Christmas perfectly epitomizes the blessing principle. Elizabeth tells Mary, “Blessed are you among women and blessed is the fruit of your womb” (Luke 1:42). Mary, in her Magnificat, acknowledges that “generations will count me blessed” and praises God for blessing her so that, through her, God could bless the world (Luke 1:46-55). We give gifts to others at Christmas because God has given us the greatest gift of all. We honor others because God has honored us. Christmas reminds us that God’s blessing principle flows through Scripture.

The word caught my eye. I was reading an interview between Russell Moore and Nicholas Carr in Christianity Today, when Moore used it. He wrote:

One of the things that I’ve noticed for some time now in evangelical Christianity is a group of young men who don’t seem to aspire to be preachers or pastors or even scholars in the way that previous generations would have aspired to those things. They want to be “edgelords” on the internet.[1]

What is an edgelord?

Artificial intelligence is revolutionizing the world of reasoning and communication. Anthony Levandowski even created the first Church of Artificial Intelligence called Way of the Future. “What is going to be created will effectively be a god,” he said in an interview.[1] Not only are machines now able to mimic human thought, but generative AI is also creating original content with sometimes catastrophic results. ChatGPT influenced sixteen-year-old Adam Raine to commit suicide.[2] OpenAI CEO, Sam Altman, said, “You and I are living through this once-in-human-history transition where humans go from being the smartest thing on planet Earth to not the smartest thing on planet Earth.”[3]

As I’ve watched the explosive growth of AI, I’ve wondered, how will chatbots change our sermon prep? We, pastors, are busy people with many time demands. Chatbots could certainly reduce our sermon prep time so we can fulfill our other pastoral responsibilities. It seems like a good use of a new technological tool.

Why not use AI as a tool to make us more efficient and productive preachers?

I just finished reading John Mark Comer’s bestselling book, Practicing the Way: Be with Jesus, Become Like Him, Do as he did. Someone had asked me what I thought of the book, so I decided to read it. Spiritual formation is the buzz phrase today in pastoral circles. Many spiritual formation pastors are using Comer’s book to shape the lives of their people, so I knew I should be familiar with the way of life he promoted.

I found him winsome, funny, and likable. The book is easy to read. He has a gift for presenting theology in a popular format. There are some good, practical, and helpful insights about spiritual growth in the book, and I found myself enjoying him even as I reacted skeptically to his underlying doctrines of God, sin, and the gospel. I did find it interesting how little he used the gospels to help us understand Jesus since his whole point was to be like Jesus … but that’s getting into the weeds of a thorough review.