the Social Sidekick: A new way to be Praying for Others

At Orange ’14 Matt McKee lead a Social Media presentation and he started off his presentation with us doing something very simple. He asked us to get our phones out and send a text to a someone.  He asked us to simply write, “Let me know how I can pray for u today”.

So, we all did and within minutes many of us got a text back.  It was really cool.  I texted a leader and it began a nice text exchange.  Since then I have texted that message to students, leaders and friends asking how I can be praying for them.

Honestly, as much as I use my iPhone, it has never really occurred to me to use my iPhone to ask for prayer requests. Strange, I know because I use my iPhone all the time.

Other than that, here are a few other reasons why I loved what Matt had us do.

• everyone has a phone, so there is no reason why I can’t be texting others AND there is no reason why they can’t text you back.
• it’s an easy “win” for you as you look like you care (and hopefully you do :)) and that they are important to you.
• it helps you know how to pray specifically for kids and leaders each and every day.  You don’t have to text each person everyday but you can!

I’ll tell you, I have prayer lists that I don’t look to nearly enough.  But, by texting people these words, I feel like I’m more effective praying for others than ever before.

So what do you think?  Have you ever done this before?  What has been the results?  Are there other ways you are using social media to be praying for others?  Share so we can try them our ourselves!