The spiritual gift of discernment is rare in the body of Christ, and it is one of the most important gifts that we need in these times. What has usurped the place of this gift is suspicion and human judgments often based on partial and/or one-sided information. The Holy Spirit’s gift of discernment is a supernatural gift that is not dependent on human knowledge or reasoning.
A new emphasis and clarity are coming concerning all of the gifts of the Spirit. We need all of them, and those who seek them as Paul exhorted in 1 Corinthians will receive them. Then, we must mature in our understanding and use of these gifts. In these days when Artificial Intelligence (AI) is a chief pursuit, we need the intelligence of the Holy Spirit even more.
Regardless of how advanced AI gets, it will never compare to the knowledge, power, and authority of the Holy Spirit. Those who seek the Lord above all, who are filled and led by His Holy Spirit, will have His truth and wisdom if they maintain the humility to which He gives His grace. This is the humility that realizes that we may have and be led by His Spirit. We must mature in learning to distinguish what comes from His Spirit from what comes from our own limited and often flawed reasoning, or worse, from the devil.
The discernment that comes from the Holy Spirit comes from knowing the Lord so well that we can distinguish His voice from all others, including our own. This comes with the maturity of experience and a humble, contrite, and correctable heart. As we’re repeatedly told in the book of Proverbs, the book of wisdom, the wise love correction and even open rebukes. They love seeing and learning from their own mistakes. So, if we want to know how wise we are, we should think back on the last time we were corrected or openly rebuked.
To be offended by correction is a revelation of how immature and proud we are, and “God resists the proud, but gives His grace to the humble” (see James 4:6, 1 Peter 5:5). It would be better to be resisted by all of the demons in hell than to be resisted by God, and our pride can cause this. His grace is more valuable than all of the treasures of this world, and our humility will attract His grace.
So, what does this have to do with AI? Does this mean that we cannot use AI, or that we need to use it because we realize the limits of our own wisdom? AI can process information and apply it much faster than we can, but does that make its conclusions right? The answer to that is “yes” and “no.” Having the ability to process such a vast body of knowledge can help us reach the right conclusions, if we have a clear definition of “right” and “wrong.” Without human programmers, AI does not have this. The issue is who is doing the programming and who is interpreting the answers.
The same warnings that we’re now hearing about AI are the same that we heard about the computer, the internet, and just about every significant advancement in technology. Some of these are legitimate and need to be heard. With the ability of AI technology to learn and change without human input is new, and it is potentially very dangerous to the point of threatening human existence. This makes human oversight and control more important than ever, if these humans have a good basis of right and wrong.
Such fears are not just being expressed by those who tend to fear everything new, but by actual leaders in the AI technology as well. This is no doubt something that people with the right motives and perspectives need to stay in front of and in control of. Who are those people?
The Lord does oversee the affairs of men, and He exerts His authority through His chosen vessels. Not all of these vessels are the most devout of His followers, and many do not even know or follow Him. However, they have been prepared in a special way to be used at the right time and in the right way. The historical books of the Bible show this repeatedly. As the Lord affirms, He can shape the hearts and ways of anyone, and we should be discerning of those He’s chosen for something that may not be at all religious.
As stated, the warnings we’re now hearing about AI today we heard about computers and the internet when they came out, and they did not materialize, at least to the extreme that was feared. However, because of these fears, many Christians refused to use them, or at least lagged behind in understanding and using them. If we are going to be the “light of the world,” we need to understand and lead in such things, or we will keep getting left behind and lose the influence in important areas where we are needed to be the light. Without Christian input while these things are developing, the darkness will dominate them.
We must have more faith in the Holy Spirit to lead us to all truth than we have in the devil to deceive us. Christians are called to be involved in the great issues of our times.
© 2026 Rick Joyner. All Rights Reserved.
