Will AI Ever Understand God's Idea of Calling?
Since AI can simulate intelligence, can it embrace the call, an idea intrinsic to our nature?
"I thought I was doing well for years. But recent work on AI makes me feel useless."
Dxaca, a web developer, shared that concern in a Y Combinator community months ago. A statement like this isn't fearful or skeptical, and the author isn't being dramatic. It's honest. And DXaca's words have stayed with me ever since.
Artificial intelligence rapidly transforms how we write, work, think, and build. Consequently, our understanding of productivity, profit, and meaning is at risk; hence, that quiet ache—AI makes me feel useless—echoes louder. One explanation is that we all held on to a false belief about AI. For instance, "AI helps me get more done, so I'll be more valuable" is a fallacy. Sangheet Paul observes that despite significant productivity gains, substantial losses will occur.
Workers like Dxaca may use AI to create great websites faster, but the winners will be a handful of others who determine how AI is used, such as by developing new systems or platforms.
According to Sangeet, faster workers primarily create value captured by aggregators who manage the entire production process. They determine the distribution of value, but workers lose bargaining power as productivity rises due to task reallocation and system redesign. Consequently, the more companies adopt AI for task acceleration, the more commoditized productivity becomes. In this environment, coordinators will accrue surplus benefits, but not the workers, leading to increased interchangeability and commoditization of the workforce.
AI increases productivity, but it also creates new systems in which the very productivity we seek reduces us to mere tools. New winners are emerging, but so are new losers; thus, the rat race will endure.
I've spent over a decade teaching and coaching through career pivots, first jobs, and those deeply disorienting "God, what next?" moments. Across all the phone calls, WhatsApp messages, and late-night voice notes, it often ends up being that we don't just want to be useful; we want to be called.
We want to know that our work matters—that it's not just optimized but ordained.
That longing brings us face-to-face with a complex tension: AI is undeniably helpful, but does it understand meaning? Can it grasp calling?
And maybe the better question is: What are we asking when we talk about "calling" in an age of code and convenience? Are we simply asking about career direction? Or are we reaching for something more profound beyond a commitment to increased outputs?
It's between the algorithm and the anointing, between automation and intimacy, between being productive and being chosen.
The Distinctly Human Experience of Calling
For all its intelligence, AI lacks something essential that matters to God: the ability to know what it means to be called. Why?
Their inability is rooted in our distinct experiences of the world. Professor John Lennox writes in his insightful book, 2084 and the AI Revolution, that it is because "machines do not have minds and cannot perceive" (p. 49). This isn't a mere limitation of current technology; it speaks to the very nature of AI.
It is even more interesting that consciousness wasn't an absolute necessity in the development of AI. Lennox notes that Alan Turing considered competence in completing tasks, not awareness of them, to be more important for AI. While machines may not be conscious like humans, they are programmed to respond cognitively like we do. Intelligence can be seen as a capacity for problem-solving, while consciousness involves subjective experiences and perceptions.
Lennox also aligns with Marc Andreessen, a web browsing pioneer who admitted that, in some cases, intelligence boils down to computational simulation, such as when developers use perception in AI systems for facial recognition. Still, other significant qualities, such as awareness, perception, insight, qualia, and the possession of an inner life, are way out of reach for the foreseeable future, since these abilities are closely tied to consciousness.
Therefore, AI's intelligent purpose is simulative. Its logic is operational, but ours is relational. This relationality makes us receive the call, but an inner contention within us leads us to perceive feelings and experiences that tempt us to sin against God. When faced with the truth about our fall into sin, we plead for forgiveness because we want our experience with God to be greater than any other.
You see, the distinction is spiritual. AI would win every time if it were merely a technical issue about whether we could fulfill tasks better than AI. God could have made us robots long before we ever thought of forcing people to do our bidding.
He didn't because he wanted our relationship and knew it would include our imperfections. This way, He calls us into a relationship with Him that AI cannot assume.
So it's not about capacity. We are people of a calling, vocare—to be summoned—we don't perform tasks. We respond to a voice, the voice of God. Surely, AI can respond to our prompts and churn out interesting LinkedIn posts and marketing reports, but it cannot respond to the prompts of the Holy Spirit.
Professor Lennox reminds us that while we can feed AI systems and optimize outputs accordingly, they "have no objectives of their own." They do what they're told, but aren't summoned into a story like us (p. 52).
Someone may say, "Does God not expect obedience from us?" Yes, "He does but doesn't make us obedient to Him by default. We surrender, though, we often choose not to. Yet, He waits on us with multiple chances and hears Jesus interceding for us. So it's a relationship. We assign a purpose to AI and optimize it to yield the best outcomes, but our purpose is often discovered, sometimes in our work.
The idea of calling is intrinsic to our nature. It is how we manifest our likeness to God, the Imago Dei (Genesis 1:27). We're made to reflect on our existence and walk with God. God empowers us to create and extend the beauty of the world. We weep in the face of evil and empathise with others, while we wrestle to tame our weaknesses and control disorder. We do all these and more as we worship God by alienating the profane. AI can learn behavior, but it cannot bear the image of God.
The Enduring Significance of a Divine Call
Why does it ultimately matter that artificial intelligence remains incapable of understanding or experiencing a divine calling?
With new AI-powered systems emerging daily, we must remain grounded, knowing that output, in and of itself, doesn’t determine our worth, but our relationship with God and our participation in His unfolding story.
Time is the only thing we can't multiply even with AI. Since AI can handle repetitive tasks, analyze vast amounts of data, and generate basic content, we are somewhat free to prioritize relationships with God and others rather than seeking fulfillment in personal productivity, as AI is proficient enough to outdo the best of us autonomously. Even in our personal lives, we need to be cautious about trusting AI to ensure our work goes well. Lay out your quarterly goals and follow thoroughly as much as you like, but when the chips are down, and your spreadsheets don't make sense, only God can speak a word over you that will keep you going.
AI predicts future events by calculating statistical likelihoods based on vast amounts of data, but this is different from genuine comprehension rooted in consciousness and spiritual awareness.
Relying on AI's statistical powers rather than kneeling in prayer for discernment is a disservice to our faith. Discernment comes as we relate to God and trust Him to reveal His wisdom to us (James 1:5-8).
The more we rely on technology to make decisions, the more we risk outsourcing our spiritual discernment, which AI is incapable of. AI can tell us trending jobs, optimize our calendar, and suggest the most profitable niche for a side hustle. But AI cannot discern our work in the Kingdom of God, nor can it replace the Holy Spirit's guidance, helping us become faithful.
Several companies have already deployed AI chatbots with considerable success, such as those used in dating and grief apps that create posthumous personalities to comfort the bereaved.
The rise in these applications shows a fundamental breakdown in the social contract that we hoped could help us find comfort in friendships and churches. During the first century persecution of Christians, the church grew exponentially, partly because they trusted one another and had things in common. Today, we now appear to trust AI more than our church leaders when we should rally them for prayers (James 5:14-16).
As millennials in the church, the mantle of leadership will rest heavily on us in the next decade. So, we must build better relationships with others and, more importantly, with God. We are called to commune with others as we break bread and remember the sacrifice of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ (Acts 20:7).
Future Considerations and the Enduring Human Spirit
Future developments may challenge some of my assumptions. However, the core of being created in God's image — our capacity for a spiritual relationship, love, worship, and bearing witness to God — seems to lie beyond the purely computational. Why?
If Jesus tarries, calling will remain human and spiritual. God calls us from various contexts into a relationship with him. No assessment determined the selection of Moses, David, Mary, or Peter—nothing predictive, without guarantees of ROI. God's calling is human, personal, and spiritual.
I'm not anti-AI. It informed my work with youth development organizations in under-resourced settings across Nigeria and Ghana. So, I believe that part of excellent, faith-driven work is leveraging tools that help us do more with what we've received.
However, it will never replace the human heart surrendered to God's purpose. It won't pray over injustice, lay hands on a dream that seems dead, or speak resurrection. But we can. That's what sets us apart—our capacity to respond to the One who still calls.