For the last couple of years the local church has been using the Echo Prayer application on mobile devices to help manage its prayer list and engage everyone in the prayer needs of the church and immediate community. It turned out to be a useful prayer tool as they navigated congregational life through the pandemic and continues to be the go to tool for prayer.
The Good
Echo is a minimalist user interface that focuses primarily on creating, tracking, and listing prayers for those engaged in prayer. It doesn’t try to do to much which is a critique that can be made of some prayer applications. It sticks to the basics.
Much of what Echo offers is free:
- One can create your own prayers,
- track your prayer streak by days and weeks for those who are driven by such things,
- see your answered prayers,
- participate in prayer groups,
- participate in prayer feeds, and
- set reminders for your prayers
These are simple things, but the ability to use an intuitive and simple interface to interact with your prayer list cannot be understated. The usability of the app is simple on iOS and Android making it one of those apps where it can be said the application is not getting in the way of your prayers. Having to work the user interface in order to pray with an application is a major issue for such an important time of spiritual reflection. Any application that gets out of your way and just helps is a win, and this is were Echo’s simplicity takes the lead.
The Other Stuff
The other stuff is called just that because there really isn’t a bad here. There is a paid version which is to be expected in order to sustain and improve the application over time. So, no bad…just the other stuff that you get with a paid subscription.
Here is some of what is available in the paid version:
- Share your prayer requests with others,
- create prayer groups including small groups, family or friends,
- create prayer feeds that anyone can subscribe to and join in prayer with you,
- create prayer goals with stats, and
- add pictures to your prayers.
Sharing prayers with others is the real bang for your buck in the paid version. A prayer feed is how our church reaches out to the community of prayer warriors. There is a definite appeal to this capability and seeing the comments of the prayer team as they respond in the app to the needs.
Need
There is only one thing that I think is a true need for Echo. It would be helpful if it added the date of a new prayer as a timestamp when entering it. It doesn’t need to be an elaborate date picker, but a simple timestamp that reminds me when the request was entered. While praying through a personal prayer list, a prayer group, and a prayer feed, it is easy to forget when a prayer was first lifted. This would be a nice memory aid enhancement.
Conclusion
Echo Prayer is an app worth consideration. Since it is available as a free download with a wealth of benefit included in the free version, there is no hesitation in recommending it to someone looking for a prayer list aid who is even beginner-level friendly with Apple or Android mobile devices. Were it not available for free, it would still garner a recommend look for those seeking a prayer tool for their daily life…
Well done Echo!
Echo Prayer app, available in the App Store and the Google Play Store.