6 apps for 6 godly habits

Use your smartphone to help you walk in faith!

In the new age of technology, for better or for worse, smartphones seem to be our new best friend. You can get an app to do just about anything! Both Google Play and the Apple App Store have over 1.5 million apps available to download. I wonder what your favourite one is?

But how do we decide which apps are worth downloading? Well your phone may be full of music, games, camera and social media apps but what about apps to help you in your walk with God? Wouldn’t it be great if we used our phones to cultivate godly habits?

To help you out, I have come up with a list of six apps to help you work on six spiritual disciplines, so that you can remember our Lord whenever you unlock that screen.

Bible Reading - App: YouVersion Bible - 1 Timothy 3:16-17

You would be surprised by how many Christians I meet who don't have the Bible on their smartphone. We have the privilege of having God’s own words in our own language and in our pockets, so make sure you have got it there to read and share with others. The free YouVersion Bible app is great as it gives you multiple versions you can use offline, devotionals, reminders and sharing capabilities. Other good options: Logos or Glo Bible.

Prayer - App: PrayerMate - Colossians 4:2

The other important discipline for all Christians is prayer and PrayerMate is a really great app to help with that. It allows you to add your own prayer points into various categories and also import prayer points from other organisations (eg. Open Doors, Scripture Union). It even helps you to be praying the Bible. So you can be praying for the things that matter. Other good options: Instapray or Echo Prayer.

Thankfulness - App: Grateful - 1 Thessalonians 5:18

This app is really simple, all it does is ask you to finish the sentence "Today I am grateful for..." This helps to cultivate thankfulness for what God, the giver of all good things, is doing in your life. My aim is to fill this out at the end of each day in order to finish the day with God.

Memorising Scripture - App: Fighter Verse - Psalm 119:11

Memory verses are not just for kids. This app is developed by desiringgod.org and is super helpful for memorising sections of the Bible. You can follow along with their sets each year or choose your verses to learn. It comes with quizzes to help learn, options for sharing and resources to study the verse deeper. We ought to be people whose hearts and minds are filled with the word of God.

Evangelism - App: The Story - Matthew 28:19-20

Turn your phone into an evangelism tool. There are several options in this category that give you gospel outlines you can show your friends or videos you can share. The Story is a great tool, kind of like Two Ways to Live. It creates a gospel tract in narrative form, gives you helpful visuals, points to the Bible and provides easy avenues for a response. Other good options: 2WaysToLive or yesHEis.

Faithfulness - App: Momentum - Galatians 5:22-25

This is a habit tracker app which aims to help you create the habit and keep you accountable to it. I have used this to keep me on track with prayer and Bible reading. It is important to remember we are no longer bound by law and so shouldn’t feel unnecessary guilt from using this app, instead use your feelings to motivate you to keep up your spiritual disciplines. Our time with God ought to be something that doesn’t get pushed aside by the business of life so this habit tracker can help you to be faithful to what is important. Other good options: Productive or Way of Life.

Apps will never save you, only Jesus can do that. But I hope these apps turn your smart phone into a tool that helps to mature you as a disciple of Jesus, enable you to form godly habits and help you share Jesus with your friends and family.