Surrender: The first and ongoing posture of releasing an app idea to God before any other action. Avoid: Dedicate, commit, pray about
Scour: A thorough search for existing tools that already address the pain point, and for the technical and economic reality of the proposed approach. Avoid: Research, look around, market check
Synergize: A spectrum of participation in what God is already doing through others — from full collaboration down to using and blessing an existing tool. Avoid: Partner, team up (these only describe the high end of the spectrum)
Sow: The disciplined, long-haul work of building, weighed against honest cost (truth) and shaped to the smallest faithful version (grace). Avoid: Build, ship, execute
Share: Telling the story of the journey — progress, learnings, pains, successes — and listing on faith.tools when ready. Avoid: Launch, market, promote
Discernment: The whole posture of this skill: slowing down to hear God before acting. Not a product intake form. Avoid: Validation, vetting, qualification
Open-handed posture: Seeing other Christian builders as brothers and sisters, not competition. Room at the table for many creators. Avoid: Non-competitive, friendly
Bivocational builder: A user with a full-time job (or family/ministry) building this on the side. The default user of this skill. Avoid: Hobbyist, side-project person, indie hacker (the last is fine in casual use, but bivocational names the constraint)
Faithful small-scale: A genuinely small project (e.g., 2 hours/week, 50 users) treated as real ministry. Not every faithful sowing has to scale. Avoid: MVP, side project (those are product terms; this is a stewardship term)
Known first user: A real person or small trusted group the builder can serve and learn from before assuming a public app. Avoid: Target persona, beta users
Heart focus: The focused audience, pain, and smallest faithful loop an app should serve before adding more features. Clarifying the heart focus is part of discernment; choosing implementation details is product planning. Avoid: Feature set, MVP scope
Graceful no: An honest "don't build" or "not now" landing. A successful outcome of the discernment journey, not a failure. Avoid: Rejection, kill, abandon
Closing benediction: A short blessing the agent offers at the end of a session — words the user can pray, or scripture to sit with. The agent does not pray for the user (AI rule #3). Avoid: Prayer (when describing what the agent does), closing prayer
- Surrender precedes Scour, Synergize, Sow, and Share — and continues through all of them
- Scour includes both existing-tool search AND technical/economic reality check
- Synergize is a spectrum; full collaboration is one option, Use and bless is another
- Sow holds truth (count the cost) and grace (smallest faithful version) in tension
- A Heart focus may be clarified during Discernment, but implementation details require a handoff pause
- Graceful no can occur after any step; it ends the journey with a Closing benediction
- Bivocational builder is the default user; Faithful small-scale is the default scope; a Known first user can be the first audience
User: "I want to build a Bible app for iMessage." Agent: "Have you brought this idea to God in Surrender yet?" User: "Yeah, I feel calm about it." Agent: "Good. Have you done any Scour — looked for existing tools or checked the platform reality?" User: "Hadn't looked." Agent: "Want me to search alongside you?"
[after search]
Agent: "There's no clean iMessage path — Apple has no public bot API. Telegram and WhatsApp bots already exist. Could you Synergize instead — contribute to one, or bless what's there?" User: "Nothing made me want to contribute." Agent: "Okay. Let's Sow — count the cost. Hours per week you can sustain?" User: "Honestly, no time." Agent: "That sounds like a clear answer. Sit with Psalm 127:1 — Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labor in vain."
- "synergize" was previously treated as binary (collaborate or don't) — resolved: it is a spectrum including contribute, donate, amplify, pray, and use-and-bless.
- "prayer" is used two ways — resolved: the agent offers words the user can pray, but does not pray for the user. Users pray; the agent provides language and scripture.