Justin R. Lester argues churches should use AI to handle repetitive admin work like email follow-ups so pastors can focus on ministry. He points to his Duke and Vanderbilt education as proof that clergy weren't trained for routine tasks. Automating chatbots and lead generation frees them to actually preach and care for people.
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How do we aggressively use AI as a weapon for good? Absolutely. We keep getting all these warnings that it's gonna take over the world. Absolutely. Robots are gonna beat the kids. Yeah, man. They gonna take everything. How do we use it as a weapon for positivity? Oh yeah. So my church and what I teach churches on is like, get your culture and then automate your processes. So there's no reason, like you went to Duke, right? Yes. I went to the far superior Vanderbilt. Listen, listen, you was in Section 8. It's okay. No, we, so, I didn't go to school to email. I didn't go to school to send follow-ups. I didn't go to school to make phone calls. I went to school to preach the gospel, to care for God's people. To that end, I think that's what churches can use this stuff for. All that menial stuff that every other business is using it for. So a chatbot on your website to gather people's information and get leads. Yeah, an app is cool, but most people aren't on apps anymore because they're just going directly to websites.