, our team is thriving while we're gone. We got new contracts, and then somebody didn't pay.
And then another missed closing and another. And all of a sudden we started counting. And while we're out serving the Lord, while we're go ye, while we're go yeah, we we it was at first like 12, then 14, then 17. And we, I think we quit counting in the high 20s. And now in 25 years, we'd had one or two delayed closings. And we're talking we have 2530 in two months. Like something's changing, right? Something's shifting. And so your first thought is, God, what have we done wrong? Yeah. Is there an accursed thing in our camp?
You know, you start calling all the prophetic people you know. Do you have a word for me? Lord, please help. Like, what's going on? You start going, Did I not see wise counsel? We we called, I don't know, every wise person we knew, and even some unwise ones. I mean, we were just going down the list trying to figure this out. And we had we had also a record amount of I mean, we're tens of millions under contract, and we had people owe us millions of dollars. And guess what? From that time to this day, we still have not received one penny of what was owed. We had two, we had
Andy Mason (09:51.846)
Yeah. Yeah. Honey, what did you do?
Andy Mason (10:03.855)
Yeah, I
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (10:21.71)
14 different projects that two different companies, good clients of ours for years, declared bankruptcy. We never got paid on those. We had other investments that got locked up. We had lots of contracts with well-known, you know, national clients that are still on hold to this day. Still on hold. So I wish we could say, hey, we we found this one glaring thing, we fixed it, and it changed, but that's not what God was up to. No, not at all. And it all comes back to being in the word of God.
Letting the word of God read us and say and dictate who we are, not what our circumstances were or are, or what's happening and what's shifting around us at the core. What did God call us to do? Who does He say we are? And standing on that in the midst of all of this is what's kept our faith up and helped us to walk through it. It doesn't say I I got to to jump over the valley of the shadow of death.
That I walk through the valley of the shadow of death and he was with me. And that's where the greatest character and the greatest parts of us that we need to chisel off get chiseled off. It's not in the mountaintop because it's too easy to just go, okay, God, thanks bye. It's in these seasons that he he molds us in a different way. And I told someone the other day it's an opportunity to see God like I've never seen him before. And if I wasn't here.
Andy Mason (11:22.524)
Yeah.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (11:47.696)
Then I wouldn't know God like I know him now. And it's it's it's the beauty for ashes type mentality that he he's changing me, he's changing the surroundings around me, even if it doesn't look like it in the natural. But that means it was easy when this was going down, right? no. There were days and and that's the beauty of of having a covenant partner. And ladies, if you're listening, take advantage of your husband's strength when you're down.
Don't discard, like, I don't want to bother him because this is a really, really hard time. I don't want to say anything and you just keep it all in. No, that is the power of the two of you. And that's the power of prayer together. That when I'm down, he's up and he pulls me up. And when he's down, I pull him up. And we cannot discard that. That is so important. And it is 100% what has helped us get through those days that were difficult because it's not all.
I'm a I'm so full of faith. I'm standing on the word of God. It's it's hard some days. Because I mean, stuff's not moving, stuff's not selling. We begin to do the normal thing, kind of like Jonah, right? We're gonna lighten the ship or Paul, we're sinking. Let's throw some stuff overboard. So we start putting assets and real estate up for sale. Nothing, nothing's selling, right? Like there's no reason it shouldn't be. We're in the fastest growing economy in the US, one of the fastest growing economies in human history. Like we're in the epicenter of.
Andy Mason (12:57.147)
Yeah.
Andy Mason (13:04.145)
Yeah.
Andy Mason (13:12.217)
Middle of
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (13:13.315)
business. Yeah. Everything's growing. And then the sad thing is all the the people that we love and walk alongside mentor, they're all growing. Except we're not growing, right? Seems like everybody's doing great except for us. And we we spent all of our personal savings. We spent all of our company savings. And then when we were done with that, you know, we had to start downsizing team. And I think for us one of the hardest things was, you know, we had really developed this amazing team. Yeah. The money you can kind of make it again. But to us
I remember the hardest thing, I was in tears, was when we had to keep letting team members go. Now God was faithful and promoted every one of them substantially into what they're doing. Now many businesses were actually born out of that transition. No. No.
Andy Mason (13:43.035)
The people.
Andy Mason (13:53.052)
Yeah, but you didn't know that. You don't know that at the time. And I I mean I'm I'm thinking of I'm thinking of David.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (13:59.72)
you've got team members that are pregnant, have babies on the way. You have team members with serious health concerns, team members that are, you know, at retirement times of their life and you're having tell these people, I know you thought you were with us forever, but we we have to transition you to somewhere else because we're we're downsizing.
Andy Mason (14:14.723)
Yeah. So how and I thank you for just sharing this. It's real. It's painful. And this isn't like you said, you're still there's there's we got a story of what's about that God did show you in this, but this is still going on. Like, no, the team didn't come back. You haven't like the job wake up one day and my wife come back and my kids come back and my cows came back. And no, the that those that business is still out. The water is still out, but God has done stuff in spite of it.
But it's so good to identify with this is painful and it wasn't a week and it wasn't a month and it wasn't even a year. It was no, if we're pushing two years of this process.
How did you stay strong? How do you not like just crumble? I mean, Kira, you talked about I've got an anchor in the word. And I mean, you mentioned scripture and I I love and hate this scripture. When I am afraid, I will trust you. It's like I hate that. It's in the Bible. It's like, okay, I'm afraid and I've got to choose what I do. Jonathan, what did you do in the midst is l like you having to let your employees go? And they're not just employees. These are people that you've kind of
Now you're actually discipling and mentoring them. The and they're and they're actually trying to produce fruit. Yeah.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (15:30.465)
How to be on how to be successful, right? The ironic part is we'd be kind of become known as the vision people. We'd help you plan, start, and grow a business. Except now ours is going the wrong way. Ours is shrinked to nothing, but you know, we're we're trying to help other people grow theirs, and they did keep growing. But I think it was kind of for us, you got to hit rock bottom, right? Why does God like to do this? I don't know. But we see it all throughout the Bible. Like the more significant your call, probably the more significant the obstacles and challenges you're gonna come against.
Andy Mason (15:40.762)
Yeah.
Andy Mason (15:54.439)
Juman fifteen.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (15:59.502)
And this isn't the first time we were saying this is the third time we basically had to give it all down to nothing, sew it all down to nothing, give everything away and start again with, in essence, nothing. Now each time you start with more wisdom, more favor, more connections than you had the last time. So I I will, it's not like starting again, but in essence, it is starting. But God had us, we'd been very blessed and we had a private foundation. God said, empty your foundation. Because in our mind, we're like, well, while business is slow, at least we can still travel.
At least we can do some ministry. And God goes, No, I want you to give all that away too. So now we're sitting with zeros across all the bank accounts, right? And essence, like, no, no, heck no. And so we were using the last, I think, airline points we had to go on something we felt obedient to go do when we were sitting there. And God was like, Hey, I I want you guys to make an impact. And I remember kind of being a little upset. I'm like, Yeah, God, we're trying. And but this is where the paradigm shift came in. Yeah. God, we're trying.
Andy Mason (16:29.115)
Yeah. You know.
Andy Mason (16:36.531)
You can't even travel on some ministry trip. Yeah.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (16:57.571)
But we don't have any capital to do that. And he said, Since when did I ever need your resources? Since when did I ever need your capital? Right. And we were like, What? He goes, I don't need your capital. I don't need your money. I don't need your resources. I just need your unyielding obedience and your faith that we're gonna to make a global kingdom impact. And then we said, Lord, what should we do? He said, What have I called you to? I'm like,
Andy Mason (17:04.539)
That now Yeah.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (17:24.397)
Make a global kingdom impact. He said, then go make one. And then we said, We have no money. He said, You're not hearing me. I'm not hearing me. You're called to go make an impact. And and now we can kind of laugh about it, but that was almost a year ago. And we
Andy Mason (17:39.089)
Like w what? How? Heck what what? Yeah, yeah.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (17:42.897)
I think, well, we're gonna blame a little bit of this on our lack of theology and a little bit on the modern church because we've told business people and marketplace leaders the greatest and highest call you can have is go make a whole bunch of money for Jesus and then give it to the man or woman of God and let them do something and make an impact. When in actuality we should be making an impact at our company level, our community level, the families in our companies level. Yes, we should be making an impact with our local church through tithes and offerings, but
Then there's another level of impact we can make through impact investing and taking what we've learned in the marketplace and helping reproduce that in like kind at a global scale. But we thought in business the sole most important metric was how many zeros are behind this. And God said, I don't care how many zeros. I don't need your zeros to do a supernatural. And you ask how it's like Moses, you know, it's to us when people say, Man, you guys are not just obedient, you're radically obedient.
Andy Mason (18:25.765)
Yeah.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (18:40.366)
That's what it takes. That radical obedience when it looks like, what, Lord, I don't have anything. And the Lord says, What's that in your hand? And Exodus 4, 2 to Moses. Well, that's just a simple shepherd staff. No, it's not. And it just no. And then God did all these miracles with that one small thing. And so we tell people, it is what God has already put in your hand, the wisdom that He's put in your hand, the anointing, the call, all of it is already on the inside of you. And we just
Andy Mason (18:53.115)
Yeah, they can't do anything.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (19:10.382)
We put world the world's way and the world's systems around the way we think. And I think that's been a big part of what God's been re energizing the way that we think and and changing the way that we think about how his kingdom works and about how he's going to do things. And that is why we had to get to where we were, because it has to be him and him alone, not man's money, the world. Now money is important because it's a multiplier, but it was just a different way that he wanted us to do things.
Andy Mason (19:39.708)
Yeah, I I and this I was talking to someone about this this morning. If God had continued that on ramp, people would have looked at you and said it was their ability. Now people know this must be God. There's something about and Gideon. Nope. Well, we got 10,000. No, it's too many. Let's get it down to 300. Now we're completely outnumbered. Yes, no flash will glorify his presence.
He just refuses to do that. But that's not a fun journey. So pause before we talk about what God led you into. In the middle of this time, when when you you were hearing God say, do something. For people that are right now in a place where things have dried up, they're not going like they planned. they've they've examined everything. Where's this sin? Is it? Are you sinning? You're not, whoa, it must be me. it's not me. They've walked through all of these that they've
check their budget, they've tightened their belt, they've got wise counsel. They've done those practical things. But in the middle of that, how, what are some of the tools that you've used to hear God in the middle of that?
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (20:49.7)
Wow, I mean, I think first you have to realize you're in the middle of a shift. We resisted it for so long because you want to say, it's an attack of the enemy. The enemy's attacking. But then, you know, at a certain point you got to go, wait a minute. Wait a minute. This is more than a normal attack. No, God's shifting me. God is shifting me. And I think when we start going, okay, God, we want to pray, even though we don't see where we're going, we don't understand what's happening. We do know you are moving us to something more significant.
Andy Mason (20:58.119)
Yeah.
Andy Mason (21:03.458)
Gods attacking me? God.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (21:19.076)
To make a more significant impact. So although we don't see it, we don't know which direction to head yet, we know you're doing something. And we began to, we just coveted together. We are going to speak faith. Yeah. We're going to only speak what God has spoken over us. And well, you know, I mean, we used to there'd be times we'd call and be talking to you guys. You'd be like, Man, so is stuff selling? Is stuff good again? We'd be like, No, but it is. And you'd be so something's sold. And this would be everybody we talked to. They'd be like, so you sold something or stuff's moving.
Andy Mason (21:41.925)
No.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (21:48.867)
No, but you just said everything's getting better. And we'd go, Yes. Because God said. Because God said. So you know, now we can see how he was moving behind the scenes, but it really does take faith sometimes to realize he is always moving. And the practical part of that is for us was just taking that step. Like, what are we being led by peace right now in? Yeah. And take that step towards that. And that would build our faith. Okay, I have a little more peace. Cause sometimes
Andy Mason (21:54.83)
Yeah.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (22:15.545)
You don't know. And so you just take the fur you you go, okay, what did God say last? Let's let's go forward in that. And then just start taking those small steps of faith together in unity. And that is so important. The unity part of it, you know, is is coming together and go, Okay, we're gonna do this afraid. We coven it together, then we're gonna step out in faith and do this afraid. And then we get there and they're like, okay, I feel peace about this. And we'd s we camp there for a minute and then we feel the nudge and then we'd move together for
And things like that. And then, you know, the red light, green light. And if maybe you want to share that with people that haven't heard that, because that's powerful that we use that. Well, we always just say you pause and you ask, Hey, do you have a red light or a green light? Not what can I afford to do, not what makes logical sense, but Holy Spirit. And I would encourage them, 'cause you know, I know we did a that you have a podcast with us doing red light, green light for them to go watch the whole story on that, which is powerful. But you know
Andy Mason (22:50.491)
Yeah, better do that.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (23:12.879)
You have to be willing to apply this to your own your own life. Right. And so we we said, Lord, in essence, you know, in the natural, we could say, what are you breathing on? Nothing. Because if your metric is money, it's nothing because the money just keeps dwindling, right? And so we say, But Lord, where do we feel you moving? And so we took all the resources we had to go do some of these impact and final missional things when they didn't make any sense. But I remember telling the Lord, well, I don't really have.
Andy Mason (23:24.454)
Yeah.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (23:39.45)
Enough money to go do this. He goes, Well, do you have enough money to do a development? Nope, not even close. Well, then what are you worried about? And so we just really had to start that childlike fate. Well, that's a good point. when you have nothing times nothing is still nothing. All right, well, Lord, it's it's you're you're gonna have to provide seed to the sower and we don't even have seed. So you're gonna have to you're gonna have to provide all this. But it was doing the little face steps when you're like, we always jokingly call it when you're on lockdown, right? Financial lockdown.
Andy Mason (23:46.755)
Yeah.
Andy Mason (23:53.957)
We can't do that anyway. Yeah, just go.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (24:08.365)
Sometimes you can get yourself into a place of fear to where you're actually working against God. So it's it's not being unwise. It's not not stewarding well, but it's also going, Lord, what have you given me with and as as I measure, so will be measured back to me. So, you know, we had so many opportunities to help people and bless people, albeit at a much different level than we were used to, but you still keep doing what you're supposed to be doing, even when it doesn't make sense.
Andy Mason (24:33.499)
Yeah, it and I mean if I on the outside in, it almost looked like you hosted more people through your home through that period of time and thinking, how am I gonna feed them? So you were doing that, but I think another thing I observed you do, there's something about creating margin or space. Like once you recognize God is doing something different, I have to let go. I I have to change. And I mean, for you, actually letting the team go.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (24:38.575)
Yeah. Yeah.
Andy Mason (25:01.991)
creates margin, one, financially, because you couldn't afford it anyway, but that's also time. W were there other areas where you intentionally created margin so that you were more available, more ready for God to move?
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (25:15.937)
Well, we we actually we didn't create margin, God did. We had all the time in the world. If you have to remember, we go from like twenty, thirty projects to zero. So with zero projects and zero prospects, zero properties selling, you you have a lot of time, you know, actually eighty plus hours a week now to do whatever you would like to do. And so we said, Okay, Lord, the earth and the fullness era is yours, and so is our time. What are we doing today? Yes. Like there I remember waking up
Andy Mason (25:19.473)
Ha ha ha
Andy Mason (25:40.955)
Yeah, okay. So that's that's a big deal. Yeah.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (25:43.462)
Yeah. Instead of waking up and being depressed, you're like, Lord, I've got twelve or fourteen hours today. Let's get it. What does that look like? And it may be a phone call to encourage somebody else. It may be helping. We actually realized God started helping us sew into other people's businesses, situations, and things, providing support and encouragement where we needed it. So when you find yourself short of something.
We always say, How can you sow into the harvest that you need? If you have no seed in the ground, you really shouldn't expect a harvest. Yeah. And it it you begin to hear the Lord in a different way. You know, you hear people are like, I don't hear God. Well, you're not practicing his presence, just flat out. Did you just have to spend time with him? Because the more time you spend, the more you're like, for example, today I was going, you prayed, had my quiet time, then I was going about my time at working and I felt the Lord say, Call this person.
Right now. Now, I've always heard the Lord, but I hear him so loud now. And so I stopped everything I was doing. I picked up the phone and I called this this person and she goes, my gosh, I was about to text you because she had this thing blow up. She said, I feel so small right now. The enemy's really attacking me. And I
I was able to talk with her. We prayed. We, we meditated on the word of God and what God says about her situation. And in that instant, everything changed. And I think if we were more in tune with the Lord, all of us as business leaders, we can do that for each other. And then we would be in unstoppable as Christian business leaders around the world if we were there for each other in that manner. And I feel like the Lord wants us to be, but we've all been too busy to be like that.
And I feel like the Lord's just like, Hey, kids, just listen. I'll tell you what to do. And I'm gonna multiply you in ways you can't even imagine when you seek me first and you build my kingdom. And so that's been a big thing that we've done this year. And then we begin to write down, re revisit the vision, right? Re sharpen the pencil. Lord, we had a a vision for global kingdom. Yeah. Yes. Yeah.
Andy Mason (27:43.047)
Like go back and check. Almost like go back and read like okay, I'm missing something. Go back and check. Well tell me again what this means.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (27:52.241)
Yeah, and you know, you think when you write it down, you understand the vision as the best you do at that moment in time through that lens. But as we move forward through time, that that perspective gets larger. And so the way we thought we were going to make a global kingdom impact, the global kingdom impact of our vision was correct. The vehicle on how we were gonna get there was very limited. It was just
You know, one wheel of a very big freight train, but we were going to ride all the way there on one wheel, right? But we needed some God was trying to build a whole train around us and we were just hanging on to one, you know, one little wheel. And so we began to say, okay, Lord, in this downtime, since we have an excessive amount of free time, and I would like to say we're super spiritual, you actually can't really pray and worship you know, 16 hours a day. So in the rest of the free time, we started going, Lord, what what should we begin to build? And we began to
Andy Mason (28:17.591)
Okay.
Andy Mason (28:36.595)
Yeah.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (28:41.712)
Revisit the prophecies and the words and the different stuff we hadn't realizing the scale of it. And we're like, we don't have systems and processes for this. We haven't built the vessels to hold what God's going to bend to pour out. Now, a lot of people would look around us and go, that's absurd. Like, why we began just the podcast and Zoom room that we're sitting in now. Yeah. You know, when we felt God told us to do this, it didn't make sense to use resources, limited resources to develop a Zoom room when you have no clients. Right? Like, what that's something you do when you're so busy.
Andy Mason (28:50.628)
Yeah.
Andy Mason (29:07.697)
Yeah.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (29:10.492)
But then as we were faithful to do that, we're I mean, we're in here what, eight, ten, twelve hours a week now? All over the world. I mean, just nation after nation. It's not uncommon to have five, six, seven nations a week now. Yeah.
Andy Mason (29:20.655)
And and just and tell people the the short version of the podcast. So I'm we're looking at it right now for those that are seeing this on YouTube. It's beautiful. It's stunning. Like that must have cost thousands of dollars.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (29:26.374)
Exactly.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (29:32.871)
No, well, no, it didn't. Because well, we thought it was going to. And we built studios before. So God told us, hey, you know, build this studio. And we're like, yeah, we don't really want to, or when we get the capital, or when we get invited to be on something, or he said, no, I want you to build it now. So we didn't for about six months. And then we got a prophetic word from somebody that said Jonah and the whale. And we're like, what does that even mean? Well, after digging into it, our Nineveh was this room.
This podcast doing exactly what we're doing right now with you. We're like, we don't like microphones. We don't like podcasts. We don't want to be on them. We don't, we don't want to do any of this stuff, Lord. we want to build things and make money. That's what we want to do. And so anyway, moral of the story was we by faith ordered all the equipment that we needed. We didn't want to have to spend that capital. And then Amazon canceled our order. We were super upset. And then what happened? And then we got a phone call from a gentleman that
Andy Mason (30:01.753)
Yeah. But you're avoiding, he told you.
Andy Mason (30:08.059)
Yeah.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (30:28.726)
had all of the things that we needed in his garage for I think almost four years. And he said, Literally, I was blinded to it. And I went in to go into my office and the Lord said, Look in the corner. And little did he know that it was everything we needed. But the Lord said, Call Jonathan and Kara and ask them if they need this. And so he was obedient, which is a beautiful part of the community. Like so he was hearing the Lord, but he said,
I felt stupid, you know, to call like or they don't do that kind of stuff, but he did it in faith and he was obedient to the Lord and called us and it was everything that the order on Amazon was that had been canceled. So God was like, No, no, you're not getting off the hook. Yeah.
Andy Mason (31:08.417)
It's just crazy. Yeah. But isn't it like this is wild? And when we're looking at it, it's it's not like average, it's excellent. the sound quality, the video com hey, and the that great video camera, by the way. And so those Jonathan and Carol, when we launched our podcast, that would have been twenty-two. So what four years ago, you s you heard the podcast and said, No, no, no, you actually you saw it and you said, Andy, that's
Terrible, you you need to actually upgrade the quality. And by the way, we're gonna see. So this when they had cash, they seeded us the camera. And then two years later, we left Pennsylvania and we didn't have a podcast. Like we didn't know what we're doing. So we just gave we thought we better give it back. And now it's being you now it's been used against me, on me, with me. And I and what what we've got is is perfect for what we're doing. So that's pretty cool. So what you're saying is in the middle of it, you were obedient.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (31:55.834)
Ha ha ha ha ha ha.
Andy Mason (32:05.851)
To do what was in your hand to do. You went back to that, like Jonah, go and do what I told you to do in the first place. And you realigned, which is so cool. Kira, I just want to highlight something that you said. You talked about the bank account, looking at the bank account. I am just listening to you thinking, I think most business people are looking at the wrong bank account. We look at the bank account that we can see that then dictates what we do or don't do.
And don't realize that the the bank account that we have in heaven is so much more and it's so not confined to a particular currency. And for everybody looking to this right now, what you heard them do is the currency that you have access to to pick up the phone and call a friend and pray for someone, the value and the eternal significance of that is huge, of how that can turn and change your situation. It can save a life. And I think we don't yet.
Recognize the depth of that currency and that bank account that we're not even leaning into, which is spiritual and is unseen, but actually influences everything. Okay, jump to what happened next. So this pause, this delay caused you to pull back, look at everything, reexamine all of the prophetic words, start to dive in and research and learn and prepare the vessels and the structure for God to multiply when you don't have the resources, and then what?
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (33:16.017)
Yeah.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (33:20.474)
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (33:35.71)
You know, I would like to say it was like an end suddenly overnight the bank accounts were restored. As you mentioned earlier, the cows had come back. But we ate all our cows, right? So we had we had no cows to multiply because we'd eaten them. Yeah, we did. They were tasty. But so we were we were sitting there kind of like, okay, Lord, and we were talking about this the other day is where we're at now versus where we were at two months ago was unbelievable. Where we're at
Andy Mason (33:42.385)
Yeah. And I helped you eat some of those, yeah.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (34:00.412)
Now versus six months ago is almost unre recognizable. So if you go back to last year when we were right in the middle of the thick of this, it wasn't there's been a series of extraordinary God things on this side of it. Like, you know, what is happening now and the scale at which it's happening and the things we're getting to invest in and be a part and do is unbelievable. But at the end of last year, we were kind of sitting there at licking our wounds jokingly and like, well, you know, God basically kept us alive all year and we're still here.
But then we felt like he said, write down what actually happened this year. And we began to write down. So on the year we had the least amount of capital to invest in missions, the least amount to sew, the least revenue we'd ever generate, right? Ever. And I'm talking going back to, you know, teenage years, the least. That's very small. And so we went, Lord, the impact that we made was still three, four, five X the year before.
Andy Mason (34:45.817)
Yeah.
Andy Mason (34:53.017)
So tell us a couple so w give give me an example, a couple of those things. What do you mean?
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (34:57.179)
I mean, what we began to see was there was just ministries and organizations all over the world, you know, we kind of started to come alongside of a Lord would have us ask, Hey, what talents do you have buried? What are you already stewarding that maybe you haven't stewarded to its full potential? Like when you get God involved, he can tend to take something little and turn it into something big. And we started seeing, you know, normally we had different foundations, different groups. When they know you have a foundation, they'll come and visit. So we had one group visiting,
Indonesia, Thailand, Cambodia, that part of the world. And they were like, hey, we need $1.2 million. Because that's what you do. You go ask people that are blessed for their money, right? And we were used to that. And we're happy to do that. Yeah, sure. Yeah. So we can write more checks to Indonesia and Cambodia, right? But they come and we're like, we can't really write you a check. And instead of saying that, we felt we listened to them for like an hour and a half. And then God said, Now ask them what they already have. So we're like, what do you already have? And they said, We have.
Andy Mason (35:31.375)
Yeah. Which is the same. You are doing the same. I can see the trajectory. What we need is more of this and we can do more of this.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (35:53.746)
Just like we had done, we have no money. So that's not what I ask. What do you have? Do you have any property? Do you have any connections? Do you have anybody in your church? Well, you know, we do own a farm in Indonesia, like 40 hectare acres. And we do own what? A prayer house. And we own that we start adding it all up. Remember, they needed 1.2 million. We added all up. Come to find out, they have 1.4 million in idle assets that they gained over like a 30 year run.
Andy Mason (36:18.887)
Doing nothing.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (36:22.023)
Doing nothing. They had more than enough. So, you know, we helped them transition those assets. And then they were going to build a Bible college. And instead, we're actually currently helping them buy a in Phenom Pen, a shopping center with six or seven retail stalls below and a second floor of this empty. So now we're putting the Bible college, the church, the English is a second language, sex trafficking rescue, all up in the empty space. And then the retail pays for the church, pays for the SL, pays for the Bible college. And you know how much that cost?
Andy Mason (36:46.823)
How you spirit. Come on.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (36:51.995)
Zero dollars because they already had everything they needed. So, I mean, we have a dozen more stories like that last year that God began to do extraordinary things. And most of the time it took little to no capital. And so it used to be we would solve the problem by writing a check. And God no. No. Nope. No. And the beautiful thing to me, for me, that the scripture came alive where they said, Silver and gold have I not, but what I do have I will give to you.
Andy Mason (37:04.167)
So you you can't claim Yeah, you can't claim credit for it now and you
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (37:19.481)
It it took on a new life for us because like the Lord's like, you don't have silver and gold, but you have something. And I feel like for business leaders, like when you get to when you have these types of situations and you're like, because money is the measurement by world standards for us of how successful we are. And the Lord's like, That's a great multiplier, but that that is not, you have so many other things. And so I encourage you guys, like when we say what's in your hand,
What are you called to do? What are you anointed to do? And utilize that. And like Jonathan said, you know, be obedient to go to that dinner you weren't so sure you really wanted to go to. But the Lord said to go and you meet the person who then introduces you to the person in another country that needs the gifts and talents that God has given you to sew into them that has nothing to do with money. It has to do with the wisdom that produced the money that God's trying to get out there.
through his business leaders, to other business leaders, and to ministry people to help us all think differently about kingdom and multiplication in the kingdom.
Andy Mason (38:24.133)
Yeah. And website, life tree global dot or g. So they can find out more on that side of it there if you if you want to find out more. Here's where we're getting to. Whether you are known or in obscurity, whether you've got tons of resources in the bank or nothing, whether you've got a platform or no platform.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (38:28.84)
Yep. I've treated them.
Yeah.
Andy Mason (38:47.515)
God can be with you in every step of that. That's the point. Don't measure yourself by any external sense of what success looks like or is not. But come back to am I being faithful? And sometimes it's almost like you think God's cutting you back. No, John 15, he prunes you for the sake of increase. It's like you know he's drawing me back. Why is God pulling me back?
Probably because you're an arrow in his hand and he's pulling you back to shoot you. And that's what I see happening with Jonathan and Kira. Jonathan and Kira, you're gonna be at this conference coming up in Dallas. It's so exciting for that. We're looking forward to being with you there. Anything you tell people listen to this, why should they come to a heaven and business conference?
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (39:36.617)
My goodness, why why why not? I mean, well, I mean, if you don't like s you know, meeting strategic people, getting downloads from God, making friends and acquaintances, and having wise counsel to propel you forward at a rate you can never achieve by yourself, then stay home. But if you want to do more, if you want to grow your business, if you want to be a better leader, why not? And meet other people in the Metroplex that are following the same direction. You know, I always say
Andy Mason (39:52.219)
Yeah.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (40:05.0)
When you get in a room like this, you're gonna find your tribe. You're gonna find people to do life with. And that's really what it's all about. It's business is amazing, but doing business and life with other believers who are have this like-minded and are marching the same direction just makes it a lot more fun.
Andy Mason (40:22.267)
Yeah, I I love that. And that you've just s just nailed the what I think is kind of the secret source of what we do. It's we have some great speakers. I mean, you guys are gonna unpack some more. That's gonna be great. We got Steve Dooland. That's gonna be fun. But what goes on in the room and how we intentionally create space for people to connect, what we watch happen in the room is far more valuable than what happens on the stage. And then what God does is always dangerous.
So if you're hearing this and you say, I want more of this, I want to find out more, heavenandbusiness.com and you'll see the links to the conference. you see other events there as well. And we just looking forward. I just wonder if we can finish Jonathan and Kira, if you guys are just praying, there's people that are walking through crazy at the moment, and then there's people walking through abundance, and both of them can be missing it if I look at the metrics rather than look at what is God wanting to do.
Would you pray for those people right now?
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (41:22.494)
Sure. Yeah. We absolutely will. So, Lord, we just thank you for what you are doing. Lord, even when we can't see it, Lord, you are always moving behind the scenes. Lord, you're not pulling us back. I like what Anity said. You're pulling us back, loading us with more kinetic energy to release us into the call, purpose, and destiny that you have for us. So Lord, I thank you that now you would begin to refine, redirect, realign anybody.
to align with their call, purpose, and destiny, Lord, that you would begin to empower them, that you would cause them to think differently about the metrics that they've used to measure success. Lord, I think that even now you begin to rip off their limited understanding, the lid that has held them back, that maybe, hey, this is what success like. And instead, Lord, you download into them what is success with you look like? What does kingdom impact look like when they partner with you? And Lord God, I just thank you for the spirit of unity, Lord God.
amongst teams, amongst marriages, Lord God. And I thank you for the covenant partners and the husbands and wives that you have, Lord God, that work together and that don't work together, Lord God. May they not neglect that relationship, Lord God. I just call unity forth, Lord, and I thank you for divine connections. I thank you for supernatural, unmerited favor of the Lord, Lord God. I thank you that you are going to do exceedingly abundantly above anything.
That anyone can think or imagine today, this week, and at this upcoming event, Lord God, we just thank you in Jesus' name.
Andy Mason (42:57.038)
Amen. So right now, jump onto heavenabbusiness.com. You see those details there. And we will see you in August.
Johnathan & Kara Sparks (43:05.301)
See ya.
