Artificial Intelligence, Real Worship?
Lord,
You are worthy of all praise and honor.
Guide our hearts and minds as we plan this time of worship.
Help us choose songs, scriptures, and words that glorify You,
and lead Your people to encounter Your presence.
Give us wisdom, unity, and joy in the process,
so that all we prepare will draw others closer to You.
In Jesus’ name, Amen.
That prayer was written by ChatGPT. I asked about its process and was told it drew on “the content of [my] request,” general themes from the Bible, common prayer patterns, and its familiarity with my background from previous uses of the model. It was theologically sound. It was efficient. I imagine few readers need to be persuaded of the positive possibilities of AI-assisted writing. But are there perils in asking ChatGPT, or any large language model, to write our prayers and sermons, or to plan a worship gathering?
I won’t attempt an exhaustive answer, but I suggest we consider two broad questions as we think about integrating AI into our writing and planning.
First, what will be missing from an AI-generated sermon or order of service?
A couple of things come to mind:
AI is not truly your voice. Outsourced writing and design may be elegant, effective, and even sound like you, but they can never fully reflect your unique perspective, insights, and convictions. A sermon is not merely an exposition of Scripture, but an encounter with God and the community of God through the preached word, an act that is both divine and human. What happens when that human element is diminished?
AI has flaws, but not human ones. Our offerings to God are bound up with our human limitations, some of which require grace and all of which remind us that we are not divine. If you have a child, what would mean more: a flawless AI-generated cartoon or a hand-drawn crayon character? From the perspective of our heavenly Father and of fellow worshipers, which of our gifts is more meaningful?
Second, what will be missing not from the product we outsource to AI but from the process we skip?
This question gets at my deeper concern with the rapid adoption of AI in ministry and beyond.
Shortcuts to productivity can short-circuit personal growth. Wrestling with a text or choosing a song is not just about the end result; it is also about the skills, habits, and insights we gain along the way. Sermon preparation and worship planning are less like finding the fastest route from point A to point B and more like training at the gym. A shortcut around traffic is useful, but there are no shortcuts on the treadmill.
Efficiency can erode relationships. Even when we engage meaningfully with an AI model, that interaction often replaces conversations with team members. What feels like productivity may, over time, lead to relational atrophy.
Nathan Mitchell puts it well: “Liturgy’s goal isn’t meaning but meeting.” I am not arguing that we avoid AI altogether, but I hope we will ask what we are trading for efficiency, and in particular, what opportunities to truly meet one another and God we may be missing in the rush to generate meaningful products and practices.
I would amend ChatGPT’s prayer:
Give us wisdom, unity, and joy in the process,
so that all we prepare, and how we prepare, will draw others, and all of us, closer to You.
