Bypassing the Struggle

Then Saul said to his servants, “Seek out for me a woman who is a medium, that I may go to her and inquire of her.” And his servants said to him, “Behold, there is a medium at En-dor…Then Samuel said to Saul, “Why have you disturbed me by bringing me up?” Saul answered, “I am in great distress, for the Philistines are warring against me, and God has turned away from me and answers me no more, either by prophets or by dreams. Therefore I have summoned you to tell me what I shall do.” And Samuel said, “Why then do you ask me, since the Lord has turned from you and become your enemy?”

1 Samuel 28:7, 15-16 (English Standard Version)

There are proper and improper ways to seek wisdom from the Lord. In this passage, Saul seeks counsel from a long-dead Samuel after spending many years rejecting God. Saul first attempts to seek the Lord through appropriate channels, but receives no answer due to his repeated disobedience and lack of repentance. Undeterred by this obvious sin issue, Saul instructs his servants to find him a medium so he might inquire of a long-dead Samuel, perhaps believing that in some way he can force God to give him a favorable insight into his war with the Philistines. Shockingly for all involved, Samuel actually does appear and gives Saul some insight, albeit an unfavorable prophecy for him.

Today we are tempted to be like Saul. We are tempted to bypass the difficult road of repentance and diligence with an interpretive shortcut and seek the Lord through an improper route. Increasingly, I see believers seeking theological wisdom from AI tools. I see this online all the time, but even in person on occasion. Sourcing your support for a theological argument from an AI is foolish, shortsighted, and places you in the same boat as Saul here. This is definitively wrong, and we don’t have to look too deeply into this passage to find out why. It bypasses the work that God wants to do in our lives, for a quick win in an argument or a desire to avoid the work of sanctification that Paul discusses in Philippians 2. From this passage, we can learn that God wants us to seek Him with a proper heart attitude, in a proper way, for a proper purpose. It is only when we follow His way, that we will find Him.

First, God wants us to seek him with a proper heart attitude. Psalm 51 tells us how we ought to approach the Lord: “The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.” (Ps. 51:17). In this passage, Saul does not approach the Lord with a proper heart attitude. At best, his approach to God comes from a heart of fear that he will be conquered by his enemies, but based on the rest of Saul’s life we can reasonably argue that he seeks the Lord here out of an arrogance that he can control the Lord. This was the sin that cost him his royal dynasty in 1 Samuel 13. Saul believed that he had the ability to make God support him in his reign. He believed, incorrectly, that God existed to serve him and his rule over Israel. Note that Saul has not repented of the sin he has routinely committed over the many years of his reign. He does not repent for the improper sacrifice, failing to follow the Lord’s commands, or chasing David, the Lord’s anointed all over the nation trying to kill him. Instead of doing this painful work to be right with God, he tries to bypass it. Here we see Saul, desirous of the benefits of a proper relationship with the Lord, but not the work required to build it.

In our era, we do the same thing. Instead of consorting with mediums, we might seek out a pastor who tells us what we want to hear ignoring those who preach a convicting message. We might also just ask an AI tool to interpret scripture for us. After all, I don’t have to repent of my sin to receive interpretation from an AI tool. Even worse, I can “steer” the AI in a direction I want it to go so that it interprets passages favorably to me. I can get my well sourced, well defended interpretation without changing myself. This is even worse for a believer today because, unlike Saul, we have the Spirit within us. He wants to change us, through a right relationship with Him, but in our laziness and foolishness, we bypass the work of sanctification just to tick a box.

Paul instructs the Philippian believers to “work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you” (Phil. 2:12-13). Their development into more Christ-like, mature believers, came through effort. Saul’s heart attitude here was to avoid the work of spiritual growth through repentance. We often find ourselves in a similar place, looking to “just get it done” and avoid the wrestling that actually helps us grow. Our limitations as humans are not a side effect of our fall, they are a feature of our design that forces us to rely on Him. When we seek to bypass our designed limitations, we defy the God who created us and claim to know better than Him.

The astute reader will notice that Samuel does indeed appear and speak to Saul on behalf of the Lord, so does this mean that God doesn’t care how we approach Him? Quite the contrary. I would place this appearance of Samuel in the same category as the divine presence of the Lord in Leviticus 10 with Nadab and Abihu. It is a truly terrifying thing when someone receives the presence of the Lord, or a word from Him, when they have sought him incorrectly. Nadab and Abihu were consumed by divine fire. Saul receives a message of divine judgment. God often does not speak to those who approach him improperly. Saul’s heart has not changed from earlier in the chapter where he sought through proper channels. In those cases, Saul received nothing. It is only on this final, objectively sinful attempt that God gives a word of judgment to him.

Second, God wants us to seek him through proper methods. Leviticus 19:31 makes the prohibition of mediums very clear. “Do not turn to mediums or necromancers; do not seek them out, and so make yourselves unclean by them: I am the Lord your God.” (Lev. 19:31). Saul very clearly violates this direct command of the Lord. Equally, Nadab and Abihu do a similar thing offering strange fire, and are consumed.

So how does God want us to seek Him? Today, as in the Old Testament, He wants us to seek Him through His Word (2 Tim. 3:16-17), through prayer for ourselves and for others (Eph. 1:16-17) and through mutual sacrifice and service in the church (Heb. 10:24-25). He does not want us to seek Him in isolation, through an automated tool designed to please us and tell us what we want to hear.

AI is a mirror of sorts. It reflects back at us what we want to hear in order to keep us engaged. These models are trained on massive collections of human generated text, and then are further trained to respond in ways that humans deem useful through a process called Reinforcement Learning from Human Feedback (RLHF). As a result, you can “gaslight” an AI to say whatever you want shockingly quickly. They are designed to please the user, not provide objective truth or challenge our preconceptions.

In contrast, James describes Scripture as a mirror that shows us where we’re wrong and informs us in our sanctification process. James strongly condemns the one who looks into the mirror of Scripture, and walks away unchanged. The mirror of AI does none of this. When we seek interpretive guidance from an AI, rather than from the indwelling Holy Spirit, we are no longer approaching Him in a proper method and are inviting the judgement of the Lord in our lives. Where an AI is designed to please us, God has designed His Word for “piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart” (Heb. 4:12).

Finally, we must seek the Lord for a proper purpose. In this passage, Saul seeks the Lord to ensure his own victory over the Philistines. He comes to the medium because he has been rejected by all other means and he desires a favorable word from the Lord despite his lack of repentance or obedience. His purpose is for himself. He fears for his own victory and success, and as a result he approaches the Almighty. Today, we are guilty of the same sin, whether we seek the Lord through an AI or through another means.

When we use an AI for interpretation, not only do we bypass the way that God intends for us to approach Him, we also do so for a myriad of selfish reasons that range from simple laziness all the way to manipulation of the text to say what we want it to say. We are no longer seeking Him for a proper purpose, but rather for a selfish purpose like Saul does here.

With all of this in mind, can we use AI in our spiritual formation, and if so, how is it best utilized? AI is a tool, like a book, sermon recording, or video lecture. It can surface valuable information to us, but as I’ve noted here, this can quickly shift from simple information gathering into interpretation. The interpretation of Scripture in the life of a believer is the role of the Spirit, not an AI tool. I believe we can use an AI tool for background research, cross-reference identification, or even commentary surveys, however our final interpretation should always be drawn through communion with the Spirit, and not from what the AI brings us.

This is not a unique issue to AI, although it is perhaps more prevalent. We are often quick to accept the interpretation of an author we like, without spending the time in prayer over the text to identify what God wants for us. This is not to discount the value of teaching, as Paul is very clear that we are to adhere to the things we have learned. As noted previously, spiritual formation can and does happen through our mutual sacrifice and service within the church of which teaching is a part. However, we must constantly be in proper communion with the Spirit through His Word, prayer, and fellowship with other believers and not entirely defer our interpretive responsibility to a tool like a book or an AI.

When we accept the interpretation of an AI for our own lives, or even worse for what we are teaching, we place ourselves in a risky position. Exodus 21:29 gives us a pattern we can follow here. If an ox has killed or wounded a person in the past, and the owner does not take proper precautions with that ox and it kills again, the owner is held fully responsible and is to be executed. We know that AI tools can and do give poor theology to their users. If we allow this tool to do this to us or to those in our care, we are no different from the farmer in Exodus 21. We cannot hide behind the “complexity of the math” to shirk the responsibility of our actions. God will hold us responsible for what we have done.

This problem will only get worse as tools improve. The temptation is strong to save some time and effort, and to just get it done. As believers, we must be vigilant in our own spiritual lives to ensure that we are approaching God with a proper heart attitude, in a proper way, and for a proper purpose if we desire to hear from Him.

If you found this essay valuable, you might also find the most recent reflection in this series. Additionally, I have written a basic primer on AI that might be helpful as well. God bless!