"What is the best Christian planner?" It's a question I've asked myself too – but not in the way you'd think. Early on while imagining what the Hope Planner could be, I asked myself this very question. I was looking for something, a planner perhaps, that would help me to make reading my Bible a priority everyday. Up until this point, the only thing I made a priority in my day was my to-do list and appointments for the day, so I figured a Christian planner might be just what I was looking for, while also doing all the regular things a normal planner does too. Was this possible? Did it already exist?
I couldn't find anything that fit my vision.
So I set off to create something from scratch. In order for my idea to work, I knew I needed to make a planner that would do more than just keep track of my to-do list and certainly do more for my spirituality that have Bible verses printed throughout (there are plenty of those on the market). So I summed it up to six, really important features it would have to have.
The Best Christian Planner will....
- Help you mature your faith in Christ
- Reminds you of daily devotion time or Bible study each day or week
- Provides prayer prompts
- Encourage you to think deeper about confession and praise
- Reminds you to pray for others
- Has Bible verses printed throughout
- Organizes you day the same way traditional planners do
SEE ALSO: 9 Reasons Women are Switching to this Christian Planner
1 - Help you mature your Faith in Christ
This is the biggest, most important feature of a Christian Planner right? If your "christian planner" isn't calling you closer to Christ at every page turn, then it may as well be a regular planner. So how can a planner do this? Through prayer and Bible study. You will grow closer to Christ the more you know him and God's word is the very first place you should be going to get to know Christ.
When I made the Hope Planner, I did so with the intention of reading the Bible everyday. But I wanted to do more than just read the words, so I wrote them too. Just a little bit, everyday to cement the words more and more into my heart and mind. After I write the Bible verse, I write a small relative prayer as I reflect on how to apply the teachings of this verse to my life. This has been the single most effective daily habit I've added to my schedule to strengthen my faith in Christ.
2 - Reminds you of daily devotion time or Bible study each day or week
While this falls in the number two spot, truly it's a tie for the number one most important feature. A planner is all about reminding us of the things we want to accomplish in our day, right? So a Christian planner, should remind us to spend time in the Word. Period. If it doesn't, it's just a regular 'ole planner with Bible verses. A Christian planner's pages should reminds us through designated space on the page for prayer journaling or daily devotion habit trackers. If we skip our daily devotion time, it appears abundantly clear on the pages of our planner thus helping us to prioritize better the next day.
READ ALSO: Christian Planner vs Prayerful Planner vs Hope Planner
3 - Provide prayer prompts
Seems so simple, yet it's so powerful. Prayer is the first step to surrender and when we write down our prayer requests (and confession and praise) either daily or weekly, we are recording a conversation with God we can recall over and over again. If the Bible is God's love letter to us, our prayers are our love letter back to him. A Christian planner that provides prayer journaling space says to the world "I don't need this whole page to focus on my worldly to-do list, I can take time and the focus of this page and give it back to God everyday."
4 - Encourage you to think deeper about confession and praise
Confession and praise are two very pivotal pieces of your relationship with God. In the act of confessing to God, we humble ourselves and elevate him. Praise especially elevates God's role in our life and further cements his position in our life. By simply designating specific "confess" and "praise" journaling prompts in a Christian planner, this helps you to pause and really think about what to bring before God in confession and what we should thank him for before we ask for something.
5 - Reminds you to pray for others
Our earnest prayers have powerful results. Praying for others might be one of the single most selfless thing we can do for others. How many people do you know who are suffering right now? Struggling? Needing direction or feeling lost? Countless. A Christian planner should remind you to build your prayer list and pray for those people daily, weekly and refresh it constantly. Since doing this myself, I've been able to actually pray for people, instead of commenting "prayers!" or "praying for you!" (but not following through) on a facebook or instagram post of a friend. It's been a powerful part of maturing my relationship with Christ.
6 - Has Bible verses printed throughout
When it comes to Christian planners, most of the ones of the market are simply planners with Bible verses and that's okay. In fact, one might think that is what makes a planner a "Christian planner" simply by decorating the pages with Bible verses. But the roots of your faith as a Christian must grow so much deeper than reading Bible verses sprinkled throughout your day – knowing where they come from in the Bible and the context that surrounds them is what will ultimately give you a firmer foundation for your beliefs.
NOTE: This is why the Hope Planner daily edition doesn't give Bible verses everyday. It's more of an advanced Christian planner where a part of your study and devotion time is spent finding the verses for yourself and writing them down.
7 - Organizes your day the same way a traditional planners does
This feature is pretty self explanatory. If we can get all the above features in one Christian planner, we still need it to do the "planning" part. Keep tracking of our schedule, monthly outlook, daily appointments and don't forget the never ending to-do lists.
SEE ALSO: How I use my Hope Planner as a Homeschool Planner
Every feature you see here you'll find in the best Christian planner, the Hope Planner daily edition. Call us a bit biased, but truly we searched high and low to find this first and nothing like it existed. So here it is - the original planner we developed after soul determining that these are the top 7 most important features of a Christian planner.
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