By Tre Goins-Phillips and Jessica Lea
WKYT, faithwire and ChurchLeaders
After struggling with her own mental health, one Kentucky high schooler decided to help herself and her classmates turn to the Lord in trying times — one sticky note at a time.
“Our school, along with the middle school, has struggled with suicide,” Sophy Jones told WKYT-TV, referring to her school, Whitley County High. “And, a lot of people struggle with their mental health.”
After seeing a popular trend on TikTok, the teenager decided to start a prayer wall in her high school. The walls, she said, were created to “help spread God’s Word” to those who need encouragement.
Many of the Bible verses scrawled on sticky notes lining the girls’ bathroom walls are passages that made a huge difference in Jones’ own life.
“God saved me,” the faith-filled student told the local news outlet.
“People can just write down a Bible verse or, like, ‘Jesus loves you,’ for example, and you can either take it with you if you want to keep it as a note; you can repost other ones,” she said of her vision for the prayer wall. “They could take that verse and say they want to read it, or we do have Chromebooks at school, so they can Google the verse.”
She started the ministry of sorts late last year, and it’s already having a positive impact.
One of Jones’ friends and classmates, Evelyn Philpot, helped start the prayer walls.
“The other day, I had seen a young female student who had one of the yellow sticky notes with a Bible verse on it that we had wrote, and it just really like made my day to know that this is something that people are loving and it’s actually helping them,” Philpot said.
She added, “These verses spoke to me, and I feel like they could speak to others.”
Both Jones and Philpot are members of First Priority, a student-led Christian organization with a chapter at Whitley County High School.
Todd Lawson, director of the organization, said he’s proud of the initiative the girls have taken.
“With prayer and God, that’s the only answer we got — that’s our only hope,” he said. “I may feel not important at home, I may not feel important to a teacher, I may not feel important to somebody, but God loves us and ain’t nothing more important than that.”
Jones added, “Prayer, to me, is just — it makes me feel loved.”
First Priority of America is an organization that “exists to educate, train, and provide resources for Christian students to legally form clubs and share the gospel with unbelieving students on the public school campus.” The response cards invite students to leave their contact information so that they can learn more about Jesus or get connected with a youth group.
In a description of the prayer wall, Jessica Lea said Sophy Jones’ post shows several photos of Whitley County High School bathroom mirrors and a wall with various sticky notes with statements like “Jesus LOVES you!” and “Ephesians 2:10.” Laminated signs say “Prayer Wall, leave a Bible verse, spread his WORD!” or “Prayer Mirror, leave a verse, spread his WORD!” Included on the walls are First Priority Student Response Cards.
“Over the year my love for my Lord has saved me more and more. My message here is to spread his Word,” Jones said in a post on Facebook. “I’ve put up in every bathroom a prayer sink, wall, or mirror. Each spot people can write a Bible quote, message, or a prayer. I hope to spread this across more schools and I hope people understand just how much Jesus loves us!”
Lawson told WKYT, “We just done a big push on the suicide prevention on ‘STAY,’ you know, ‘stop,’ ‘talk to somebody,’ be ‘attentive’ and ‘you are important.’”
Jones’ mother, Shawna Hughes, told the Times-Tribune, “I’m so incredibly proud of her…She has chosen to spread faith.”
First published Jan. 9, 2024
