"FYI: You are in my prayers."

My workdays often feel like an endless stream of interruptions.

Phone calls from my boss.

Colleagues stopping into my office.

Slack messages from coworkers near and remote.

Important emails from people who need things from me.

Spam emails from LinkedIn snake oil peddlers who want to sell me AI tools that will quadruple my revenue.

Text messages from my wife.

Monday.com boards where helpful information goes to be lost forever.

Some days it feels like I spend the entire day attending to these various fires without even looking at my to-do list until quittin’ time. Then I come back the next day and do it all over again.

But the other day, an unexpected signal made its way through all the noise—instantly stopping me in my overstimulated, distracted tracks.

A Slack notification appeared in the top right corner of my screen and flitted away before I could fully read it, but I saw that it was from a colleague in a different office with whom I am not particularly close, though we’ve had some good conversations when our occupational paths have crossed.

Here’s what it said:

Just FYI: You have been on my mind and in my prayers.

Not expecting to receive any such message—much less from someone I haven’t spoken to in weeks—I was caught completely off guard and had to read it again.

This time the words washed over me like a salve and I felt my eyes uncontrollably filling up with tears. Slack messages have elicited many reactions from me over the years, but never anything like this.

I had not asked for her prayers.

I had not told her about a situation in my life that needed prayer.

I had honestly not even given this woman a thought in weeks.

But there she was, several states away, telling me that she was thinking about me and praying for me.

Dang, that’s powerful stuff.

And the twist ending is that we all have this power.

Sure, you might not work for a Catholic non-profit like I do, so the odds of receiving a message like this in a workplace Slack might be far-fetched. But you know people and you contact them, and every interaction you have is an opportunity to raise that person up in prayer and then to let them know about it.

I am a firm believer in the power of prayer. My Mom stressed that power to me from a young age, and I have witnessed it time and time again. But as I get older, I’ve realized that one huge aspect of the power of prayer is not just the prayer itself and whether or not the prayer gets answered in the time/place/way that you want it to.

There is great power in simply knowing that others are praying for you.

This was never made more manifest to me than when I was diagnosed with cancer in 2015. The feeling of being held up in prayer was palpable, mainly because of all the phone calls, texts, emails, instant messages, and greeting cards from people I knew and people I barely knew telling me that I was in their prayers.

You can’t hear that and not be changed by it.

Again, even if the prayer is not answered to your exact expectations, the fact remains that your fellow humans are approaching the Lord on your behalf. This is a tremendous way to live out the oft-quoted Aquinas definition of love—to will the good of the other.

And so, much like my coworker, I have tried to add this weapon to my arsenal. If someone is struggling with something, I tell them that I will pray for them. Even for friends who are not religious, it seems to mean a great deal to them because they know it means a great deal to me.

But I want to take this a step further—I want to start randomly storming Heaven with prayers for people whom God has randomly put on my heart. And I want to tell them about it via Slack or some other means so they can also well up with tears in their office.

I’ve done this practice before, where I will sit in prayer and see who God calls to my mind, but I don’t frequently make it a practice of telling these people that I’m praying for them—and that could make a huge difference.

Will you try it, too? Let your prayers reach their full potential and ultimate power by making them known to the recipient.

The idea that other people are spiritually rooting for you—especially when you haven’t asked for it—is somewhat overwhelming. Honestly, it could bring someone back to the faith. Prayer is hopeful, joyful, and attractive.

It’s also really easy to do. So let’s get to prayin’.