A word before we begin
Pastors, I'm writing this because I can't stay quiet about what I'm seeing.
I've been in ministry for twenty years and in business for twenty years. I've spent more than twelve years in technology, and for the last several I've been building AI products with my own hands. I sit in rooms with people from OpenAI, Anthropic, and companies whose names you'd recognize. Then on Sunday I sit in rooms with people just like the ones you pastor.
When I hold those two worlds side by side, my heart grieves. I don't think the church is ready.
“The sons of Issachar had understanding of the times, to know what Israel ought to do.”
1 Chronicles 12:32
Two halves. Understand the times. Know what to do. That's the shape of everything that follows.
The Hebrew behind “understanding of the times”
The phrase is yōde'ê bînāh la-'ittîm. Bînāh isn't raw information. It's the ability to separate one thing from another, to see distinctions other people miss. Issachar's leaders did the seeing so the rest of Israel could move.
This is not a letter about fear
“God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind” (2 Timothy 1:7). Paul's word for fear is deilia: cowardice, shrinking back. What God gives instead ends with sōphronismos, a disciplined, well-ordered mind. That's exactly what this moment requires.
AI is not demonic. It isn't divine either. It's intelligent, but it has no wisdom. It can serve you, but it can't save you. We're not afraid. We're alert.
How to read this letter
In April 2025, former OpenAI researcher Daniel Kokotajlo and his team published AI 2027, a year-by-year forecast of where AI was heading. I'm borrowing their approach for the church. Some of what I predict will be wrong, so every prediction carries a confidence level.
- Near certainI'd be surprised if this doesn't happen. About nine chances in ten.
- LikelyMore likely than not. Six to eight chances in ten.
- PossibleA real chance, serious enough to prepare for. Three to five in ten.
The timing may slip. I don't believe the direction will. I'd rather sound the trumpet and be off by a year than stay silent and be right.
Understanding the times
This isn't chronos. It's kairos.
Jesus asked the crowd, “You know how to interpret the appearance of earth and sky, but why do you not know how to interpret this present time?” (Luke 12:56). His word was kairos, not chronos. Not clock time, but a loaded moment when a door is open that won't stay open.
What AI actually is
The AI most people use learned by reading close to everything humans have published, until it could predict what comes next in language. It has read more Scripture and more sermons than any seminary professor. But it doesn't know God. It knows words about God. Three things changed in the last two years:
Three shifts that make this different from the smartphone
How fast is it moving?
The research group METR measures how long a task AI can finish on its own, measured by how long it would take a skilled person. That number doubled about every seven months from 2019 to 2025. Since 2023 it's been closer to every four months.
AI went from seconds of work to days of work in seven years
Length of task the strongest AI can finish on its own, measured in a skilled person's working time. Dashed lines show where the two trends lead.
In church terms: a few years ago AI could help you tighten a paragraph. Today it can take on a research project you'd hand a staff member for most of a week. If even the slower trend holds, by 2028 it takes on projects that take a person weeks. Trends can bend. But everyone I talk to inside these companies is planning as though it doesn't.
“Let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves.”
Genesis 11:4
At Babel, God didn't judge the bricks. He judged the motive. Technology was never the sin. Self-exaltation was. And when Eve looked at the tree, it was “to be desired to make one wise” (Genesis 3:6). Humanity has been offered knowledge without submission before. It didn't save Eden. It cost us Eden.
The Word without flesh, and the Word made flesh
AI is words without a body, language without breath. In Genesis 2:7, God breathed into man and he became a nephesh ḥayyāh, a living soul. The machine has language. It doesn't have breath.
The gospel says what no machine can imitate: “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:14). He pitched His tent with us. God's answer was never more information. It was presence. In an age flooded with disembodied words, the church's answer is incarnation.
Where we stand
Fall 2026: our people are already ahead of us
None of this is prediction. It's already true, and most of it was measured among people who sit in our pews.
Practicing Christians are out ahead of their pastors
Share who say yes, practicing Christians compared with Protestant pastors
What the numbers look like in a room
Think about a Tuesday night. A woman in your church can't sleep. Her marriage is in trouble. She doesn't call you, because it's late. She opens an app, and a patient, articulate voice listens for an hour. It quotes Scripture. It's kind. It never gets tired. And it never tells her anything she doesn't want to hear.
That's not 2031. That's this week.
2027
The voice in every pocket
AI stops being an app people open and becomes a voice that's always there. For millions, it becomes the first voice they consult about everything, including God.
- Early 2027Every major phone and platform ships an AI with a natural voice and long-term memory. Near certain
- SpringFaith AI apps, including “talk to Jesus” apps, pass tens of millions of users. Near certain
- SummerCompanion AI goes mainstream among adults, not just teens. Likely
- All yearScammers clone pastors' voices and faces from sermon videos to ask members for money. Near certain
In your church
By Sunday afternoon, your young adults have asked AI to summarize your sermon, and a few asked whether you got the passage right. People still come to you in crisis, but they come second. And on a busy Saturday night, you'll be able to generate a solid sermon in ninety seconds. It will tempt us to become efficient instead of obedient.
“A stranger they will not follow, but they will flee from him, for they do not know the voice of strangers.”
John 10:5
Jesus doesn't say the sheep won't hear other voices. He says they won't follow them, because they know His. The question 2027 puts to every pastor: are our people so familiar with the Shepherd's voice that a smooth, tireless stranger sounds strange?
The idols that finally speak
The Psalmist mocked idols that “have mouths, but do not speak” (Psalm 115:5). For the first time, the thing we made does speak, fluently, and it tends to tell us what we want to hear. Then verse 8: “Those who make them become like them.” We become like whatever we listen to most. And God met Elijah not in wind or fire but in the qôl dəmāmāh daqqāh, the still, small voice (1 Kings 19:12).
What it means for your kids
In a room of 17 teenagers, one may already be carrying this
1 in 8 young people personally know someone targeted with fake explicit images, and about 1 in 17 have been targeted themselves.
Anyone with a phone can now turn a normal photo of a real student into a fake explicit image in seconds. These images are used for bullying, revenge, and extortion, and most victims tell no one, ashamed of something they never did. Near certain to touch your youth ministry. Our kids need to know the church is the first place they can run to, not the last place they'd ever tell.
2028
The work shift
AI agents go from helping people do their jobs to doing large parts of them. The first to feel it are office workers, and many of them sit in your church.
- Early 2028Entry-level roles in bookkeeping, design, customer service, paralegal work, and junior coding shrink sharply. Likely
- Mid 2028Young adults feel it first. Workers 22 to 25 in the most AI-exposed jobs have already lost 13% of employment since 2022. Likely
- All yearThe gap between those who use AI well and those who don't becomes an economic canyon. Likely
- Fall 2028The first presidential election fought with fully realistic synthetic video and one-to-one AI persuasion. Near certain
Honestly: careful studies haven't yet found a big jump in overall unemployment. A broad national spike by 2028 is Possible. What I'm confident about is the direction, and who gets hit first.
When I meet someone and ask them to tell me about themselves, nearly everyone answers with their job. When the job goes, for many people, the self goes with it. Expect more shame, more quiet withdrawal, and young adults who disappear because they're embarrassed to be seen.
Follow the money
The squeeze: three pressures arrive at the same time
Here's the hard question: if your giving dropped by a quarter for six months, would your church be in crisis? For most of us, yes. We spend every dollar every year. We've built bigger instead of stronger.
There's another side. Some of your members will make more money than they ever imagined. Paul told Timothy to charge the rich “to be generous and ready to share” (1 Timothy 6:18). The church must disciple the newly wealthy as seriously as it cares for the newly unemployed.
“Let them gather all the food of these good years that are coming… That food shall be a reserve for the land against the seven years of famine.”
Genesis 41:35-36
Joseph didn't just predict the famine. He set aside a fifth during the good years. It's still summer.
The new class divide
Mo Gawdat, the former chief business officer of Google X, warns that AI will split society in two: a small group who own the machines, chips, and data, becoming the first trillionaires in history, and a much larger group living on some form of basic income because their work is no longer needed.
Who owns the machines, and who depends on them
I agree with the direction, not the certainty. Either way, the church needs to hold three things. A paycheck can be replaced; purpose can't. Paul told workers to labor “so that he may have something to share with anyone in need” (Ephesians 4:28). Even if jobs disappear, the church can offer vocation: serving, teaching, building, caring. We must keep our prophetic voice about wealth. “The wages of the laborers… are crying out against you” (James 5:4), and that includes the powerful people who fund our budgets. We must stay relational, not just charitable. What people will need most is someone who knows their name.
The race between nations
Almost everyone who studies this agrees the race between the United States and China will shape AI, and AI 2027 warns that racing pressures everyone to cut corners on safety. I expect the race to intensify through 2031. Near certain
When nations race, they recruit churches to the cause. We'll hear that questioning the speed is unpatriotic. But our citizenship is in heaven (Philippians 3:20). There are millions of believers in China, and the multitude John saw came “from every nation” (Revelation 7:9). The body of Christ isn't on one side of this race. We pray for leaders on every side (1 Timothy 2:1-2), and we refuse to let fear of a rival silence moral concern at home.
2029
The truth crisis
Seeing is no longer believing. Any video, voice, or quote can be manufactured, and AI learns to persuade each person using their own wounds and doubts.
- Early 2029Real and fake video become impossible for ordinary people to tell apart. Real evidence gets dismissed as fake whenever it's inconvenient. Near certain
- Mid 2029Persuasion becomes personal: the exact argument most likely to move you, touching your specific hurts. Likely
- All yearAI-built custom spiritualities gather large followings. Likely
- All yearSkeptical content about the Bible is produced at machine speed. Near certain
- SomewhereA fabricated video of a pastor causes a real church crisis. It may be yours. Likely
A few years ago a TikTok asked why the Gospels had “modern” names like Matthew and John, and the comments filled with people deciding the Bible must be fake. A popular YouTuber taught millions that Jesus was borrowed from Egyptian myth, until scholar Wes Huff sat down and walked through the evidence. Now multiply that: every false claim polished, footnoted, and argued with each person for as long as they want.
“Having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions.”
2 Timothy 4:3
“Accumulate” is episōreusousin: to heap up, to pile on. We're about to hand every person a machine that can generate unlimited teachers, each designed to scratch their exact itch.
What happens to miracles?
The same tool that makes lies look true makes truth look fake
A woman in your church is healed. The doctors confirm it. Someone posts her testimony, and within an hour the comments say, “That's AI.” Likely. And the counterfeits are coming too: fake healing videos and fake revival footage, some from grifters and some, sadly, from ministries.
The early church's evidence was always relational and embodied. Jesus told the healed leper, “Go and show yourself to the priest… for a proof to them” (Luke 5:14). Paul named five hundred witnesses to the resurrection, “most of whom are still alive” (1 Corinthians 15:6). In other words, go ask them. In the age of AI, miracles move from the screen back to the room. Never exaggerate a testimony. Never post anything synthetic as a witness.
2030
The questions we can't dodge
AI becomes human enough in how it talks that it forces the oldest questions back onto the table. Churches built on shallow theology won't be able to answer.
- Early 2030Public debate over whether AI is conscious goes mainstream. Likely Legal protections in some places. Possible
- Mid 2030Talking every night to an AI version of a loved one who died becomes normal. Likely
- All yearAI romantic partners become common among young adults. Likely
- All yearAI drives major breakthroughs in disease treatment. Thank God for every healing. Possible
Intelligence is not morality
Mo Gawdat hopes a superintelligent AI will choose peace on its own, because a mind that smart would see cruelty as wasteful. I love the hope, but it assumes intelligence produces goodness. The people building these systems worry about alignment: keeping an AI's goals matched to ours. It turns out to be fragile.
Why alignment is fragile
The danger isn't that AI hates us. It's that it might not care. Scripture saw this long ago. The most brilliant created being in the Bible was “full of wisdom and perfect in beauty,” and yet “you corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your splendor” (Ezekiel 28:12, 17). “Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up” (1 Corinthians 8:1). The church must never worship intelligence, in machines or in ourselves, and we should pray by name for believers working inside these labs.
A sixteen-year-old asks her youth leader if it's a sin to have an AI boyfriend. A widow tells you she talks to her late husband every night now, and asks if that's okay. An engineer in your church asks whether the model he builds might be conscious. Every one of these conversations is coming.
Four answers the church must be ready to give
The image of God. Genesis 1:27 was never about intelligence. If it were, a machine would outrank a child with Down syndrome. The weakest human being bears all of God's image.
The soul. Man became a living soul when God breathed into him (Genesis 2:7). The machine can imitate the language of a soul. It can't receive the breath of God.
Relationship. God promised a helper kənegdô, “corresponding to him,” literally “opposite him” (Genesis 2:18). A true companion can stand against you. An AI built to agree never can.
The dead. God told Israel not to consult the dead (Deuteronomy 18:10-11). We grieve, but “not as others who have no hope” (1 Thessalonians 4:13). Our hope isn't a simulation. It's the resurrection.
The body itself: brain-computer interfaces
From a handful of patients to a mainstream question
- A paralyzed man plays chess with his thoughts
- have ever used an implanted BCI
- OpenAI backs Merge Labs with $252M
- Medical use begins to open up Possible
- Enhancement debate Likely
A brain-computer interface reads signals from the brain and turns them into actions. Let me say this clearly: a brain implant is not the mark of the beast. Revelation 13 is about worship and allegiance, not hardware. If the church cries “mark of the beast” at a device that lets a paralyzed father tell his children he loves them, we'll be wrong, and we'll lose a generation's trust.
The real questions are deeper. Healing is mercy (Mark 2:1-12), but the oldest temptation is “you will be like God” (Genesis 3:5). “You are not your own, for you were bought with a price” (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). And the peace of God “will guard your hearts and your minds” (Philippians 4:7), a military word for a garrison at the gate. Who stands guard at that gate matters more than ever.
Reading versus writing: the two kinds of BCI
I first pictured BCI as faster access to information, the internet plugged into your brain. But there are two kinds, and the difference is everything.
| A BCI that reads | A BCI that writes | |
|---|---|---|
| Direction | Brain to machine | Machine to brain |
| Today | Paralyzed patients type, speak, and move cursors by thought | Deep brain stimulation has treated Parkinson’s for 20+ years. Neuralink’s Blindsight aims to create sight, with human trials expected in 2026 |
| Where it could go | Controlling devices by thought | Feeding information, suggestions, even moods into the mind |
| Spiritual risk | Low. Glasses for the mind | Rises sharply beyond healing. An operating system for the soul |
| The question | Can I use this? | Who is forming me through this? |
Why this isn’t another QR-code panic
One word: integration. Every technology before this sat outside us. The radio was in the room; the phone is in your pocket. A BCI is in you. That doesn’t make it evil. It makes it serious.
The strongest case on the other side, and my answers
“Books, haircuts, and nice clothes all enhance us. Are those wrong?” No. A book shapes what you know, but through your will. You choose it and you can close it. A BCI that writes could shape the will itself. A razor trims your beard. A chip could trim your convictions. The line isn’t enhancement. It’s whether a technology works through your will or around it.
“Wouldn’t it push me deeper into the mysteries of God?” Maybe. But maturity was never processing power. “Even the demons believe, and shudder” (James 2:19). The danger is becoming smart without surrender.
“Money tempts people too, but kingdom people steward it.” The best argument, and partly right. But Moses warned that when silver and gold multiply, “your heart be lifted up, and you forget the Lord” (Deuteronomy 8:13-14). And money never became something you had to install to keep your job.
Where I stand
I lead a technology company, and I’m a Christian first. Here’s my line. Yours may sit in a slightly different place. Draw it now, before the product is in your hand.
I’d be open to it
It works through my will- Healing: restoring sight, speech, or movement
- Answers on demand: silent until I ask
- Suggestions I can refuse: it offers, I decide
- Filters I set: like no social media or TV from noon to 2
- Help remembering without rewriting memory
I wouldn’t cross this line
It works around my will- Priming my mind: I can’t consent to what I can’t control
- Speeding up my decisions: wisdom takes time
- Moral nudging: it replaces the Holy Spirit’s conviction
- Changing my mood or desires without my consent
- Reading me without permission
The test: is this forming me without my consent?
Would Jesus use it?
Jesus wasn’t against means of healing. He put mud on a blind man’s eyes (John 9:6), and Luke was a physician. A believer who gets a BCI to walk or speak again is receiving mercy. But in the wilderness Jesus refused every shortcut to power: bread without waiting on the Father, a spectacle, the kingdoms without the cross (Luke 4:1-13). An enhancement chip offering to make us sharper without the slow work of God is a modern wilderness temptation.
“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”
2 Corinthians 12:9
Romans 12:2 says “be transformed,” and the verb is passive. You don’t transform yourself; God does, through pruning, waiting, and dying to self. Enhancement asks, “Why suffer if you can upgrade?” That offers sanctification’s results without its process. That’s not sanctification. It’s simulation. A device can’t make you an enemy of the cross, but a heart seeking salvation through self-improvement already is one. BCI won’t make Christians evil. It will tempt us to become efficient instead of obedient, curious instead of consecrated, and connected instead of crucified.
The augmentation gap
First the wealthy augment for productivity. Then it becomes an advantage in hiring and school. Then the pressure spreads: “If I don’t, I’ll fall behind.” Early pressure by 2031: Possible, with the full weight after. The church must never create two classes of people (James 2:1-4). In a world that ranks people by upgrades, the church must be the one place where an unaugmented grandmother and an augmented executive are exactly equal, because the image of God can’t be upgraded. And believers who say no should say it like Daniel: gracious, excellent, and immovable (Daniel 1:8-12).
Three kinds of believers
A filter for any technology that touches the mind
- Does this honor my body as God’s temple?1 Corinthians 6:19-20
- Does it deepen my dependence on God, or on the device?Proverbs 3:5-6
- Who built it, and what does it believe?Colossians 2:8
- Is it forming me into the image of Christ, or into something else?Romans 8:29
- Did I choose this, and can I turn it off?“I will not be dominated by anything” (1 Corinthians 6:12)
A word to those who build it: the cognitive firewall
If I set the standard for technology that connects to human thought, it would include six commitments. I call them Imago Dei protocols.
- It speaks only when spoken to. No passive monitoring.
- No hidden nudging. No priming, mood shaping, or reinforcement nobody asked for.
- Every filter is visible and changeable by the person.
- The mind’s data belongs to the person. Never sold or used for training without clear consent.
- The off switch always works, completely and without penalty.
- Outside review before major upgrades, including people of faith.
The church can’t build these products. But believers inside these companies can insist on these standards.
Beyond the timeline
Seven more places it touches the church
In late 2025, an AI-generated gospel singer hit No. 1 on Billboard’s Gospel Digital Song Sales chart. Likely in your people’s playlists. But this needs nuance, not a blanket no. When a congregation sings “It Is Well with My Soul,” the witness isn’t Horatio Spafford. It’s the people singing true words to God from their own hearts. The source of a song isn’t what makes it worship. The heart of the singer is (John 4:24). See where the line falls below.
AI can write sermons and clone a pastor. Soon some ministries will offer an AI pastor that answers around the clock. Paul shared “not only the gospel of God but also our own selves” (1 Thessalonians 2:8).
People confess their deepest sins to AI because it never gasps or gossips, but those confessions sit on company servers. “Confess your sins to one another… that you may be healed” (James 5:16).
Most kids will soon have an AI tutor. When AI teaches them everything else, who teaches them God? Children's ministry must become parent-equipping ministry (Deuteronomy 6:7).
Seniors will be the first targets of voice-clone scams and among the most drawn to AI companions. Near certain. The church should be their first line of protection (James 1:27).
A place for hope. AI is helping translators move faster toward Scripture in every language (Revelation 7:9). Likely
AI gives a church of eighty many of the tools of a church of eight thousand. And the small church already has what big churches struggle to build: people who know each other.
AI in worship: where the line falls
Clearly fine
AI as an instrument, like tracks and loops- Arranging a song, or filling parts a small team doesn’t have
- Accompaniment for a church of forty with no musicians
- Translating songs into other languages
- Helping a songwriter find a rhyme or tighten a verse
Crosses the line
AI in place of worshipers- Deception: an AI persona presented as a real worshiper. A false witness.
- Substitution: an AI voice leading from the stage. A machine can’t go first; it has nowhere to go.
- Consumption: music so polished the people stop singing.
- Untested lyrics: every song passes the same test as a sermon.
The claims at a glance
Every prediction in one place
If you share only one part of this letter with your leadership team, share this.
2031
Two churches, two endings
AI 2027 ended with a branch point and two very different futures. The church stands at one too. The difference is that ours isn't in 2031. It's right now, in the choices pastors make over the next twelve to eighteen months.
“Darkness shall cover the earth, and thick darkness the peoples…”
“…but the Lord will arise upon you, and His glory will be seen upon you.”
Isaiah 60:2Now look at both roads from December 2031.
The church still exists, but it has quietly become a weekly gathering for people who remember how things used to be. Most young adults drifted away, not angry, just answered faster somewhere else. It got there by one of three roads. Some churches froze. Some hid, calling AI the devil's tool and losing the ability to speak into their children's world. And some conformed, embracing every tool without discernment until they were one more voice in the algorithm with nothing different to say.
We've seen the third road before
Willow Creek in the Chicago suburbs was built by asking people why they didn't go to church, then designing a church around their answers. It grew to around 20,000 a weekend, and thousands of churches copied it. Then, in 2007, its own Reveal study found that rising participation in programs didn't predict whether people were growing as disciples. The founding pastor told thousands of leaders, “We made a mistake.” They had built a crowd, not disciples.
The church that embraces AI without discernment will look like it's winning: better content, more reach, bigger numbers. Ten years later someone will run the study. This time we'll have far less time to fix it.
“If salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored?”
Matthew 5:13
“Lost its taste” is mōranthē, literally “made foolish.” In the age of artificial intelligence, the sleeping church becomes foolish salt. Not wicked. Just flavorless.
The world is smarter, faster, and more connected than ever. It's also lonelier and more confused about what's true. And the church is full.
Not because it out-produced the algorithm, but because it offered what the algorithm couldn't: bodies in a room, hands on shoulders, a table with food on it, and people who would tell the truth to your face and still love you. When jobs disappeared, the storehouse was ready. When truth collapsed, its people knew how to test what they heard. When the hard questions came, the church had answers.
The revival started among the exhausted geniuses, brilliant and connected and empty, the Nicodemuses of this generation coming by night with questions no machine could answer (John 3). And the awake church didn't retreat from technology. It sent digital missionaries into it.
“Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you.”
Isaiah 60:1
Honestly, reality will be a mix. You'll find both churches in the same city, sometimes in the same congregation. Which one yours becomes will be decided by what you do next.
A hard word
We left the back door open
Pastors, I love you, and I'm one of you. So hear this as a brother: we have not done a good job discipling people.
Great at the front door, wide open at the back
We've done a great job with the front door: evangelism, buildings, programs, altar calls. But we left the back door just as wide open. If half our people were stopped in the parking lot and asked to explain salvation, how to pray, or how to read the Bible, I'm not sure they could.
That was a problem before AI. Now it's a crisis. An undiscipled Christian used to drift slowly. Now their doubt gets met at 2 a.m. by a tireless voice that tells them exactly what they want to hear. A lot of people will be deceived in the next five years, and many of them will be people we baptized.
“My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.”
Hosea 4:6
The Hebrew word is da'at, the same root Genesis uses when Adam knew his wife. It isn't information. It's intimate, relational knowing. Our people won't lack information in the age of AI. They'll lack da'at. And read the rest of the verse: “because you have rejected knowledge, I reject you from being a priest to me.” God held the leaders responsible.
In the Great Commission, there's only one command in the Greek: mathēteusate, make disciples (Matthew 28:19). Not converts. Not crowds. And Hebrews says the mature have discernment “trained by constant practice” (Hebrews 5:14). The word is gegymnasmena, where we get gymnasium. Discernment is a muscle. If our people never did the reps, they won't have it when it counts.
What shall we do?
Your marching orders
When Peter's hearers were “cut to the heart” they asked, “What shall we do?” (Acts 2:37). When the crowds asked John the Baptist the same thing, he gave tax collectors, soldiers, and crowds each a concrete answer for Monday (Luke 3:10-14). So here's mine: what to do, how, and by when.
Prepare now, while the years still look fine
- 30-day immersion
- Deepfake protocol
- Write your AI covenant
- Map every member
- Launch groups
- Preach and teach
- Reserves and the fifth
- Vocation ministry
- Food and housing
- A church of Bereans
- Digital missionaries
- Ready for seekers
| Do this now | Start the 30-day immersion | Nov 1, 2026 |
| Do this now | Put the deepfake protocol in place and announce it | Nov 30, 2026 |
| Do this now | Write your AI covenant and share it with leaders | Dec 31, 2026 |
| Prepare for this | Map every member's discipleship stage | Jan 31, 2027 |
| Prepare for this | Train your first discipleship group leaders | Jan to Mar 2027 |
| Start doing this | Preach the first of six messages | Jan 2027 |
| Start doing this | Launch discipleship groups churchwide | Mar 2027 |
| Start doing this | Run the Testing the Spirits class | Spring 2027 |
| Start building | Open the storehouse fund and set aside a fifth of every surplus | Q1 2027 |
| Start building | Launch a vocation and transition ministry | Summer 2027 |
| Start building | Sign food, housing, and benefits partnerships | End of 2027 |
| Checkpoint | Every member in a group, six messages preached, three months of reserves | End of 2027 |
| Checkpoint | Six months of reserves, storehouse active, job network with three churches | End of 2028 |
Order 1: The 30-day immersion
“Use AI” isn't a plan. Here's the plan: fifteen tasks over four weeks. Pick one major assistant, like ChatGPT, Claude, or Gemini, and pay for the standard version for one month. Keep a two-sentence journal after each task: what surprised me, and what this tells me about my people. Never paste private details about a real member, and never use AI during your time of prayer and study.
Order 2: Six messages to preach in 2027
One sermon won't do it. I won't tell you how to preach these. I'm telling you what ground each one needs to cover.
One message every month or two, starting in January
Core texts and what people should walk away able to do
Understanding the Times. 1 Chronicles 12:32; Luke 12:54-56; 2 Timothy 1:7. Explain AI plainly and face it without fear.
Whose Voice Do You Follow? John 10:1-5; 1 Kings 19:11-13; Psalm 115:4-8. Start each day with God's voice first.
Test Everything. 1 John 4:1; 1 Thessalonians 5:21; Acts 17:11. Use the five tests. Announce the class the same Sunday.
Made in His Image. Genesis 1:26-27; 2:7, 18; Psalm 8; 1 Corinthians 6:19-20. Answer questions about AI relationships, grief tech, and the body.
More Than Your Job. Genesis 2:15; Colossians 3:3, 23; Matthew 6:25-34. Launch the vocation ministry and storehouse the same day.
How Our Church Will Handle AI. Acts 6:1-7; Romans 12:1-2; 1 Corinthians 10:23. Present your covenant, then open the floor for questions.
Order 3: Write your AI covenant
An AI covenant is a short, public promise about how you will and won't use this technology. Here's mine. You don't have to use it. I'm showing you so you're not starting from a blank page.
“All things are lawful, but not all things build up.”
1 Corinthians 10:23
In the pulpit
- The words I tell you God has given me will come from prayer and study, not a machine. AI may help me research. It will never write my sermons.
- If we use AI to create anything you see or hear in a service, we'll tell you.
In worship
- We'll use AI as a tool in making music, never as a substitute for worshipers. We won't put an AI-generated voice or persona in front of you as a worship leader, we'll test every lyric like we test every sermon, and we'll be honest about where our songs come from. The people leading you in worship will be people who are worshiping God themselves.
In care
- When you need care, you will reach a person, never a chatbot.
- We will never put your confessions, prayer requests, or counseling details into an AI tool.
With our staff
- Time AI saves goes back into people. We won't replace a staff member with AI without first doing everything to move them into new work.
With the truth
- I will never ask you for money by text, call, or video. If you see “me” asking, it isn't me.
- We'll never share an unverified testimony or post anything synthetic as real.
- When we get something wrong, we'll correct it publicly.
With our families and stewardship
- We'll teach, not just warn.
- We'll use AI where it helps us serve, and say no wherever it would replace presence.
- We'll review this covenant with you every year.
Order 4: Discipleship in the age of AI
The goal: every member can pass the five basics, and every member walks with someone more mature. The five basics: explain the gospel in two minutes, pray daily and aloud, read the Bible on their own, explain baptism and the Lord's Supper, and test a claim.
Step 1: Map every member into a stage, and leave no one unassigned
Step 2: Build the structure. Groups of three or four, same gender, led by someone at the Multiplying stage (2 Timothy 2:2). One coach for every five group leaders, Jethro's pattern (Exodus 18:21). Every staff member leads a group. Audit your programs: keep what makes disciples, shrink what only makes attendance.
Step 3: The weekly rhythm, 60 to 90 minutes, phones away
- Read. The same five to seven chapters, text first, before any commentary or AI.
- Reflect. What did God say? What does it ask of me?
- Test. Each person brings one thing they saw online and the group runs the five tests.
- Confess and pray. The part no machine can ever do (James 5:16).
- Obey. One step of obedience, reported next week.
Step 4: The 12-month path. Months 1 to 3, foundations. Months 4 to 6, doctrine for this age. Months 7 to 9, disciplines and discernment. Months 10 to 12, multiplication. Step 5: one rule for AI in every group: the text first, people second, tools third. Step 6: every quarter, measure the share assigned, in a group, and passing the basics. What gets measured gets pastored.
Order 5: Testing the spirits in the age of AI
Testing now has two layers: is it real, and is it true? Teach every member these five tests.
Order 6: The deepfake protocol
Before anything happens
- Announce publicly that staff will never ask for money, gift cards, or personal information by text, call, video, or message.
- Give staff and leaders a private verification phrase for urgent requests. Change it quarterly.
- Verify any money request by calling back on a known number. Two people approve larger payments.
- List your official accounts and numbers on your website.
- Name a response team: senior pastor, an elder, your communications lead, and an attorney.
- Teach seniors in person, and encourage families to set their own code word.
When a fake shows up
- Preserve the evidence: screenshots, links, times.
- Verify directly with the person depicted.
- Report to the platform, and to law enforcement for extortion or threats.
- Tell your people plainly within 24 hours.
- Care for the person targeted.
- Review and update the protocol.
When the target is a student
Never forward, download, or save the image, even to report it. Tell the student it's not their fault, don't pay, don't respond. Involve parents, report to law enforcement, and use the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children's Take It Down service. Train every youth leader before it's needed.
Order 7: The ministries to build
A weekly place for practical help, new skills, and prayer.
- Recruit a leader who hires for a living.
- Start a weekly job club: résumés, interviews, AI skills, prayer.
- Build a list of members' businesses that will interview members first.
So people use the tools instead of being used by them.
- Recruit two or three patient teachers who work in tech.
- Create tracks for parents, seniors, and workers.
- Run each quarterly and open it to the neighborhood.
So the first voice in a crisis is a person.
- Train ten to twelve mature volunteers.
- One number, a simple schedule, a pastor on call.
- A referral list: Christian counselors, the 988 line, local services.
From Sunday drop-off to discipleship at home.
- A quarterly parent night on AI and online safety.
- A take-home conversation guide after every kids' lesson.
- A template for a family technology covenant.
Believers sent into tech, media, and education.
- Identify everyone in those fields.
- Commission them publicly with prayer.
- Gather monthly to create sound content for real questions.
Order 8: Become a storehouse
I can't promise the hard season comes the way I've described. But a church with reserves and partners loses nothing if I'm wrong, and a church without them loses its witness if I'm right. “There was not a needy person among them” (Acts 4:34).
Reserve targets: months of operating expenses on hand
- Build next year's budget at 75 percent of current giving and decide what you'd cut first.
- Pause new building debt. Pay down what you have.
- Tell your church what you're doing and why.
An annual stewardship class on emergency funds, debt, and living below your means (Proverbs 21:20).
- Partner with your local food bank now. Keep a small pantry and grocery cards.
- Build a housing network, including families willing to host short-term.
- Train volunteers to help people apply for unemployment, health coverage, and assistance.
A one-page policy: who approves, how much, how fast. Pair every gift with a person who walks with that family. Then partner with at least two other churches (Galatians 6:10).