By Brianne Shaw
It wasn’t part of the program. It happened off to the side at a conference, between sessions, the kind of moment where someone finally says what they’ve actually been thinking.
“I want this,” a pastor told me. “I just can’t figure out how to use AI.”
He wasn’t skeptical. He wasn’t pushing back. He was tired. And he wanted his time back.
I’ve now heard some version of that same sentence in cities across the country. In hallways, over coffee, after services, from pastors leading small churches to pastors leading large ones.
But while church leaders are figuring out how to use AI, their congregations are moving ahead — without them.
New research we partnered with Barna on shows that 66% of practicing Christians say AI is improving their lives, even as many hold concerns about it.
At the same time, about one-third of practicing Christians say AI-generated spiritual advice is as trustworthy as a pastor’s.
That should get our attention. Not because it’s a threat, but because it reveals something deeper.
The question is not whether AI is shaping our people. It’s whether church leaders are present in that process.
I live in two worlds. I’m a bi-vocational pastor, and I also spend my week working with leaders across the country at Gloo, helping them think about how technology intersects with ministry. I’m constantly moving between Sunday mornings and strategy conversations, between real people and emerging tools.
The pastors I’ve watched use AI well aren’t using it to become something different. They’re using it to get back to who they already are: leaders who show up, who follow through and who have enough margin to sit in a hard conversation without watching the clock.
Because here’s what most conversations about AI miss entirely, the real opportunity isn’t what AI produces.
It’s what it gives back: time.
Real, pastoral time.
Jesus was never in a hurry. But He was always present. That kind of ministry still matters.
And research suggests Christians are remarkably open to AI as a toolset, though not without reserve. Barna’s research describes this tension clearly. Christians are not divided into optimists and skeptics. Many hold both views at once, seeing AI as both an opportunity and a risk at the same time.
That tension is not something to avoid — it’s something to lead through.
Here are five places to start.
Sermon and message preparation. Write the sermon yourself; just do it faster and better with AI tools. Ask it to surface context on a passage of Scripture, generate study questions, or flag what you might be missing before you sit down with your notes.
Pastoral communication. You can use AI to help write a late-night email or check the tone of the message to a family going through something hard. You still bring the voice. You still bring the care. But you don’t have to start from nothing.
Care responses. Someone sends a message midweek. You’re stretched. You want to respond well, but you need a moment to gather your thoughts. Some pastors are using AI to organize what they want to say, surface relevant Scripture, and draft a response they then shape in their own voice.
Team and volunteer leadership. AI can help create meeting agendas, simple training outlines, or a follow-up message to a volunteer who needs a word of encouragement. These aren’t complicated tasks, but they take time and they often fall through the cracks.
Discipleship content. You can employ AI to draft small group questions based on the Sunday sermon’s passage, a brief devotional to send your leaders before a big week, or a next-step resource for someone who just made a faith decision.
To be clear, none of this replaces the role of a pastor. But it can help clarify it.
And pastors need to give themselves permission to start small, not with a strategy or with a framework, but by taking just one step. Use it to help prepare your next message, to write your next email, or to support your team. Let it serve you so you can serve your people.
So, be encouraged that you’re not behind. You’re already doing the most important work. Now you might have a little more time to do it well.
Brianne Shaw is the Director of Church Marketing at Gloo, a leading technology platform for the faith and flourishing ecosystem. She also serves as a bi-vocational pastor at Vineyard Church in Los Angeles.
