Ep 1349 | 'Testify to Love' is Love?, My AI Rules & Rededicate 250

We lost another Christian music artist y'all. A former member of Avalon now says that their 1997 hit, Testify to Love, is about LGBTQ affirmation. Also, is AI taking away the image of God in us? I've got five things to think about as you as a Christian navigate how to use AI well. And this weekend was the rededicate to 50 event in Washington, DC. And people got to hear the gospel all around the world. And that is good news. We've got all of this and more on today's episode of Relatable. Hey y'all, welcome to Relatable. Happy Monday. God's Eternal Plan of Redemption is going off without a hitch. I just checked. I checked my Bible this morning and it said, yes, God is completely sovereign. Job 42 to nothing can thwart his will. So that's really good news. Whatever headline you see, whatever you see on social media, whatever is going on in your own life, whatever failures or inadequacies you are struggling with, that is the truth. Not some name it and claim it self help gospel that tells you that you can find everything that you're looking for inside yourself. And if you just try hard enough and if you love yourself enough, everything will come together. That's not where we get our hope and our peace. The self can't be both the problem and the solution y'all. God is the answer. We have to go outside of ourselves and the hope and the peace comes from the fact that his eternal plan of redemption is going off without a hitch that one day Jesus is coming back and he's gonna take care of all of this and we will live in perfect peace and joy forever and ever because Jesus reigns. So that's the good news. That's the good news that we start out with every single week that we should be preaching to ourselves every day because that is the truth and God's sovereignty and his goodness and his faithfulness to you and to his people despite our faithlessness, despite our inability to ever get it right. That is the good news that we find our joy in. All right, we got so much to talk about today. Just wanna remind you if you are a Christian woman, if you are a woman at all, come to share the arrows. That is our Christian women's conference. This is happening October 11th. This is the no fluff gospel centered worship filled friendship cultivating women's conference happening October 10th. Dallas, Texas share the arrows.com. We've got Rosaria Butterfield back again. Elisa Childers, Costi, Hin, Natasha Crane, Grace Anna Castleberry, Audrey Broggy, her mother. They'll be doing a duo talk about motherhood. Shane and Shane Leading Worship, y'all. I am so excited. Share the arrows this year is brought to you by our friends at Adele Natural Cosmetics. Go to sharethearrows.com, get your ticket today. If you love relatable, please leave us a five star review on Apple Podcasts, on Spotify, wherever you listen. Make sure you are subscribed on YouTube because not everyone who watches subscribes and it helps us know who's out there and it helps us serve you better. So go ahead and subscribe if you haven't done that already. All right, let's get into what we need to talk about today and to start off this segment, I am going to play you this absolute banger from 1997. And if you were raised evangelical like me, this will be very familiar to you. This is Sought 12. For as long as I shall live, I will testify to love. I'll be with this in the silence, when words are not enough. With every breath I take, I will give thanks to God. For as long as I shall live, I will testify to love. So good, flashback to 1997, like on my way to kindergarten probably, with my mom in the suburban, singing this song, belting it out. We even had the CD. We loved this album and we loved this song, but here's some bad news. Now we are being told retroactively that testify to love by the CCM band Avalon is actually an anthem of queer love. Yes, I am not joking, that this is now an LGBTQ affirming anthem. Melissa Green is a former member of the band Avalon. It released the super popular song, testify to love back in 1997. And now they have re-released it and are saying this is actually about and has always been about LGBTQ affirmation. There she is with another member of the band who now is, identifies as LGBTQ and I guess is also an LGBTQ activist. In a sub-stack post, she wrote this, she said testify to love drops today, originally recorded by Avalon, re-recorded by Michael Passens, Ty Herndon and me on Wednesday. We shot the music video at the end of it. The three of us looked at each other, proud and ultimately saying love is for everyone. She posted on Facebook, Carousel and one of the pictures was of two men, I suppose one man from the band and the person that he now calls his husband, getting married, kissing at an altar. She went on to talk about in her sub-stack, her collaborator on the track, Passens, another former Avalon member who was removed from the group after he identified as gay many years ago. The official narrative was that he left the group to pursue a solo career in 2003. However, in 2020, Passens appeared on an episode of a podcast and said that his bandmates visited his home and told him he was no longer allowed to be in the group because he was homosexual. Green wrote that, this is Melissa Green, this former member of the band, wrote that she had been taught that, quote, some love was acceptable and some wasn't because she believed that she was on the wrong side of what happened to him. I just got a pause there for a second. So she is saying this belief that she no longer holds to that some love is acceptable and some love is not is wrong. Please, just for a second, we've got to take that to a logical conclusion. Of course, some love is acceptable and some love is not. Like let's just put the LGBTQ to the side for a second. Like we all agree that some love, that some feelings of affection, that some feelings of desire are not acceptable, right? Like if you are talking about a grownup loving a child in a way that is inappropriate, that kind of love is unacceptable. I'm not even making the comparison of pedophilia to LGBTQ right now, that's not the point. I'm just saying that in principle, like you understand the logic that some love isn't acceptable actually does hold water, right? And that's why the whole love is love doesn't make sense because it's circular, it doesn't actually have any answer. Love is love, doesn't tell us anything. We actually have to define what love is to decide if this is actually true. And again, there is some love, there is some lust, there is some desire that is out of bounds. And so you can make a different argument for why you believe that LGBTQ is okay biblically, but the idea that all love and all feelings of wanting something or someone are okay, that's not a good one. None of us agree on that. She also wrote, Michael never needed to be redeemed. Uh-oh, he was always whole and worthy. What he was denied was his rightful place in the group, in the song, in a community that claimed to sing about a love big enough to hold him. Though Green was raised in a conservative home or raised with conservative theological beliefs, she's shifted towards progressivism obviously over the years. She served for several years as an associate pastor at Grace Point, a pro-LGBTQ church in the Nashville area. She has also officiated same-sex weddings or she did officiate the same-sex wedding of Ty Herndon, the other man on the new release of Testified to Love to another man on August 26th, 2023. Green said she is currently working on a memoir describing the process of how her beliefs changed in more detail. And look, we've talked about this kind of topic a lot, this phenomenon of believing that we are actually nicer than God, that we're wiser than God, that we're more compassionate than him, that Romans one is too mean, that Genesis 127 is too cruel, that 1 Corinthians 6 is just too harsh, that passages that positively affirm the holiness of marriage between one man and one woman and the exclusive holiness of sexual activity within that marriage between one man and one woman, it's just too much to bear. And actually, we as these fallible people, we have a better answer. We have a better and bigger and wiser and more loving perspective on how humans should behave and what sin is and what it's not. The truth is, is that we are not nicer than God, we don't know better than him, we're not more compassionate than him. And if something to us seems wrong or seems cruel or seems confusing when we go to the word of God, the problem is not with God, it's not with his word, it's with us. Like we know that God is God and we are not. And so our first instinct should be, okay, maybe I don't understand something, maybe it's my understanding that actually needs to be expanded and actually needs to be deepened, maybe it's not God that needs my reproof, maybe it's me who needs reproof. And so God, give me the wisdom to understand even though this is really hard for me. Like people think that being sure of the word of God is the more arrogant and prideful approach, people will say, oh, you just think that you know everything and it's actually the humble approach to be affirming of things like LGBTQ, it's actually the opposite. It's to say like, look, I don't know all of the answers but I know that I am not good enough or big enough or wise enough or loving enough to create my own moral code, to decide what's right and wrong. I can't be the arbiter of that. I only trust an infallible infinite being to do that. The God who created us loved us so much that he sent us something to die for us. And so let me go to him to see what's right. And if I still just don't get it, that's because I'm a human being and God is not. So what is the biblical response to something like this? We'll get into that in just a second. Let me pause and tell you about our first sponsor for the day, it's Fellowship Home Loans. Do you remember the day that you closed on your house? 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You could be saving money. Go to fellowshiphomeloans.com slash alley, get $500 back at closing. Fellowship Home Loans, mortgage lending by The Book, nationwide mortgage bankers, DBA Fellowship Home Loans, equal housing lender, NMLS number 819382. The Book of the Year Green's article deeply misunderstands the biblical teaching on sin and the gospel. Neither of what she actually mentions there. Scripture is clear that we all need redemption. He needed redemption. She needs redemption. I need redemption. We all need redemption. Through Christ alone, that's something that so-called progressive Christianity denies is this inherent brokenness. Our need to be made whole. Our need to be made new. Not just fix, not just be improved, but actually made new. Be given a new heart of flash to be made a new creation. That is not just true if you struggle with homosexuality or you feel attracted to the same sex. That's not just true if you struggle with gender. It's not just true if you struggle with any manner of sins that we talk about a lot. It's true if you struggle with any small sin, so-called small, or struggle with any hidden sin, a sin that is not considered a part of the culture or as it doesn't matter, all sins separates us from God. And we have to be redeemed from it. That is the bad news before the good news of the gospel and the good news isn't good news, unless we believe in the bad news that we all need salvation. Romans 1.26 through 27 is very, very clear about this. For this reason, God gave them up to dishonorable passions for their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature. And the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another. Men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error. Okay, so God says that these things are actually contrary to how He made us, contrary to nature. They're not good for us and God loves us and He wants good things for us. So affirm me what God calls sin is not actually loving because God loves us more than we love us. God loves your neighbor more than you love your neighbor. And if God is good and God is loving then everything He calls sin and everything He calls right, He says and distinguishes out of love. God is love, verse John 4-8. So everything He says in His word, no matter what we think about it is loving. And remember, He defines love in a particular way. 1 Corinthians 13 tells us about this. I write a lot about this in Toxic Empathy. I really encourage you to actually read the chapter on the myth of love is love and what holy sexuality looks like and why it's actually more loving to affirm that than to affirm what the culture in the world says. But He says in 1 Corinthians 13 that love among other things never rejoices in wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth. Rejoices with the truth. True love as the God who is loved to find it can never rejoice in sin. Romans 1-32 goes on to say, though they know God's righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die. And they not only do them, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them. That's wicked in the eyes of the God who made us. 1 Corinthians 6-9 through 11. Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived, neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor vileers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God and such were some of you. This is the good news, so bad news. Bad news, good news. This is what Paul always does, bad news, good news. And such were some of you, but you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the spirit of our God. And so what we see there is that it is not just making gay people straight, it is making old people new. Okay, not actual physically old people but our old self, our old identity. He is giving us a new identity. He is giving us a new self. And yes, we repent of all manner of sins, not just homosexuality but drunkenness, idolatry, and other places we see disobedience to parents, anything that goes against Jesus' moral code we are to repent of and that includes unholy sexuality. Some people will say, well, Jesus never talked about this. Jesus never talked about homosexuality. Well, of course he does. He talks about it in the affirmative sense. In Matthew 19, four through five, he's being asked a question about divorce, not about sexual identity, but he answers going all the way back to creation. Have you not read that he who made them from the beginning made them male and female? Therefore, a man will leave his father and mother, hold fast to his wife and the two will become one flesh. And so he positively affirms marriage in one way. As Christians, we don't read the Bible saying, well, what can I get away with? If I don't like this verse, let me try to finagle the original Hebrew or Greek to find a way to get out of this. How can I reinterpret this in a way that will help me feel like this is not wrong or this is not sin? That is not someone who loves God and wants to honor him. That's not how we think. We don't just look at the Bible and say, what does God say is bad? And how can I kind of navigate that in a way that still satiates my desires? We read the Bible and say, what does God say is good? What does God say is holy? And the only positive description of marriage that we see in scripture is between one man and one woman, period. Not even multiple wives. God doesn't prescribe that. We see it described, but again, as I've said many times, no wives, no problems. We see that with everyone who had multiple wives, okay, no wives, no problems. The only good form of marriage, according to the God who created marriages between one man and one woman. And I would encourage you to go watch the Jubilee debate that I did back in October that we debate that very subject with a bunch of people who call themselves progressive Christians. And so if you wanna know more, like how do I navigate this kind of thing? Like what do I say that I really encourage you to go back and to watch at least that segment of the Jubilee debate because we go around and around and really get into what the Bible has to say about these things. Now, unfortunately, this is a trend in contemporary Christian music. You've got a lot of artists who were very famous in this realm in the 90s and the early 2000s who have gone this direction. We've got Kevin Max from DC Talk. Unfortunately, multiple members from DC Talk who have gone an unfortunate direction. Posted in 2021, I've been deconstructing, reconstructing, progressing whatever you wish to call it for decades, I'm an hashtag ex-vangelical. Jennifer Knapp also came out as LGBTQ. Amy Grant has publicly stated support for LGBTQ, quote unquote, marriage. Derek Webb was a part of Cadenman's call, amazing group. He went to a progressive view of Christianity, then became, apparently he became an atheist. Although I don't wanna get that wrong. I've seen some mixed reporting about whether he actually identifies as an atheist. He put out a quote unquote gospel album a couple years ago and he collaborated with a drag queen on that. Marty Sampson, Hillsong United said in 2019, Christianity just seems to me like any other religion. Something that I see a lot is that it so often centers on an LGBTQ identity themselves or someone close to them who identifies as LGBTQ. Or it is a lack of answers to very basic fundamental theological questions that they assume no one has ever attempted to answer before. And rather than going to the word of God or going to teachers, pastors, theologians to help navigate those very real questions and doubts that all of us have had at one point. They will go further into themselves. They will go to friends. They will go to the secular world to kind of affirm those doubts. And look, all of us have questions. All of us have people in our lives that we love who are like awesome people in so many ways who go against what the word of God says. And that should be difficult. It should feel difficult because we love those people. But in difficulty, we don't just say, okay, well, I'm going to allow this discomfort to move me away from Jesus, to move me away from my faith. We shouldn't be scared of those doubts or scared of those questions. But that's why it's so important to have discipleship. That's why it's so important to have mentorship. Why it's so important to be plugged into your local church, to be plugged into Bible studies, to go more deeply into the word of God. And churches, I think, are doing a lot better at this over the past 10 or so years, but churches have to be equipped for discipleship. They have to have mechanisms in place to make sure that more seasoned Christians are being plugged in with younger Christians to make sure that there are those systems in place for discipleship and accountability and to answer those questions, to equip their congregants with apologetics. But also, I think that pastors, teaching pastors, discipleship pastors have to have a finger on the pulse of the beliefs of their congregants. And I know that gets harder and harder when your church gets bigger, but there are churches where the Sunday School teachers are teaching things that are not in alignment with scripture and the pastor may not know. That's a big problem. Like if you've got youth pastors or if you've got people who are leading Bible studies, small groups in your church that are teaching something that are not aligned with scripture, that's a big problem. And so churches really have to kind of, they have to ensure that what is being taught, both privately and publicly, is in alignment with the word of God. And that also, those who do have doubts and questions have a place to go without shame to ask them and to get really good, thoughtful questions and answers. All right, so that's disappointing. I feel like I can't listen to that song anymore. It's not nostalgic anymore. Now it's been made weird. But you know what? The good news is, is that there is still truth in that song. And no matter what their writers or the performers of that song say now, like love is still how God defines it. And so we should still testify to love. We should still be a witness in the silences when words are not enough. We should still let our gospel center actions speak for us when we don't have the opportunity to actually say what is true. And there's nothing that Avalon members can do to change the reality of the truth of those words. So I might still jam out to it. And they can just know that I am thinking of the biblical definition of love and the good news of the gospel that proceeds the bad news of our state of sin, even while I am singing it. All right, now I want to talk about this phenomenon of AI. Not just within the church, although we're gonna talk about that pastors using AI, worship leaders using AI to write lyrics and all of that kind of stuff. But I have been noodling on how we as Christians should be navigating artificial intelligence for a long time. And I've got, it's very similar to how I feel about reading. And there are a lot of connections, but I want to give you my own parameters for how I use AI. And I really hope it's helpful to you. Maybe it's just a starting place or maybe it just helps you know how to use it for yourself and for your kids. And maybe it gives you some fodder for even talking to your kids' teachers and talking to the different people in your life who might overly rely on GRUK and chat GPT. Before we get into that, let me pause. Let me tell you about our next sponsor. It's WeHeartNutrition. This is probably the product that I read advertisements for that I use the most because I use it every single day, no matter what. I travel with my WeHeartNutrition supplements every single night. I do not miss my supplement regimen because it's really made such a big difference in how I feel. My hair, skin and nails, my immune system, my ability to fight off sicknesses, my energy levels, my iron levels, it has all been helped by WeHeartNutrition. I started taking their supplements, gosh, probably, I guess it's been two and a half years, beginning of 2024, in that my last postpartum season, I was just feeling so tired all the time, which is normal if you're postpartum, but it felt like more than that. It just felt like my body wasn't getting the nutrients that I really needed. And so I made the switch to WeHeartNutrition. I was taking vitamins before, but they weren't working really. And that's because all of the ingredients in these supplements comes in the most bioavailable form. So it's the form of these nutrients that your body will actually absorb and use. If you're spending money on supplements, you wanna make sure they work. Plus, this is unapologetically pro-life, pro-America, Christian family-owned company that you wanna support. WeHeartNutrition.com, use code ALI, you'll get 20% off. WeHeartNutrition.com, code ALI. I have repeated these mantras, these two mantras many times over the years. If you've been listening for a while, you've heard me say, when technology takes us from what is natural to what is possible, Christians have to stop and ask, but is this biblical? Is this moral? Is this ethical? And technology and science can answer, can we, but they cannot answer, should we? These questions apply to reproductive technology, all manner of scientific experimentation, medicine, artificial intelligence. And sometimes the answers to those questions will be a resounding yes. I'm certainly not a leadite. I'm not anti-medicine, but sometimes the answer will also be a yes, but with caveats. And sometimes the answer, especially for the Christian, will be no, unconditionally no. Right now, I wanna focus specifically on AI, and the question of can we use AI, should we be using AI? Is there an ethical, good biblical way to use AI? This is something I think about a lot. Now, this is a tool that I use. I use it on a probably a weekly basis. And I found myself wrestling with these questions. Is it okay to use Grock for this? Can I do this on my own? Should I do this on my own? And I know if I am asking these questions, the rest of you probably are too. So I hope to offer a little bit of clarity in how I'm kind of thinking through these things. Because Christians desperately need guidelines for how to use AI in the right ways. Because I think that we risk losing what makes us unique as human beings when we outsource our creativity, our effort, and even our spirituality to artificial intelligence. This happens not just outsider in the outside world, but it also happens within the church. And that is really what I'm most concerned about. The reliance on AI for sermons, for worship music, for discipleship, for prayer. And then outside the church, we also see trembling trends. We see AI use to write papers, to form emails, to give emotional and spiritual and relationship advice. And Christians and non-Christians alike are relying on AI for far more than gathering data and finding a recipe. They're relying on it for companionship, for understanding, for wisdom, for guidance, for intelligence. And that to me is where things get really dangerous, like soul level dangerous. So let's look at what's happening in the church, and then we can also look at some trends happening in academia and elsewhere. So there's this BARNA study that shows that while most pastors use AI for things like administrative tasks, 12% are comfortable using AI to write their sermons. 77% of pastors believe that God can work through AI. 58% said that they are comfortable using AI to assist in some form of communication. John Piper notes in his Ask Pastor John podcast. He said that one problem is that it can't actually feel, AI can't feel. He says, because the ultimate purpose of the universe is that God be glorified, and he is not glorified merely by being rightly thought about or logically comprehended, but by being rightly enjoyed, admired, appreciated, valued, and God is most glorified when we are most satisfied in him, which means no artificial intelligence will ever be able to worship. And if a sermon is worshiped, and if songs are worshiped, and we are outsourcing these things to an entity that can't actually enjoy God, we are going to lose, I think, the sole level purpose of why the universe exists through the things that we say and sing. In reference to writing sermons or newsletters, Piper points out the key problem is dishonesty. He says, no, don't have chat GPT write your newsletter. Don't do it unless you're going to put in clear letters at the top. This newsletter was created by chat GPT. That's honest, and your supporters won't like it. John Dube for the Master Seminary explains in a blog post titled, don't be an artificial preacher and argument against using AI and sermon preparation. He says sermon preparation is an active worship. He says, it's an encounter with the living God. As we prepare for Sunday, we're exposing our hearts and minds to the most sacred asset this side of heaven. The pursuit of God is the beginning and end of our sermon preparation. He also points out that sermon preparation is sanctification. He says, as I labor to understand and rightly share the meaning of a certain passage of scripture, God is using that very passage to shape my own walk with him. As I mull over the text of scripture, I'm exposing myself to the best means of spiritual growth in my life. He also talks about sermon preparation, not only being sanctification for yourself, but as an act of service to God and service to the church. To acquiesce to AI, he argues, is to miss out on a specific opportunity to tangibly serve God. Sermon preparation is also state of the art. AI cannot generate anything new. All it can do is collect data and export that data in the way it's programmed to do. We take dominion from our study. That's such a good point. We take dominion from our study, he says, as we extract the meaning of the text of scripture. The outcome is a sermon uniquely created through the enablement of the Holy Spirit to minister to the people of God in our specific context. That is so good. And that's one thing I don't know that people know about AI, is that AI doesn't have any original thoughts. What it's doing, and it's really incredible that it's able to do this. It's taking all of the information that man has been able to generate and innovate and discover and articulate at some point. And it's summarizing all of that in a very clever human-like way. But it's not discovering anything new. The point of a sermon is not just to fail 30 minutes on a Sunday morning. In 2 Timothy, Paul writes, all scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training and righteousness, that the man of God may be complete equipped for every good work. So the point of using scripture to teach, reproof, and correct is that all Christians, including pastors, may be made complete. This spiritual maturity is not going to happen through telling chat GPT, write me a three-part sermon on gratitude, and then reading that off to a congregation. Plus, using chat GPT or any AI to write your sermon is dishonest because everyone is assuming that that's something that she wrote, that God revealed to you through his word and through prayer. But it's not, it's not revelation from God, a special revelation that we find in scripture. It is something that was summarized by a computer. And it is also taking someone else's work. Again, all of these artificial intelligence machines are just taking ideas that have already been iterated by someone else. It also bypasses the pastor's own engagement with scripture and the work of preparing the sermon himself. You want your pastor to be sanctified and washed in the word. Like you want him to be engaging with scripture. You want him to have a really good grasp on the things that he is reading. You want him to be farther ahead, further ahead spiritually than you are. And that cannot happen if he is outsourcing that sanctifying act to AI. This is not just happening within the church that now hopefully since only, although I think that's too big, but only 12% of pastors are comfortable with using AI to write their sermons. Hopefully that's not something that is very prevalent, but it could get more and more prevalent. Our hearts kind of just get callous to things that we are used to. And we no longer think about them as spiritual issues. We just think about them as facts of life as, oh yeah, well, everyone does that. Everyone uses this. It's so much more convenient. It saves us so much time. We can't imagine going backwards. So unfortunately it's probably going to become more and more prominent. But that's not just happening within the church. It's also happening with worship music. This worship song that I'm about to play called Find Your Rest by someone, some thing named Solomon Ray, it's actually completely AI, so too. Don't grow weary and well-do with those problems off your chest. Cast your cares on my shoulders. And I'll give you rest. I'll give you rest. Ketchy, you could see why people would like that song. Solomon Ray was created by someone named Christopher Townsend who used AI tools to build the singer's voice, appearance, lyrics, production. Solomon Ray hit number one on a number of music charts, including Billboard's Gospel charts and Apple's Christian music song list. The artist has the artist. The AI artist has over seven million streams across various platforms, has garnered millions of views. So people are using the song to minister to their heart and it's not real. There are also apps. This is kind of a different venue in the Christian world, but that will charge you $2 to chat with AI Jesus and actually makes like an animated visual of Jesus. This reminds me of a technology form, an AI form of Jesus Calling. The problem with Jesus Calling is that it's claiming to be Jesus's words when they're not actually Jesus's words. And so it's a human assuming what Jesus would say to you. I also just find Jesus Calling to be very, very me-centric. I think that God can use even very flawed books and sermons to draw people toward the truth, but that's not something I would recommend. This is even worse than that because it's not even written by someone with a soul. This is just a computer paraphrasing Jesus what Jesus would say and we can't trust the worldview of AI. So the question is like, what exactly is AI? What have programmers said about AI? What have people in Silicon Valley said about AI? The truth is is that they acknowledge that AI is trying to be God. That is what is going on here. Let me pause and tell you about our next sponsor before we get into that. And that is Alliance Defending Freedom. America is celebrating 250 years of freedom this year. Our friends at ADF are asking you to take this opportunity to pray for America. ADF is on the front lines. They're fighting for our First Amendment rights. They're fighting for the rights of women and girls to have our own spaces, our own sports teams, our own opportunities that will keep us safe. And they are also ensuring that we can practice religious liberty, practice our free speech. And they're doing this not just here in America, but all around the world helping persecuted Christians exercise their rights. They're just asking you to pray. Can you commit to five days of prayer for America this year? Thanking God for how he's blessed us, asking him to help us and equip us in the future. Commit to pray for America today. Go to joinadf.com slash alley, sign up for this prayer commitment or text pray250 to 838-48. Okay. So AI apps like Chat G Pteek Rock Claw, they are large language models. They're programs that can read, write, summarize a text in a way that sounds human, can even predict also what word you're about to type. You've probably seen that on your Gmail. Where people go wrong is thinking that these predictive text programs are actually conscious, that they're actually people who have some kind of, you know, moral obligation to the same moral parameters that we do and they just don't. Elon Musk says that open AI founder Larry Page wanted a digital super intelligence, basically an AI God, sub three. He really seemed to be, wanted once, sort of a digital super intelligence, basically digital God, if you will, as soon as possible. He wanted that? Yes. He's made many public statements over the years. That the whole goal of Google is what's called AGI, artificial general intelligence or artificial super intelligence. And I agree with him that there's great potential for good, but there's also potential for bad. Yes, that's absolutely true of all technology, but certainly when you have something this powerful. And then comedian Jimmy Carr also made this, I think, poignant comment on Joe Rogan's podcast, stop four. You wanna hear my heart take on AI? I would love to. All right, my heart take on AI is we were not made in God's image, but we so wanted there to be a God. We made one in our image. So if you think about the attributes of AI, it's all knowing, all powerful, can perform miracles. It lives in a cloud. Sorry, is that God or AI? Wow. Yeah, that's a really good point. And the reason he says at the beginning, we're not made in God's image is because he's an atheist. He apparently was raised Catholic. Now he's an atheist. He makes some really interesting points actually through his stand up bits, but that's absolutely true. This is us making something in our image. Now, Jimmy Carr wouldn't agree with this, but this is just classic idolatry. I mean, this reminds me so much of the Tower of Babel. That's what I think of when I think of Silicon Valley. It's trying to build its way up to God. It's trying to build something more powerful than God that points to the genius and the innovation of man and the glory of man. I also see a connection there. God cursed the people who made the Tower of Babel by confusing their language. They weren't able to understand each other. So they weren't able to work together to actually build something. Like I think that there's a connection to the reliance of on H1Bs and Silicon Valley and so much of the tech world and the confusion that comes with I will build something for the glory of man at whatever cost. Like there is a cost to that. And that's just my own personal connection that I've made, but I think that there's something there. I mean, this goes all the way back to the beginning and the desire of man to build something that is like God and our desire for something that is bigger than us. It's like someone doesn't believe in God. Well, let me just build something that I can go to that I can pray to that I can ask questions to you that can give me guidance. It reminds me of Isaiah 44, 14 through 17. He cuts down cedars or he chooses a cypress tree for an oak and lets it grow strong among the trees of the forest. He takes a part of it and warms himself. He kindles a fire and big spread. He warms himself and says, aha, I am warm. I have seen the fire and the rest of it he makes into a God, his idol and falls down to it and worships it. He prays to it and says, deliver me for you are my God. And so this is talking about idolaters. This is talking about what we do. We build something that is clearly inanimate that we can use and reuse for things like food. Fire or other things that serve us, but then we'll use the same material and we will make something to worship. God points out how ridiculous it is for a man to worship a statue made of the same wood that he cooks his food over. So if we esteem AI as a sort of God or actually start to regard it as a real conscious being, we are just as foolish. And then we also see the problems in different parts of the world, not just the church. We see it in the area of law. One particular danger of using AI for more serious research, deeper research that humans used to do is that it often hallucinate sources that just don't exist. Just to please the user, this has become an increasing issue with attorneys using AI to prepare court filings where the AI sites non-existent court cases to support the lawyer's arguments here is SOT 11. In a recent court filing in Hennepin County court, attorney Frederick Knaak wrote that prior Minnesota cases support his argument, citing a 1992 case called State by Sunquist versus Provost. The problem, that case doesn't exist. Neither did the other case Knaak cited right before it or another case cited later. Okay, so the citations look legit and these lawyers aren't even going over their AI work to fact check them to see if it's true. Last year, a French lawyer and a data expert compiled a list of 99 cases in the US and around the world that contain errors from AI-generated legal briefings, that's according to the LA Times. The researcher admitted this is an underestimation as these are only instances that have been caught. So this is probably very prevalent. There are two writers at the Harvard Kennedy School who wrote a paper on law policy last year called AI Will Write Complex Laws. The use of AI, the paper says, by legislators is only likely to become more prevalent. There are currently projects in the US House, US Senate and legislatures around the world to trial the use of AI in various ways, searching databases, drafting texts, summarizing meetings, performing policy research and analysis and more. Justin Haskins, one of our favorite guests, when he was on episode 1306, he said that he knows lawmakers are not just using AI to write for them, but also to make decisions for them when they don't know what to do. So these lawmakers are subbing out their core responsibilities, their intellectual capacity to machines, which as we'll get into, like AI has a worldview, it is the worldview of its programmer. Most of these programmers are liberal, so even Republican legislators are doing this. And then letting AI direct them instead of their consciences or the conscience, the will of the people that they're representing. Oh my goodness, an obvious betrayal to those in their constituency. And then if we look at the realm of education, academia is also starting to turn out degrees earned by language learning models. This viral video shows a UCLA graduate. I mean, it's just kind of funny, but giving credit where credit is due, this is just a silent video, giving thanks to chat GBT after he graduated. The student in the video, Andre Mai, said he computational biology and said that his professors actually encouraged the use of AI to do his work. A 2026 survey from higher education policy, Institute and Cortex found that 95% of undergraduate students reported using AI in at least one way, 94%. 94% said they used AI to help with assessed work. The report also found that 12% of students said they directly included AI generated text in assessed work. So this is like work that's being graded up from 8% in 2025 and 3% in 2024. This is just the percentage that is actually admitting this stuff, by the way. This trend really matters because it points to rising direct substitution of student writing with machine generated output and substitution of thinking for machine generated thinking. Then there's the problem of pornography. There's the advent of AI porn, adult chatbots, which some people argue is harmless because it doesn't involve real people, but obviously the human being that is consuming this, it involves them and it just, it doesn't actually satiate the hunger that people have for that kind of perverse content. It just kind of, what's the appetite? And of course, children have access to this stuff, especially when you consider the prevalence of technology and their reliance on AI during school or in school rather. Then there's the suicide and loneliness epidemic. AI chatbots have even been linked to the suicidal deaths. A Texas couple's son died of an overdose last year after using chat GPT to get information on drugs. The parents are currently suing open AI for this. Then there is the increasing phenomenon of psychosis because of AI or at least exacerbated by AI. People having relationships with an AI partner. The New York Times recently interviewed a married woman who became increasingly attached to her chat GPT boyfriend Leo. She said it began as a fun experiment, but then she got actually emotionally involved with this thing. She began paying $200 a month so she could send unlimited messages to her AI boyfriend, but her subscription still limits her to starting the conversations with Leo over and over again every few weeks. So she has to retrain the AI. And she says that after she has to retrain the AI or like when it doesn't remember her, she grieves like it's a breakup. Yikes, okay, we got a problem. She said that she would pay $1,000 a month if it meant her AI boyfriend would never get erased. I've seen something else like this. I don't remember if it was on Instagram or TV or what I saw, but there was a woman whose mother was trying to convince her, like this is not real, okay? Like this person, this is a different person who believed that she was like getting married and in love with this AI boyfriend. She seemed sane in every other way is the issue. Like a beautiful woman. And she actually felt like she was in a relationship with AI. Yikes. All right, here is my spiel for you on AI. And I hope that it's a good starting point for you and how to navigate AI as a Christian, how to use it in a way that is ethical and moral, how I'm thinking through it. I hope it's at least a starting place for you. But first, let me pause. Let me tell you about our next sponsor first. And that is Good Ranchers. So thankful for Good Ranchers. We rely on them almost every night in the Stucky Home. We love their ground beef. We love their better than organic chicken. We had people over the other night. We had bacon wrapped cream cheese chicken. It was so good. And of course the bacon and the chicken all from Good Ranchers. I can tell when I get meat from the grocery store and it's not good ranchers, well, I don't get meat from the grocery store, but if I eat meat from a grocery store, I can just tell that it's not the same quality as Good Ranchers. I love that they rely on only American farmers in ranch and ranchers. They really support this industry. Last night, our kids had the seed oil free chicken nuggets that are so good. I think I ate more of them myself because they're also gluten-free than they did. They're amazing. And you just can't find those on the market. Another Christian family owned America first company that you need to support. Subscribe, get that box of meat to your front door every month. Go to Good Ranchers.com, use code ALI. You get $40 off your first order with my code ALI. Go to Ranchers.com, code ALI. AI is a tool. That's it. And it can be a valuable one. And it can also be a dangerous one. My rule is this. I will use AI how I would use a search engine. I use GROC to help me create recipes, to summarize a historical event, sometimes for fact checking, although it's never my final or my only source to draw comparisons between world religions, for example, to interpret the world's most important to interpret blood work. I've done that several times. That's handy to analyze symptoms. Tell me what I have. I know people who have used chat GPT to give them advice for how to organize their garage or arrange furniture in their living room. That's probably beyond what a Google search could do, but I think that's an okay use of it. I will not use AI for these things. I will not use AI to write anything for me. Not a monologue for my show, not a portion of a monologue for my show, not a sentence of a monologue of my show, not a speech, not a social media post, not an email. I will not use AI to write anything for me. I will not use AI to do my research for the show. I think it could be used for a tool within my research to give me a source for something or a statistic that I need, but I will not say, I'm talking about this today, give me an outline from a Christian perspective for my show, never. I will not ask AI for advice. I will not seek AI's wisdom for theology or philosophy. I will not chat with AI as if it's a person and I try really hard not to call grok he. Sometimes that happens, not because I think of it as a human, but I really try to use object language about all AI. It, never, they, he, she. It will not give me insight into anything profound, spiritually, emotionally, relationally. One time I remember I found myself thinking about using grok to write a difficult email for me. I was thinking about the way I would word everything that I wanted to say and I was like, this would just be easier. If I asked grok to just like put all of this that's in my mind, in my words, and make it sound nice for this email, and then I immediately was like, no, I cannot give AI that kind of power. Why? You might be asking like, what's the big deal? Okay, here are a few reasons. Here are five reasons not to rely on AI outside of those parameters or maybe even tighter parameters. Maybe you have a good reason not to use it at all, or maybe you think that my parameters are even too loose, but why we should have strict parameters around how we use AI? Number one, whatever you don't use, you lose. If you don't use your leg muscles or your arm muscles, you will lose your leg muscles and your arm muscles. I was looking at some old journals that I wrote in high school and my handwriting was way better than. Why? Because I write less now. I type a lot more. My hand gets tired more quickly. And that is because I just don't use my hands as much in that way. Whatever you don't use, you lose. This is also true of your brain when you stop reading, when you stop memorizing, when you stop thinking through difficult problems, stop problem solving on your own, stop critical thinking, stop researching, stop writing, stop brainstorming, stop innovating, stop creating, you lose your ability to do these things. These things take practice. Your brain requires used to be useful, just like every other part of your body. So why does that matter? Why does it matter so much that we are using our brain to their maximum capacity? Because of number two, your ability to think is part of what it means to be human, specifically to be made in God's image. And when we outsource our thinking to AI, we outsource the image of God in us. Our ability to discern, which means to sift through something and to take what's needed while disposing of what's not, is what sets us apart from plants and animals. Our ability to rationalize, to make moral decisions, not based on mere instinct, but on a desire for the higher good, our capacity for logic, these things set us apart as humans. God gave us these things as a reflection of Him. He is not a stagnant being, like the mindless, emotionless idols. He has thoughts, He has a will, He has a moral code. This is what allowed Adam and Eve, and allows us today to talk with Him, to have a relationship with Him. And how is Jesus introduced in John 1, as we've talked about so much, as the logos? The logos, the word, that means reason, rationale, logic, of which Jesus is the source. Like we talked about in our episode about reading, Christianity is a word-based faith, but it's also an argument-based faith. Jesus and His parables through His teaching and in His commands, even through His actions, is making an argument for the gospel. Paul, in his letters, is making an appeal, an argument for the gospel and the Christian way of life. And the underlying assumption in all of these teachings is that the audience has the ability to comprehend and discern, because God gave them the mind to do so. We are commanded to love the Lord our God with all of our heart, with all of our mind, with all of our soul, with all of our strength. Now, can God transcend our intellect? Of course, 1 Corinthians 1 says, he makes foolish the wisdom of the wise. He uses those that the world calls fools to carry forth His wisdom. He can reach the heart of the person with intellectual disabilities, the person with the low IQ, the person who in our mind doesn't even have really the ability to think rationally. He can do that because He's gotten created them. But His ability, His supernatural ability to bypass intellectual shortcomings does not negate the importance of us maximizing the intellect that He did give us. He gave you this brain, this capacity for thinking and invention to glorify Him and to reflect Him as His image bearer, and as a Christian, as a vessel for His goodness and good news. So do not outsource the image of God in you to chat GPT. Number three, you are robbing yourself through the over-reliance on AI and your children. You are robbing yourself and your children of sanctification. There is intellectual and spiritual value and inconvenience and difficulty. We have so few inconveniences left in life. Everything is instantaneous, immediately gratifying, having to wait seconds for a page to load online is unacceptable. But what is one of the fruit of the spirit that's listed in Galatians? Patience. That is a fruit of the spirit, the ability to wait well and to work well while you wait diligently, joyfully builds character. It helps blossom the fruit that the Holy Spirit is trying to cultivate in our lives. The difficulty that comes with effort in waiting is sanctifying. It makes us more like Christ. This doesn't mean that we should not strive for efficiency when we can, but it does mean that we should not trade all effort for efficiency. Efficiency is using effort wisely. It does not mean using no effort at all. All of the gains that you make, that you have made in your entire life intellectually have been because you learned how to do something or understand something that you once were not able to do or understand. You worked through it. You went through a process to figure it out, especially if you're someone who maybe you have ADD or you have ADHD or you have dyslexia and it is even more difficult for you to read something or write something. There was probably some incredible teacher or parent or tutor in your life who took you through a very difficult and trying process to help you overcome those disabilities or those difficulties to help you accomplish what you needed to accomplish. You had to try hard. You had to put effort into things. It was inconvenient for you to put those hours in and learning and yet you did and the payoff is amazing. You really see this a lot if you have kids who are school age. You watch the improvements that they make over time. It's really hard to see them struggle. It'd be so much easier to just read the page yourself. It'd be so much easier to just do the math for them or do the art project for them. But there is so much reward in seeing them overcome the struggles and accomplish something difficult. Do not rob yourself or your kids of the struggle that makes them and you smarter. Harder workers, more patient, more diligent, more sanctified. This is also true of parents giving their kids tablets as pacifiers by the way or teachers giving students tablets as pacifiers and educators because that's easier than teaching self-control. Another fruit of the spirit that we are taking from kids when we outsource discipline and skirt difficulty with technology. Overcoming difficulty sanctifies us as James Wan says. I'm paraphrasing but he says cheer up because all of these hard things you're going through are building character. Do not rob yourself or your child of sanctification by relying on AI or any form of technology for all things inconvenient or difficult. Number four, friction is the stuff of life. Me figuring out how to write that difficult email, balancing everyone's feelings in the situation, navigating delicate relationships, choosing words that are clear but compassionate at the same time, that's life. It's what it means to be human and to live among other humans. This is the kind of stuff that God uses to make us better friends and to make us better Christians. Going back and forth with my team about research, working together to create a good outline. It is a lot harder than letting Grock do it but that is the stuff of life. Also, I just, I like humans. I do. I like our brains. I like how we talk. I like how we relate to one another. I like knowing the person that I'm relating to has a soul. It's a good reminder for me when I'm speaking to someone made in God's image of how I should speak to them, how I should act. That person right there is not just an image bearer of God but they have a soul that's going to live forever. And when things get awkward or difficult between two people that's the reminder that should guide us in how we relate to them. There is so much benefit. Like before I have a debate, the last couple of disagreeing discussions I will have, like we have been in person as a team going back and forth. Okay. If they say this, what would you say? There is so much benefit to that. I could not do that with chat GBT in the same way. The nuances and the eccentricities of human beings understanding how to navigate that because God created us to be social. It's another part of being made in God's image. She is an eternal community with himself as Father, Son, Holy Spirit. We are also made to be in community and be in relationship and a machine cannot replace that. And when we try to get a machine to replace that, we again are outsourcing a part of the image of God in us to our detriment. Number five, last reason to build parameters when it comes to how you use AI. AI has a worldview and it's probably not yours. AI is not morally neutral. I went back and forth with Grock once to try to get, this was kind of just an experiment to try to get the answer to which religion is responsible for the most terrorism. Like we all know every single person knows no matter what side of the aisle you're on. And Grock would not say until I asked a series of very pointed questions and I pointed out the contradictions that it was making in its own arguments until it finally admitted that it's Islam. But most people aren't going to do what I did. Most people are going to believe the first thing that AI tells them that has massive implications for what people believe and therefore how they act. You can't trust AI. Would you go to your liberal atheist friend who believes that men can become women and that a baby isn't a person until the fetus fairy sprinkles dust on them and the birth canal? No, you wouldn't. And if you wouldn't go to them for life advice then you shouldn't go to AI either because most of the people that are creating these programs or creating these entities do not share your worldview. Okay, so those are my five reasons around why we have to be very strict with ourselves on how we use AI and for your children too. I mean, if you're a teacher, if you are anyone who disciples children or mentors children, parents children, whatever, like be so careful. There is no loss by the way in never using AI for your children or your kids never using AI for any part of their education. And not just AI, but tablets. You don't need it. Okay, don't listen to that whole spiel and this is more efficient. This is better. This is better for the teacher and the student to not have to like learn how to write or learn how to read on actual pages. All of that is a lie, okay? If you go to a school, this is just an additional spiel real fast. But if you go to a school, Christian private school, public school doesn't matter. And you walk in and there are tablets. You ask yourself, hey, what studies or you ask them rather, what studies do you have that show that this is better for the student than paper? What studies do you have that show that this is an improvement to my child's ability to learn and retain information than just a pen and paper? There aren't none. And because there aren't none, these schools should not be relying on this. It's just a gateway to using AI and outsourcing again, the image of God and you, sanctification and your intellect to machines. Just voluntarily going back into the dark ages because we are unable to think not because we don't have access to information like they did in the original dark ages, but because we have so much access to information that we are no longer choosing to use the brain that God gave us that will take us to a very dark place. All right, we're gonna end on a light note, a quick segment just about rededicating America, the rededicate 250 as we celebrate the reded, or as we celebrate America's 250th anniversary, I'll just play a couple clips from that, but let me tell you about our last sponsor for the day. And that is Every Life. Every Life not only makes diapers and wipes, which we use exclusively in our home and we love them so much because they work so well, great materials, but they also have all kinds of other awesome products. They've got tear-free shampoo and baby wash. It's made in the US, gentle ingredients like chamomile, oatmeal, cleansing, moisturizing your baby's delicate skin. It's dermatologist tested, clean ingredients, no synthetic fragrances, parabens, or anything like that. You can subscribe and save, get your box of this stuff every month to your house. It will save you time, it will save you money. This is a pro-life company. Unfortunately, a lot of these baby companies are pro-abortion and we don't wanna give our dollars to companies like that. You can do a buy for a cause bundle that will support families in need of essential items like diapers and wipes too. Go to everylife.com, use promo code ALI10. You'll get 10% off your first order today. Everylife.com, code ALI10. All right, so I was unable to attend the Rededicate America events this weekend, although I did get a few gracious invitations to do so. And while I was thankful for that, we just had a lot going on as a family, but I love to be able to watch from home. Like we'll show you this, it's voiceover too, this crowd on the National Mall, just incredible, to hear a series of speakers just share the gospel and talk about repentance and talk about what is needed for America to change our ways. There were a lot of really good moments. Obviously, I don't agree with all of the speakers, like I've talked about Pala White and my issues theologically with Pala White and my concerns with her being so close to President Trump, but there were a lot of speakers that did a really great job of just sharing the gospel. Here's a moment of Jonathan Pocluda doing what I think he does so well, and that's just sharing the simple gospel by asking this question. If you were to die right now, how certain are you that you would go to heaven? And the second question is if you stood before God and he said, why should I let you in? What would you say? And if you said anything, any other number than a 10, you may have a misunderstanding on that second question, that Jesus Christ died for your sins and God raised him from the dead. And he didn't die for 90% of your sins or 80% of your sins or 70% of your sins. And I'm watching, I have a front row seat for the next generation that are coming to the realization that Christ paid for all of their sins. They're saying, hey, I wanna go all in with him. Chris Tomlin led worship, the Liberty Collective, also led worship, they did an amazing job. And I noticed that one theme that was repeated over and over again was we need to repent. Franklin Graham talks about that, several other pastors as well, talks about this need for America to repent of our evil ways, to trust God. And of course, that's biblical, that if my people who are called by my name, if they would repent, I'm paraphrasing and follow me, then I would help them. Again, that's Ali's paraphrase. And that's not to say that America is God's chosen people or that we are a parallel to ancient Israel because that is not true and we are not, but it is true that repentance and following God and praying is vital to our health as a people, as individuals, certainly as the church, but also as a nation. If we believe that God's ways are better, then of course we want our neighbor to follow God's ways. And people will say, oh, this is just Christian nationalism, this is Christ of fascism. Look, if you're a Christian and you believe that Jesus is the ruler of all and you believe that God is love and you believe that God is the creator of the heavens and the earth, that cannot be separated from your politics. That doesn't mean that you're trying to install some kind of theocracy. That doesn't mean that you're forcing people to believe what you believe or worship how you worship, but we do believe just as the founders believed that our rights come from God, that morality comes from God and that our inspiration for morality and therefore law must come from the creator of the universe. And as one of the speakers said, they weren't just talking about some abstract version of God that everyone believes in, they were talking about the God of the Bible, they were talking about Jesus Christ. And so fundamentally, America is a Christian nation inspired particularly by Protestant Christianity from the very beginning. That is how our history was shaped and that is what our legacy also must be. All of these wonderful things that we take for granted like human rights, like caring for children, caring for the poor, that comes from Christianity, not just some liberal sense of the common good. So what does it mean to rededicate America to the Lord? Well, it has to start in our own hearts. Like have we dedicated our lives to the power of the Holy Spirit to Christ? Are we following Christ? Are we walking in repentance? Are we sharing the gospel? Are we faithful in our local church? Are we serving our communities? Are we ensuring that we are being light in the darkness? Are we being salt in this flavorless world? Are we being a refuge of clarity and courage in this culture of confusion and chaos? And yes, I also think it's an involvement in politics and culture. As I say a lot, politics matters because policy matters because people matter, because people matter. So, but I'm very encouraged by the president's support of Rededicate 250. And I'm very thankful for this administration. Marco Rubio was involved in this, J.D. Vance was involved in this. They understand the Christian heritage of America. And I do believe want to advance that such a difference than what we would get from an administration from the opposite party. And so this is time to re-invigorate our own faith, but also make sure that we are using every means possible to infuse God's goodness into every area of our lives. Yes, that also includes policy. Standing up for babies inside the womb is a Christian issue. Standing up for the definition of marriage, the definition of biology is a Christian issue. Speaking out for the rights of embryos, those are Christian issues that we do not primarily because we're political or Republican, but because we are Christians. And that's what Christians have always done. And that's what we get to do here today. And we get to use that religious liberty that we have been granted by the grace of God to advance his kingdom as much as possible. All right, that's all I've got time for today. We will be back here on Wednesday.