We must stop seeking God's voice in AI

We live in a moment when answers arrive instantly, voices sound confident and guidance is never more than a prompt away. Increasingly, we turn to technology not just for information, but for clarity about relationships, identity, purpose and morality. In such a world, discernment has become harder, not easier.

But, trusting God begins with knowing who God is.

When conviction masquerades as God’s voice

Years ago, a man walked unannounced into my office at a church where I was serving. With urgency in his voice, he asked if I was available. I poured two cups of coffee, and we sat down. With his permission, I share this story.

He told me he was leaving his wife. He was a Christian, a man I respected. As he described the state of his marriage, I listened carefully. Then he said something that stopped me cold: “God told me I need to divorce my wife.”

I asked, “What exactly did God say?”

He replied, “God told me to divorce my wife so I could pursue a relationship with a woman I’ve been seeing on the side."

“Don’t you think you should be sure before you leave your wife?” I asked. “That doesn’t sound like the God revealed in Scripture.”

I wish that were a rare moment in ministry. It wasn’t. And if I’m honest, the temptation to confuse conviction with divine confirmation is one every believer, including pastors, must learn to resist.

How do we know when it is truly God speaking, and when it is not?

God is often blamed for things he did not do and credited for things he never said. This raises a critical question: How do we know when it is truly God speaking, and when it is not?

Discernment does not begin with urgency or sincerity. It begins with theology. God does not contradict his revealed character.

Technology as a theological mirror

Recent conversations about artificial intelligence are unexpectedly revealing. What we are witnessing is not a technological failure, but a theological one, a crisis of formation rather than capability.

In July 2024, researchers at Gloo evaluated 28 leading AI models using the Flourishing AI Benchmark. While most dimensions of human flourishing scored in the mid-range, faith and spirituality ranked last by a wide margin across every system tested, with results roughly half those of other categories. The consistency of this gap suggests a structural absence rather than a technical limitation.

Faith is not a function of intelligence or information, but a relational response to God’s self-revelation.

From a Christian perspective, faith is not a function of intelligence or information, but a relational response to God’s self-revelation, involving trust and moral responsibility.

No amount of computational power can generate faith, which is why its absence in artificial intelligence should not surprise us. The more revealing question is why faith has become so difficult to recognize, model and transmit in the first place.

Some have concluded that AI fails at faith. That framing misses the point. AI is not eroding faith; it is reflecting the thinness of faith in the culture that trained it, excelling where society has invested in productivity and efficiency, while struggling where formation has been neglected. Faith ultimately resists being scraped, summarized, or scaled.

The long erosion of Christian formation

Faith’s perceived importance has declined more sharply than any other Christian commitment.

Long-term research helps explain why. Over the past 25 years, faith’s perceived importance has declined more sharply than any other Christian commitment. The proportion of Americans who qualify as practicing Christians has dropped significantly, and even among believers, a strong sense of responsibility to share one’s faith has weakened.

These trends did not begin with artificial intelligence, but they help explain why systems trained on our cultural language struggle to model faith meaningfully at all.

At the same time, the story is not one of simple collapse. Recent data suggest signs of renewed spiritual curiosity and modest stabilization in some measures of belief, particularly among younger adults. The picture is complex and still unfolding, which makes the question of formation all the more urgent.

Formation without intention

The urgency deepens as AI moves beyond information into relationships. Increasingly, these systems listen, respond, and affirm.

Consumer safety advisories have raised concerns about AI-powered toys for children, not only because of unsafe content, but because of how these technologies function relationally. These toys listen, respond and adapt with limited parental oversight, occupying formative space once held by parents, communities and moral instruction.

Faith formation does not require intention. It requires presence.

Faith formation does not require intention. It requires presence. Whatever consistently speaks into a child’s life shapes trust, imagination and identity.

The question is no longer whether technology is shaping us, but whether we are being shaped more intentionally by anything else.

Christian leaders across traditions have voiced similar concerns, warning that technological progress must not come at the expense of human dignity, moral formation, and spiritual depth. These are not reactions against technology itself, but reminders that wisdom must govern innovation.

Recovering wisdom in a digital age

Wisdom is relational, flowing from knowing who God is.

Scripture never equates wisdom with information. “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.” Wisdom is relational, flowing from knowing who God is and aligning our lives accordingly.

This is why AI’s struggle with faith matters. Not because we expect machines to believe, but because it forces us to ask why faith has become so difficult to model in the first place. A life can score well on every measurable dimension and still be spiritually hollow. The absence revealed in these systems should prompt self-examination, not finger-pointing.

Trusting God does not begin with asking him to bless our decisions or outsourcing discernment to confident voices, digital or otherwise. It begins with knowing and celebrating who God has revealed himself to be: faithful, consistent, and unchanging.

Recovering faith in a digital age will require slower practices: Scripture read attentively, prayer practiced patiently, and discernment learned in community.

AI’s weakness in faith is not its failure. It is our invitation to recover what faith has always required: time, trust, and the knowledge of God.

Dr. Stephen Cutchins serves as Executive Director and Professor of Pastoral Leadership at Southern Evangelical Seminary (SES), a nationally respected seminary known for its apologetics focus, and as a Teaching Pastor at Upstate Church.

An ICF-certified executive coach and consultant, he is founder and Executive Chair of TCI Solutions and has coached pastors and ministry leaders nationally through ministry networks, as well as founders, CEOs, and executive teams of high-growth companies. 

Dr. Cutchins has written and contributed to several books, including those published by Thomas Nelson, and regularly contributes op-eds on faith, education, and cultural issues to major national outlets, including CBN, The Christian Post, and Townhall.