A Letter About AI

by Jaco Bester

Dear Friends,

Every now and then an article comes along that names something we’ve been feeling but haven’t quite found words for. Ben Sasse’s recent Wall Street Journal article, “Habits for Humanity in the Age of AI,” (sent to me by a dear member of this congregation) did that for me. The piece, adapted from a speech he gave in accepting the Manahttan Institute’s Alexander Hamilton Award, is about what kind of people we are becoming – and, more specifically, what kind of people we are raising our children to be – in a world where artificial intelligence is advancing faster than our wisdom, our habits, and sometimes even our discipleship.

Sasse’s central argument is not that AI is evil, nor that we should all run off into the woods, throw our phones into the Peace River, and begin communicating only by Smoke Signals. His point – as I interpret it – is more careful, and much more important: technology is changing the world around us, but keep in mind that habits shape the world within us.

Sasse says, “The challenge is how to live with virtue and technology.” And his answer is wonderfully ordinary: reading, hard work, tech sabbaths, and serious travel – not as hobbies for the privileged, but as formative practices for families, communities, and citizens.

That answer strikes me as deeply Christian. Long before anyone worried about artificial intelligence, Scripture was concerned with spiritual formation. “Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it” (Proverbs 22:6). And Deuteronomy 6 gives parents and grandparents a vision of faith that is not outsourced, nor downloaded, but lived: talk of the Lord’s commands “when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.”

The question for parents and grandparents is not, “Will our children know how to use the tools of the future?” They already do. Pew Research reported earlier this year that 64% of U.S. teens use AI chatbots; 57% use them to search of information, 54% use them for schoolwork, and 12% say they’ve used them for emotional support or advice. The deeper question, therefore, is: Will they know who they are when the tools become powerful enough to answer almost everything… except the questions that matter most?

That’s where Christian homes and communities have work to do. We cannot raise children merely to be efficient. We are called to help form children who are faithful, wise, courageous, compassionate, attentive, and capable of delight.

AI may help a child summarize a book, but it cannot teach them to love a story. It may solve an equation, but it cannot teach integrity. It may imitate conversation, but it cannot replace the sacred awkwardness of sitting across the table from another human being and learning how to listen.

So, perhaps one of the most loving things we can do is also one of the simplest: talk. Talk with our children and grandchildren about the tools they are using. Ask what they are curious about. Ask what they are afraid of. Ask where they are tempted to take shortcuts. Ask what kind of person they want to become. And then – this is the difficult part – model the answer for them.

If we want our children to read, they need to see us read. If we want them to pray, they need to see us pray. If we want them to serve, they need to see us roll up our sleeves. If we want them to treat technology as a tool rather than a master, they need to see us put the phone away at the table, in worship, during conversation, and perhaps for a Sabbath stretch each week.

So, let’s take a quick look at the first three of the four habits that Sasse suggests might offer an answer to the challenge of living with virtue and technology. I’ll leave the travel bit for the bloggers out there.

Sasse is right to call us back to reading. The National Endowment of the Arts reported that, in 2022, fewer than half of all adults read a book in the previous twelve months, and only 38%, of those who did read a book, read fiction. That matters because reading trains patience. It stretches imagination. More importantly, for Christians, it also prepares us to be people of the Book – people who can sit with Scripture slowly, reverently, and expectantly, rather than treating every word as one more bit of content to be skimmed.

Sasse is also right to command hard work. Not busyness. Not frantic striving. But honest, meaningful work. The kind of work that teaches responsibility. The kind that gets dirt under fingernails, dishes into cupboards, laundry into drawers, weeds out of flowerbeds, and love into muscle memory. In a world of instant answers, children still need slow skills. They need chores. They need practice. They need the holy frustration of trying again.

And perhaps most of all, Sass is also right to remind us that we need Sabbath rest. Not simply a day off, but a declaration of faith: that we are not machines, and we are not saved by productivity; rather, we belong the the Creator who sanctified rest and are saved by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. The world keeps spinning when we stop. That’s humbling, and it’s also very good news.

Friends, AI will almost certainly change how we work, learn, communicate, and create. Some of those changes may be wonderful. Some may be troubling. Most will probably be both. But the calling of the Church remains beautifully stubborn: to love God, to love neighbors, and to teach our children the faith… to worship with joy, practice hospitality, tell the truth, keep the Sabbath, break bread, read Scripture, and to become, by grace, more fully human in Christ.

So, let’s not panic, and let’s not drift, let’s be awake, wise, and hopeful. The future does not belong to the machines. It belongs to the Lord.

With love,
Jaco