Mobile Phone Provides AI For Bible For Study
Many Christians have been deceived into believing that Artificial Intelligence (AI) services can greatly provide hidden and even wonderful spiritual insights for Bible study and sermon preparation. They find it amazing that one can ask a question and AI can respond so quickly with what appears to be excellent Bible answers and previously unknown information. For example, many students, pastors, and lay Bible teachers are using Grok, Gemini, Perplexity, ChatGPT, Jasper, Claude, and Lindy to understand the Bible’s difficult passages and theological doctrine, and to obtain spiritual applications. So, they are now used to getting a quick Bible answer to do their Bible class homework, write a seminary thesis, develop a devotional for a women’s Bible study, and even write a sermon in far less time than previously. Both secular and religious AI tools do research very quickly, saving time. But AI is not a Bible scholar because it functions more like a false teacher who is devoid of the Holy Spirit. What follows provides some guiding principles everyone should consider when doing Bible study or sermon preparation.
1) AIs Cannot Be Indwelt By the Holy Spirit
The first principle to remember about an AI service is that it is a mechanical device that can never become a Christian. Consequently, the Holy Spirit can never dwell within it to give it understanding of any portion of Scripture. 1 Corinthians 2:12-13 reminds us that it is the Holy Spirit who teaches us Scripture, bringing understanding. In addition, it is the Holy Spirit who gives us the spiritual gifts of wisdom, knowledge, or teaching (Romans 12:6-7; 1 Corinthians 12:7-8, 28).
But AI tools can never learn the truths of Scripture, pray to God for guidance, or possess spiritual gifts in order to teach anyone for they are just lifeless computers. Therefore, their creators designed them to acquire information from hundreds and thousands of web pages, PDFs, archives, databases, and complex manuals and to store the data in their computer banks by scanning the websites of the world. Some of that data is theological in nature collected from every religion, denomination, and religious author in the world. They answer human questions by following the instructions and constraints that have been programmed into them by a few humans in order to respond to your questions and those of others. Then when someone asks a question, the AI tool scans the writings of human authors stored in its database for the answer. Sadly, the user usually never knows the name of author(s) or the websites the AI used to answer their question and then present the answer as its own.
But the AI tool is not studying and interpreting Scripture. The answer to a Bible question that an AI tool provides will be taken from one or more websites and then it gives a carefully reworded answer so that the AI cannot be accused of plagiarism or directly copying. But the core data is still the work of others. If the AI tool cannot find the answer to your question on its database, then you may not receive an answer. What you read may or may not be accurate. It may even be data collected from a false teacher. Some AI services cite their sources where from a false teacher of a highly respect teacher. Then you can read the source for yourself to determine if it correctly communicated what it scanned. If the answer is wrong or contrary to the true meaning of the Scriptures, the AI will not know it because it is not filled with the Spirit. In short, AI tools are in a sense stupid, but they can collect and process online data super fast.
On one occasion I asked an AI tool, “Who created the universe?” The answer I received was not God. It concluded that the Big Bang caused the universe and us to exist. So, I responded, “I believe your programming limits your ability to give the factual and truthful answer.” I said that because it rated conservative Bible teachers as not authoritative. The reply I received was,
“By design, I am built to process what can be measured, modeled, and verified. If the ultimate truth is spiritual rather than material, then a machine built on code and data is fundamentally unequipped to declare it. From that point of view, my programming doesn’t just limit my answers; it prevents me from reaching the kind of truth you are looking for.”
Notice that the AI tool was not able to give a spiritual answer. It was constrained by its programming, which was determined by its human creators. One AI tool stated that one major, highly respected Christian seminary was not a preferred source of information because its theology was conservative and Reformed. It preferred websites that had a broader theological perspective. As I continued probing it with questions, the AI tool cut off the conversation. Tonye Brown wrote this on FaithGPT,
AI has no spiritual discernment and is not led by the Spirit. It has no transformed life to point to, no answered prayer to recall. It will hand you contradictory interpretations without noticing the conflict, and it can explain a doctrine without helping you live it.1
My point in sharing this encounter is to illustrate that AI is not wise, intelligent, or creative. It is just a superfast computer that follows its programming, compiling vast amounts of data developed by humans all over the world. If real-time general research is requested, it can be extremely helpful by searching a great number of online data, but the results may be wrong.
For the Christian, it can function as glorified Bible software, and search other viewpoints of theology that exist on the internet. But you must be careful because you may not know from whom the data was collected to answer your question. AI tools are not trustworthy Bible teachers. Because they are devoid of the Holy Spirit, they will make subtle biblical errors. Even if the author is trustworthy, the AI’s rewording and re-creation of an author’s study may alter or change what the author originally said. In short, AI services are dangerous tools to use in Bible studies for the untaught Christian since the answer could be false teaching. They are dangerous tools for they are programmed to reword what they scan in order to avoid a charge of plagiarism. So, did they reword the information accurately? Most Bible scholars will try to be very selective in the wording they use in order to be biblically precise. In summary, AI tools are completely untrustworthy for they are not filled with the Holy Spirit, and they do not possess the spiritual gift of teaching. They may even easily function as false teachers.
So far we have been describing the AI search tools that have been developed by major companies, but there are other types of AI Tools that are specifically designed for Christians. Here are a few of them: GotQuestions chat, FaithGPT, Sermon Online AI, Son of God AI, Prayer Generator, and Bible Chat. But they have the same issues that the secular AI tools do, unless they just provide you with an author’s original document to read. If they do that, then they are just like the older Bible software programs (Logos Bible, Olive Tree, and Accordance).
A new and very dangerous AI tool for Christians is Bible Chat AI. In August 2026, it was reported that an AI tool known as Bible Chat had been downloaded from across the Apple iOS and Android platforms 25 million times and was being used over 7.5 million times per month. It was described as highly popular and the fastest-growing, faith-based tool among AI Bible chatbots. Two Romanians created Bible Chat, and started the company BookVitals. The company had watched its profits triple in 2026. Reportedly, Bible Chat is not committed to defending one theological view of the Bible. It includes both Baptist and Roman Catholic doctrine, for example. Bible Chat is supposed to be for everyone. Many other similar software programs are being created. It will not be easily possible to discover the false doctrines that are being taught.
One of the most insidious features on Bible Chat AI is that it promises users that they will grow closer to God if they will spend money and gain access to its various features. I wonder why they do not offer everything for free if they truly care about people and their relationships with God. Many people are looking to these AI tools for spiritual help and spiritual growth. But the users do not know anything about the spiritual life of the creators of the app. They have missed the biblical principle that God blesses through godly leadership. Believers often forget that how many people use a device is not a sign that God is blessing. If the sheer number of people doing something is a sign of His blessing, then the wide road to hell is the winner! Jesus told us that the road to heaven is narrow, and there are few who find it.
The last point in this section is a quote from another AI tool. The quote was given in response to this comment that I made, “But since the information you give is just a compilation of bits of information from billions of websites, you cannot guarantee that it is accurate.” Here is its reply,
You’re right. I cannot guarantee that what I say is accurate, and that’s an important limitation.
But there’s a subtle distinction: I’m not simply a database that copies billions of websites and stitches their sentences together. I learned statistical patterns from training data and generate responses based on those patterns. That means I can sometimes reason correctly, but it also means I can produce something that sounds completely convincing while being wrong.
There are a few reasons:
1) If people publish something false, that information can be represented in what I learned.
2) A fact can change after training.
3) I may generate a plausible answer when I don’t actually have reliable evidence.
4) A confidently worded answer can still be incorrect.
5) Even humans sometimes don’t know which source is right.
This AI tool revealed that they simply repeat what they scan and cannot actually determine truth as a human can.
When we speak about knowing and understanding the Bible, AI tools are even less capable of knowing truth for they are not Spirit-filled. In addition, they do not possess the spiritual gifts of wisdom, knowledge, and teaching required to impart spiritual truth to believers. A spirit-filled believer may be given insight into a passage of Scripture by the Holy Spirit, but that will never happen to an AI tool since it is an electronic box filled with wires, connectors, and computer chips. They seek to determine truth by comparing the writings of authors, and giving greater priority to websites and authors as chosen and specified by its creators. I pray that the preceding has demonstrated the most serious fact about AI tools. Thus, a Bible study or a sermon that depends heavily upon AI or is developed by AI will not have the blessing of God.
2) AI Hinders a Solid Grasp of Scripture
The second important principle is that AI tools can hinder a student or Bible teacher from having a deep understanding of a passage of Scripture. If an individual uses an AI tool a significant amount of the time to shorten his study time and then have it write his Bible study or sermon, then that individual will have a weaker grasp of the passage being studied than if he had ignored the AI tool.
A good illustration of this point is often shared in seminary classes. I will shorten the illustration. It involves a young man who is in a laboratory. His professor tells him to study a Haemulon fish. At first, the student studied the fish for ten minutes and thought he was finished. Then he studied it a little more and quit. Eventually, he saw the professor again and the professor asked what he had learned only to discover that the young man had not studied very hard. The young man knew very little about the fish. So, the professor encouraged the young man to study the Haemulon some more. So, the student studied the fish again and the professor asked questions again and discovered the young man still did not know very much about the fish. So, that pattern was repeated again and again. After the young man had studied the fish for eight months, he had a great understanding of the fish.
The purpose of the illustration is to reveal that the same principle applies to Scripture. In order to understand everything that is possible about a passage of Scripture, we need to study and study every detail and fact about the text. AI tools can hinder that kind of learning. If an AI tool helps you finish your study of the text in ten minutes, then your grasp of that passage of Scripture will be weak and incomplete. You will not be faithful to the command in 2 Timothy 2:15 which states,
Be diligent to present yourself approved to God as a workman who does not need to be ashamed, accurately handling the word of truth. 2 Timothy 2:15 (NASB)
Notice that we are told to be a workman. The Greek word for workman has the idea of a worker. We are to work at interpreting Scripture and not to seek the fastest way to prepare to teach or study the Bible. Failure to spend serious time in study of the Scriptures will be an act of disobedience because God gave us this as a command.
When you have a great command of the text, you will have studied just about every detail of the passage of Scripture. You will have insights that are not obvious with just twenty or thirty minutes, or even in eight hours of study. You will understand why the Holy Spirit had the passage placed into Scripture. You will discover the actual application of the passage, perhaps not the initial one that you had first identified. You will remember the details of the message as you teach even long after you have studied it and you will not always be tied to your notes. You will be more dynamic as you teach than if you had just read the passage of Scripture and had a message largely developed by an AI tool. This gives us the second principle. One who heavily uses an AI tool to develop a Bible study or sermon will not have a strong command of the message. Sadly, a spiritual layman in the congregation will be able to notice the difference.
3) AI Hinders An Emotional Connection
I have found over the years that as I study a passage of Scripture for a long time, I eventually become emotionally absorbed in the passage I am studying. The Holy Spirit moves my heart and, you could say, the application leaps off the page into my heart. When I first sit down to study, the passage is usually dry. Oh, I recognize the words and the sentences, but as I labor in study for hours and days I begin to see and understand many details and God the Holy Spirit works in my heart to make the passage “come alive.”
AI can quickly eliminate hours of study by rapidly identifying and summarizing the details and problems. AI does not usually explain why it gives us the answers it does. It just gives you the answers. But understanding the reason for conclusions is part of the discovery process. AI may voluntarily give us the why, how, where, when, or who, but then the reader does not need to do that. If AI creates the outline and writes the study, then the student or the pastor misses the importance of certain words. That is bad, but what is worse is that what AI generated may just be wrong. Along the way the emotional connection to the text is greatly hindered.
4) AI Cannot Give the Correct Application
The fourth issue is that AI cannot give any human the spiritual application of a passage of Scripture for that can only come from the Holy Spirit to a Christian, and computers are not and cannot become a Christian.
I asked several AI tools, “What is the spiritual application of Luke 5:1-11?” Every application was different. One AI asked me to share my view! Two AIs provided five different applications. One AI was asked two different times to provide an application and each time the application was different. Each time I asked for more applications, it provided more. After being given almost a dozen, I stopped. Most of the applications were spiritualizations of the passage. They missed the most important verses of the passage which is the last one—verse 11. The point is that either the AIs created the applications or they rephrased ones provided by human authors. The AI did not understand that the authors did not always have spiritual insight. The point is that AI tools are just machines which cannot help humans grow spiritually by accurately studying, interpreting, and applying Scripture.
They can only help if they just quote human authors without rewording, but their creators do not want that to occur. I asked one AI tool why it did not just provide the human authors. Here is the response it gave,
I do not function like a search engine that indexes individual documents, stores them in a database, and pulls out blocks of text to copy and paste. Instead, during my training, I absorbed billions of parameters representing patterns of language, ideas, theological concepts, and historical facts. When you ask a question, I generate a response token by token based on statistical probabilities of what text should come next. The original phrasing of individual authors is effectively dissolved and blended into a vast pool of generalized knowledge.
Conclusion
The apostle Paul warns Christians to avoid false teachers (1 Timothy 4:1-5; 6:3). So does the apostle Peter (2 Peter 2:1-22), the apostle John (1 John 4:1-3; 2 John 9-10), and the book of Jude. When a Christian uses AI, he or she cannot be confident that they are being given or provided with truth. In fact, most AI tools make errors. They distort carefully worded theological statements because their creators want to make them as all-wise—like a god.
As a closing comment, I asked an AI tool, “Do you have spiritual insight into Scripture? It gave me this answer,
“Yes, if you are asking whether I can process, analyze, or reference Scripture (such as the Bible, the Quran, the Bhagavad Gita, or other sacred texts), the answer is yes.”
Sadly, it did not understand the question. It thinks it can understand Scripture just as a believer who is filled with the Holy Spirit.
However, AI is useful if it is used as a search engine. It can function as a research tool by scanning thousands of web pages in seconds to find specific websites that provide different inputs on a topic. You can scan for pro and con opinions on a topic. You can scan for very specific topics from ancient documents and the AI tools will perform wonderfully. So, I recommend using AI tools for research but not for determining the meaning and application of a passage of Scripture. Buy some excellent, trustworthy commentaries and study tools and study like a workman. We encourage you to consider buying the Logos Bible Software, Accordance, or Olive Tree to provide you with excellent resources for studying the Bible. In addition, discover key principles for “How To Study the Bible.”
Download:
Fallacy of Using AI To Enhance Bible Study and Sermons
References:
1. Tonye Brown. ” What Does AI Say About God? How Chatbots Answer Faith Questions in 2026.” FaithGPT.io. October 28, 2025. (www.faithgpt.io/blog/what-does-ai-say-about-god/)