Guide · By Monolith3 · Updated
How to collect prayer requests by phone
Give your church one phone number for prayer, and have a small team read every message, every day. That is the whole job. Below are the steps, a greeting you can copy, and the ways churches set this up.
What does a church need to take prayer requests by phone?
You need five things: a number, a short greeting, one place where messages land, a few people who read them, and a plan for urgent calls. The number matters least. The reading matters most.
How do you set up a prayer request line?
Seven steps. The first five fit in one afternoon.
Get a number just for prayer.
Keep it apart from the office line, so prayers don’t get lost with billing calls. A local area code feels close to home.
Write a short greeting.
Say who they reached. Ask for their name and their prayer. Tell them if anyone else will hear it.
Point people in danger to help.
Your greeting should say: if you are in danger, hang up and call 911, or call or text 988.
Pick two or three readers.
One person goes on vacation. Two or three means someone always reads it.
Choose when you read.
Once a day is a good habit. Pick a time and keep it.
Share the number.
Say it on Sunday. Put it in the bulletin, on the slides, and on your website.
Mark what you prayed for.
Keep a simple sign that a request was read and prayed over, so no one is missed and no one prays twice by accident.
What should the prayer line greeting say?
Keep it under 30 seconds. Here is one you can copy and change:
“You’ve reached the prayer line at [your church name]. Leave your name and how we can pray for you, or tell us what God has done. Say if you’d like it kept private. If you are in danger right now, hang up and call 911, or call or text 988.”
What are the ways to do it?
Here are four common setups. Each one works. They differ in who can read the messages and how much work it takes.
| Setup | Calls | Texts | Written out | Whole team reads | Cost |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Voicemail box on the church line | Yes | No | Depends on your phone system | Usually one person checks it | Part of your phone plan |
| Google Voice | Yes | Yes | Yes, voicemails | Made for one person; work plans add more | Free for personal use in the US; paid with Google Workspace |
| A church texting tool | Varies by tool | Yes | Varies by tool | Usually, yes | Varies by tool |
| Prayer & Testimony Line | Yes | Yes | Yes, every call, with the recording | Yes, a shared Inbox with a Reviewed tick | $35 a month |
Texting tools are built to send messages out to your church. A prayer line is built to take messages in. If you already pay for a texting tool, check if it can take calls before you add anything.
Can prayer request voicemails be written out for you?
Yes. Many phone systems can turn a voicemail into text. The hard part is what comes next: getting the words to the right people, and knowing who has prayed.
With Prayer & Testimony Line, each call is written out in minutes. It lands in a private Inbox with the recording beside it, marked as a prayer request, a testimony, or both. If a word looks wrong, play the recording. Each person on your team can get a morning email, daily or weekly, or turn it off.
How do you keep prayer requests private?
Keep the list of readers short. Give each one their own sign-in instead of a shared password. Ask callers if their request is private or OK to share, and never read a private one out loud.
On Prayer & Testimony Line, each person signs in with their email and a 6-digit code. Callers say “private” or “OK to share,” and the Inbox shows which.
What if a caller is in danger?
A prayer line is not a crisis line. Your greeting should send people in danger to 911 or 988.
Prayer & Testimony Line plays that in the greeting. If a call sounds like someone may be in danger, we mark it Possible crisis and email your church’s crisis contact right away. A person on your team still has to act.
Want stories too? Read how to collect testimonies from your church. Or go back to the Prayer & Testimony Line home page.