Features
Write. Plant scripture. See the pattern.
A journal built for spiritual growth — slash commands and contemplative rituals right in the sentence, the Lamp to show where your heart has been leaning across the whole Bible, the Ascent to climb the long view of your seasons, and the Altar to gather the prayers you keep carrying.
The editor
A page worth returning to.
The editor is the soul of Dayspring. If it isn't a joy to write in, nothing else matters — so this is where the most care went.
- Slash commands Type `/` for scripture, prayer, a sense, a ritual, or an inline photo. Inline glass panels, keyboard-native, dismissible. The spiritual life captured where it actually happens — in the middle of a sentence.
- Focus mode Everything but your words disappears. Typewriter scrolling keeps the line you're writing at eye level; the lines above quietly dim. Just you and the page.
- Light, dark, and your own hand A light or dark surface, set to follow your system. Then choose your writing face — Serif, Literary, Typewriter, Mono, Sans, or Readable — and set your own size, line height, and measure.
- Nothing between thought and word Markdown-first, with no perceptible input lag and continuous autosave. Keyboard-first throughout. You'll never lose a keystroke, and you'll never wait for one.
march 14
Hard conversation with Marcus
I went in defensive and left grateful — not sure when that shifted.
I've been praying about patience for months now. /
Name what you're reaching for, even loosely. Dayspring finds the passage and sets it inline, word-for-word from the ESV — and every reference lights up your Lamp.
James 1:19
"Let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger…"
Rituals
Forms that carry you in.
Not a prompt of the day — contemplative writing forms drawn from two thousand years of the praying church, opened with `/ritual`. Browse the library, read the threshold, and write into a structure that knows where to begin.
- Nine forms, one library The Daily Examen, Lectio Divina, SOAP, Psalmic Lament, Wesley's Questions, Prayer of Recollection, Ignatian Discernment, and more — each with its origin, tradition, and intention named before you begin.
- Scaffolding, not script Each section renders a label and a guiding question in the editor — display-only. Only what you type is saved. When you're done with the form, dissolve it into plain prose with one click.
- Filter by what you need Examine, encounter, listen, lament, gratitude, form — browse by the contemplative function, not by denomination. The same page holds Ignatius and the Psalter.
The Practices
How will you draw near today?
Nine forms today — Examen, Lectio, SOAP, lament, recollection, and more.
In the editor
The Daily Examen
Gratitude
What am I grateful for from today — even one small thing?
The conversation with Marcus — it went better than I feared.
Awareness
Where did I feel most alive? Where most distant from God?
Consolation and desolation, honestly…
Prompts stay as scaffolding — only your words are saved.
The Altar
A place of remembrance.
Not a prayer to-do list. The prayers and senses you plant while writing gather here on their own — and when God meets you in one, however He moves, you mark the place.
- Gathered by what you carry The names you keep bringing to God, the places and callings your prayers are spent on, the matters He keeps tending in you — each one kept before Him, with how long you've held it laid plainly alongside.
- However He moved — not a checkbox No answered / unanswered toggle. You name what happened in honest words: answered, redirected, surrendered, or He changed me. And still carrying is a posture of faith, not a missed deadline.
- Thus far the Lord has helped Switch to the Over-time view and the altar becomes a testimony — where God has met you across the years, stones of remembrance to carry back into prayer, not requests to file away as closed.
Altar
A place of remembrance
Lately your prayers have circled around esther, family.
Names you keep bringing to God the people you carry
- esther kept before Him · across 14 years
- family kept before Him · across 14 years
Places & callings where your prayers are spent
- work kept before Him · across 11 years
- the church returned to again and again · over 10 months
What He keeps tending in you the matters that recur
- patience kept before Him · across 15 yearshe changed me
- presence kept before Him · across 14 years
Some He answered. Some He redirected. Some you're still carrying.
The Lamp
Where your heart has been leaning.
The feature we kept reaching for and never found. Not coverage — returns. The whole Bible, lit by your journal.
- Warmth where you've lived Every chapter you've touched, glowing by how often you came back. Quiet where you haven't. No streak. No shame.
- Seasons change the picture Scrub to the hard year — Psalms and Lamentations. Spring — John and Philippians. The map remembers what you couldn't see yet.
- Your words, still there Tap a book. Read what you wrote the night that verse found you.
The Ascent
See who you're becoming.
The Lamp shows where your heart leaned; the Ascent shows who you're becoming — not a stack of reports, but elevation over one terrain, climbed from the Valley of the week to the Summit of the year.
- Four altitudes, one terrain Week, month, quarter, and year aren't four summaries. They're heights over the same landscape — the lines you wrote, the verse you reached for, the prayer you kept — each resolving at a longer range as you climb.
- The higher you go, the less it says In the Valley it only puts your words in order. On the Hillside it names a pattern — as a question. At the Summit it goes nearly silent and hands back your own marks. No verdicts, no scores, no streaks.
- Watching this season Keep a row of lenses in view — gain, gratitude, scripture, work, family — so the climb stays anchored to what you're actually paying attention to right now.
Valley · Week
Standing in the days.
Close to the ground — your own words, in the order you lived them. The app only arranges.
Your words · in order
Monday, bracing for the worst. Thursday, the hard conversation with Marcus. Friday — I left grateful, and I'm not sure when that shifted.
What you reached for
James 1:19
“Quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger.”
In order, nothing interpreted yet — you're close enough to feel them.
Hillside · Month
What you kept returning to.
Step back, and the same dimensions resolve at month scale — named only as a question.
The lines you kept
Less about bracing. More about the people in front of you.
The month's recurring verse
James 1:19
What you kept asking
That I'd listen before I defend.
You started to see…
Patience, showing up in small places — the dinner table, the long call with your brother.
↑ The app names what seems to connect — tentatively. Each is yours to rename or wave off.
Ridge · Quarter
The season, distilled.
From the ridge the season distills — and the app holds it up and hands it back.
The phrases you circled
less bracing · more showing up · slow to speak
The season's anchor passage
James 1
The prayer, and first signs
“Soften my heart toward Marcus.”
“I went in defensive and left grateful.”
first signs
What you now hold
Patience isn't summoned. It arrives while you're busy showing up.
↑ The app asks; it never answers. These go back to you, and to God — not to a verdict.
Summit · Year
Looking back down the year.
The quietest ground — your own words and the stones you set. The app nearly disappears.
The one line of the year
I went in defensive and left grateful.
The verse of the year
James 1:19
The prayer, and the Ebenezer
“Soften my heart toward Marcus.”
“I left grateful.”
March → November
Looking back down the trail — what did He teach you this year?
Everything in Dayspring
The small things, all the way down.
One premium plan, and a great deal of care. Here's the whole of it — the page, the tools in the sentence, the long view, and everything underneath.
All of it, one plan — $64 a year, with a 14-day free trial.
The page you write on
- Full-screen, distraction-free editor
- Focus mode
- Typewriter scrolling
- Paragraph dimming
- Six writing faces — Serif to Mono
- Your own size, line height & measure
- Light & dark, follows your system
- Continuous autosave — never lose a word
- No perceptible input lag
Writing tools
- Markdown-native
- Bold, italic, inline code & links
- Selection format bar
- Headings, lists & quotes
- Task lists with checkboxes
- Inline photos — drop or paste
- First line as title (optional)
- Keyboard-first throughout
- Shortcut guide — press ?
Slash commands
- /scripture — ESV, word-for-word
- /pray — log a prayer
- /sense — a word or impression
- /ritual — contemplative forms
- /image — a photo, inline
- Scripture references, auto-linked
The Rituals library
- Nine contemplative forms
- From Ignatius to the Psalter
- Filter by what you need
- Guiding questions, in the editor
- Optional previews before you begin
- Dissolve a form into plain prose
Looking back
- The Lamp — your whole canon, lit
- Scrub the Lamp by season
- Tap a book to reread that night
- The Ascent — week to year
- Weekly & monthly reflections
- The Altar — prayers gathered
- Altar's “over time” testimony
Finding & organizing
- List, Month & Year views
- Search every entry
- Entry previews in the list
- Collapsible sidebar
Your history & data
- Import from Day One
- Import from Diarly
- Import Markdown
- Your photos come too
- Parsed privately, on your device
- Export your whole journal
- First look-back ready on day one
Trust & platform
- macOS & web, kept in sync
- iPhone app — coming soon
- Encrypted in transit & at rest
- Never sold, never trained on
- Zero-retention AI reflection
- Yours alone — between you and God