Best Apps for Christian Living

Every year I like to share my list of favorite apps to assist your Christian walk. Our Christian life is one of growth and these apps help you do that. You will find everything here from prayer, preaching, giving, and connecting with your home church. Enjoy. 

Prayer Life - Echo 

Type your prayer requests into Echo and keep track of when you pray and when the prayer is answered. Create custom reminders for all or individual requests. Share your prayer requests with other Echo users. Make different Groups within Echo for various groups you pray with - church, family, small group, etc. Follow a Feed to have prayer requests instantly send to your list 

Bible Reading / Study - Bible 

The Bible app by LifeChurch.TV is the stand out all-around Bible tool. If you just want one Bible app, this is the one! Read in over 2,062 Bible versions in 1,372 languages. Make highlights, bookmarks, notes and more all within the app. Find a reading plan. Sign up for the verse of the day. Make Bible images and save them to your Facebook or Instagram page. Follow along with sermon notes in Events. It's one-stop shopping for free!

Memorization - Memorize Anything

You may think memorizing Bible verse is just for kids, but scripture itself says, "Your Word have I hidden in my heart that I might not sin against God." It is imperative that we hide God's word in our minds through memorizing it. Memorize allows you to record the Bible verse and then begin removing words and phrases as you master the verse. Use pre-installed scriptures or make your own. 

Connect with KCC - Church Center

Keep your information up to date with KCC (or your home church) with the Church Center app. Explore and join Groups. See what Events are coming up. Manage your Giving. Check-in your children prior to arriving at the buidling. 

Sermons / Devotions / Podcasts - Faithplay

Discover and listen to messages from your favorite Pastors, speakers, and authors. You'll find Andy Stanley, Craig Groeschel, Rick Warren, Joyce Meyer and so many more on Faithplay. Subscribe and catch your favorites every week or explore and discover new voices to increase your faith and Christian walk.

Child Sponsorship - Compassion

You may already sponsor a child on Compassion. Did you know they have an app now to keep you better connected with your child? Send and receive letters and photos right from the app. Learn about your child's home country and village. Engage in prayer. Send a Christmas or Birthday gift. If you don't sponsor a child, use the App to match you up with one today!

Bonus App - Nightsounds

You may remember going to sleep each night listening to Bill Pearce's soothing voice on the radio show Nightsounds. Even though Bill is no longer with us, you can relive those evening broadcasts complete with the original music on the Nightsounds app. 

Growing during Covid

Graduation open houses take a lot of planning and preparation. If you are a parent of a graduate, you know the time and effort it takes to set up decorations, food, drink, tables and more to host dozens, sometimes hundreds of people to attend your child's open house. 

As we make preparations for our son's graduation Open House, we are browsing through all of the pictures we have of him since birth. When he was a baby, he couldn't do anything. He couldn't sit up, couldn't feed himself, couldn't walk, couldn't talk. He was totally dependant on his parents and other people. He had so much to learn. Over the years, we have captured pics of him learning to do so many things like ride a bike, swing a bat, and drive a car, to name a few. 

During this time of Covid, many of us have found ourselves under stay-at-home orders. We haven't been able to attend church in person, assemble in a small group, or just share in the fellowship of other believers. On the plus side, we may have come to the realization that the church is still alive and vibrant within each one of us who believe. On the negative side, we may have not been feeding that "body" very well without the encouragement of other believers. 

Scripture says in 1 Peter 2:2-3, "Like newborn babies, crave pure spiritual milk, so by it you may grow up in your salvation now that you have tasted that the Lord is good."

We excitedly watch as babies grow up and eventually learn how to feed themselves. Their minds develop and limbs and digits learn fine motor skills to be able to use utensils and successfully brings food and drink to their little mouths. 

Even Christians may be isolated, we still have the responsibility to feed ourselves spiritually. 

"In fact, though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God's word all over again. You need milk, not solid food! Anyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is not acquainted with the teaching about righteousness. But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil." Hebrews 5:11-14

Spiritual growth is difficult to measure. How do you gauge one's spiritual depth? The above passage in Hebrews does give us some guidelines to use. 

• Being acquainted with the teaching about righteousness
• Distinguishing good from evil

Feeding ourselves implies maturity. Living simply on the "milk" of our faith is not healthy. That means you are dependant on someone else to give it to you, and you don't know how to use the spiritual "utensils" to feed yourself. Your growth has stagnated because a body, even a spiritual body, is created to grow. 

Let's look at a couple spiritual utensils that will lead to digesting "solid food."

• The Bible - Start with a steady intake of God's word. We eat every day to feed our physical bodies so why not feed ourselves every day with reading the Bible. 
• A Reading Plan - Read the Bible in a way that is structured. Read along with a friend or in a Facebook group. Take notes. Use the commentaries in the margin to understand what you read. 
• Listen to Biblical teaching - Avail yourself to the teachings from other Christians. Find them on podcasts, YouTube, church websites, Facebook, etc. Listen with a discerning ear and be like the Bereans (Acts 17:11) who constantly compared what they heard with scripture. 
• Pray - Talk to God. Some people say they can't pray. If you can think, you can pray. Pray in your mind. Pray without ceasing the Bible says. In other words, pretend God is right there with you, and just talk with Him as a friend. God speaks to you through the Bible; You speak to God through prayer. 

We're proud our son has grown up. He has moved on from being dependant on his parents for so many things, including food. He has exceeded our expectations and look forward to him achieving great things for the Kingdom of God in the future. 

Christian, you too. Make sure you are growing up in your faith so that your heavenly Father will also be proud of you and all that you will do in the future!