How We Built a Church Potluck Sign-Up App in One Afternoon
TL;DR: We built Shared Table, a potluck sign-up app, by describing it in FaithGPT Apps, approving a desktop and a phone mockup, and letting FaithGPT build and check it. Everyone sees one list of dishes and what is still needed, and each person can edit only their own entry. A build like this typically uses about 109 to 284 credits; opening the app and adding dishes costs nothing.
A lot of church potlucks end the same way: six desserts, plenty of bread, and somebody running to the store for a main dish half an hour before lunch.
The problem is rarely generosity. People sign up in a group text, the dish list scrolls away, and nobody can see the gaps. So one of the first apps we built with FaithGPT Apps was a sign-up sheet that shows what is missing. It is called Shared Table.
Step 1: say what the list should do
Go to /apps/make and pick Apps. You describe the tool the way you would explain it to a volunteer. Something like this is enough:
"A potluck sign-up for our church. People add their name, the dish they are bringing, whether it is a main, side, dessert or drink, how many it serves and any allergy notes. Everyone sees the same list. Show how many of each kind we still need."
The price of the build shows under the box before you send it. A build like this typically uses about 109 to 284 credits, and FaithGPT releases whatever it holds and does not use.
Step 2: approve two mockups
Before writing any code, FaithGPT wrote down what it understood and drew two mockups, one for a desktop and one for a phone. This is the cheapest moment to change your mind. A missing column or a confusing label is one sentence in chat now, and a rebuild later.
If something is wrong here, say so in chat and it revises the design. Nothing gets built until you approve, and the mockups stay in the app's settings under Design afterward.
Step 3: let it build and check
After approval, FaithGPT built the app and opened it on a phone-sized screen and a desktop-sized screen to check that every screen loads, the buttons work and nothing runs off the edge. For Shared Table it found three small things, one on a phone and two on desktop, and listed them on the app page in plain words. The app went live anyway, with a Polish these button that starts the next edit.
That is the honest version of "it works". The first build worked, and it still had rough edges worth fixing before Sunday.
What the app does
Shared Table has three tabs. Dishes is the shared list, grouped as mains, sides, desserts and drinks. Add dish is a short form. What's needed is the reason the app exists: it shows each category against a target with a progress bar, so "Mains: 1 of 6, 5 more needed" is on screen before anyone picks up a fork.
Two choices make this work, and you can ask for either one in plain words. Most apps keep each person's records private to them, but a sign-up sheet has to work the other way round, so Shared Table keeps one list that everyone can read. And while anyone can add a dish, each person can change or remove only what they added. Nobody can delete your lasagna.
Sharing it with the church
New apps start private. In Settings, under Sharing, choose who can open it: only you, up to 50 email addresses, or everyone with the link. Send the link in your church email or newsletter. People open it on their phones and add a dish. They do not need to know anything about FaithGPT, and opening the app or adding a dish never costs anyone credits.
If you allow remixing, another church can Remix your app. That gives them their own copy with an empty list, at no cost, and they can change it to fit their hall.
Changing it later
Say you want a drop-off time for each dish, so the kitchen team knows when food arrives. That change is one sentence in chat, and FaithGPT checks the edit against the dishes already on the list before it replaces the working version.
If your church has a sign-up that lives in a group text, start there. Go to /apps/make , pick Apps, and describe it. The details on plans, sharing and privacy are in the FaithGPT Apps help article .
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