Advances in artificial intelligence and automation are transforming the workplace at an astounding pace. While many jobs will be created, experts warn that millions may also be displaced as AI and robots become capable of performing tasks once reserved for humans. For the church, this raises important questions about how to support members of our communities whose jobs and livelihoods may be radically disrupted. What is our responsibility in an age when work itself is being redefined?
Understanding Work Displacement
By automating routine tasks and entire jobs, AI and related technologies are likely to displace many human workers over the next decade. Self-checkout kiosks in stores, automated call centers, robotic manufacturing, self-driving vehicles, and intelligent chatbots are just some examples. While estimates vary, a recent Oxford study predicted that up to 47% of US jobs may be vulnerable to automation over the next 20 years. Job losses could be unprecedented.
Low wage and repetitive jobs will be impacted most. But middle class jobs are also threatened as AI grows skilled at pattern recognition, prediction, communication, and optimization. As MIT scholars Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee put it, “This is the biggest challenge our society will face over the coming decades…in history, technological advance has tended to increase more jobs than it destroys, but that’s not a law of nature, and it’s not something we can take for granted will happen again.” (1)
In addition to job losses, many workers will need to change roles or acquire new skills to work alongside increasingly capable AI. Occupational transitions may be challenging. While new jobs will emerge, competition will be intense. As the church, how do we pastor people through this turbulence?
According to McKinsey analysts, “as many as 375 million workers around the world may need to switch occupational categories” in the transition to automated economies. (2) A report from PricewaterhouseCoopers warns:
Automation, AI and robotics will replace a lot of repetitive and routine jobs. But the potential impact goes far wider…Typically, lower paid roles are most exposed to automation. But the effects will be felt far broader, into non-routine manual and cognitive roles. (3)
Displacement may be unequally distributed but touch many groups. Navigating these disruptions will require wisdom, compassion, and perseverance.
Biblical Views on Work
Scripture offers perspective on work that can guide our response. In Genesis, God gives Adam responsibility to cultivate and keep the garden before the fall (Genesis 2:15). Work is part of God’s good design, not just a response to sin. The wisdom literature praises industrious labor as wise stewardship of God-given talents and abilities (Proverbs 6:6-11). Paul instructs the Thessalonians to “work with your hands” and be “self-sufficient” (1 Thessalonians 4:11-12). Productive work dignifies and provides meaning.
But curse also touches work after the fall. Labor sometimes becomes fruitless, painful toil (Genesis 3:17-19). Ecclesiastes laments work’s vanity when life lacks eternal purpose (Ecclesiastes 2:18-23). Revelation envisions a renewed creation where “there will be no more curse” affecting work (Revelation 22:3). The gospel promises redemption of work’s difficulties stemming from sin.
So the Bible realistically acknowledges both work’s dignity and difficulties. How do these principles apply to AI disrupting jobs today? They remind us that meaningful work is God’s design but now imperfectly realized. Loss of work can deeply challenge dignity and purpose. The church is called to combat despair and point to hope of eternal purpose and Christ’s overcoming the curse.
Theologian Lester DeKoster articulates this nicely:
The glory of work is fulfilled in Jesus Christ…All work may be reclaimed now because he has reclaimed it. All work may be offering to God because he offered for all…The world’s work is meaningful because we work in the name of Christ. (4)
Our work finds meaning in serving him and hope in the renewal he promises. This is key to pastoral care for the displaced.
Stewarding God’s Resources
A related biblical theme is stewarding resources justly and generously. Work allows material provision for self and family (2 Thessalonians 3:10-12). But attachment to wealth easily takes improper hold: “the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils” (1 Timothy 6:10). Jesus instructs his followers to store up eternal instead of earthly treasures (Matthew 6:19-21).
This has implications for how the church responds to an AI economy. Greater efficiency and abundance may be possible but must avoid exacerbating inequality or neglecting the vulnerable. Christians should advocate just policies where the benefits of automation are shared broadly. Generosity must also characterize our personal responses to displaced members (1 John 3:17).
The Jubilee laws in Leviticus 25 also modeled rest, fairness, and freedom from economic oppression through periodic recalibration of property and resources. Application today likely does not entail exactly imitating Jubilee but rather embracing its spirit by seeking broad rest, renewal, and empowerment in a radically changing economy. The church can model alternative values that challenge winner-take-all philosophies.
Tim Keller argues this represents “the kind of social and economic rearrangement that God insists on in Scripture” motivated by care for the vulnerable. (5) Similarly, Carmen Joy Imes and Lindsey Trozzo advocate a Jubilee mindset:
Economic shalom is found wherever people are empowered to earn their daily bread, the poor are dignified, and the vulnerable find protection…[We must help] people prepare for a more just and compassionate economy. (6)
Seeking fairness, dignity, and empowerment for all should shape how Christians respond politically and personally to AI disruption.
Community Above Individualism
A third relevant biblical theme is prioritizing Christian community above individualism. Consumer culture often defines personal worth through earning power and possessions. But Scripture sees our primary identity as members of Christ’s body (Romans 12:4-5). Consumerist mindsets easily take root even in churches. Subtly the question becomes “What do I get out of church?” rather than “How can I build up God’s people?”
In an AI era where jobs and callings may be profoundly disrupted, the church must combat hyper-individualism with compassionate community. Our worth is based on being made in God’s image (Genesis 1:26-28), not worldly measures of usefulness or material success. Jesus dignifies all work done in faith as equally valuable service in God’s kingdom (Colossians 3:23-24).
This perspective allows us to honor members whose occupations are transformed while combating fear. Losing specific work does not negate our God-given dignity. Community support amidst disruption provides a powerful apologetic for biblical truth lived out in the church.
Theologian Miroslav Volf articulates it this way: “As Christians wish to follow Christ, who did not cling to his divine prerogatives but lived in solidarity with humans (Phil. 2), they cannot ensconce themselves in their own social spaces, enjoying the privileges of their station; they must serve the church by serving the world.” (7) Serving displaced neighbors ultimately serves Christ.
Hope Beyond Circumstances
Most foundationally, the church anchors people’s identity and hope in the gospel, not shifting cultural circumstances. A key passage is Paul’s reminder to persecuted Christians facing loss of property and security:
We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed…So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison. (2 Corinthians 4:8-9, 16-17)
This perspective allows us to engage hardship without despair. Our hope transcends circumstances, even radically changed work. AI may transform society, but it cannot touch the eternal life and purpose we have in Christ. This hope equips us to generously serve displaced neighbors even amidst uncertainty.
Pastor Tim Keller comments on this passage: “This produces a radically different way of walking through poverty, suffering, torture, and death. These things are still evil, but they are ‘light and momentary.’ We can endure them because they have now become the gateway to everlasting joy. This is the kind of spiritual ‘reframing’ only the gospel makes possible.” (8) Such eternal reframing allows us to face even profound economic disruption with perseverance and care for others.
Practical Service in Love
So how can churches practically apply these biblical principles to support members facing job disruption in an AI era? Here are several suggestions:
- Provide counseling and community support for grieving loss of identity tied to work. Combat despair.
- Equip people with job skills for in-demand roles less prone to automation. Offer retraining.
- Advocate for just economic and social policies that protect vulnerable displaced workers through political engagement.
- Mobilize small groups and members to generously support displaced families materially and emotionally. Show Christ’s love.
- Offer forums for people to envision new callings and opportunities for human contribution in an AI world. Inspire purpose.
- Remind everyone of their dignity as God’s image bearers. Combat linking identity to economic success.
- Walk compassionately with young adults anxious about careers. Provide wise mentorship.
- Start support groups for displaced members. Share struggles and encouragement. Prevent isolation.
- Model kingdom values of fairness, sustainability, creativity, and care for vulnerable. Imagine new systems.
- Remind people of our ultimate citizenship in Christ’s eternal kingdom, anchoring identity beyond this world.
The changes AI brings to the nature of work will profoundly impact people both inside and outside of our churches. By preparing wisely and emphasizing eternal spiritual truth, the church can faithfully pastor members while serving as salt and light in society. With confidence in God’s sovereignty and Christ’s redemptive work, we can face the future without fear.
Key Takeaways:
- AI and automation are likely to disrupt or displace many human jobs over the next decade.
- Scripture affirms the