{"id":306665,"date":"2026-02-28T15:31:11","date_gmt":"2026-02-28T15:31:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/306665\/"},"modified":"2026-02-28T15:31:11","modified_gmt":"2026-02-28T15:31:11","slug":"students-need-a-bigger-story-than-ai","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/306665\/","title":{"rendered":"Students Need a Bigger Story Than AI"},"content":{"rendered":"

Earlier this month,\u00a0I read an essay<\/a> that I can\u2019t stop thinking about. Matt Shumer, an AI startup CEO, published \u201cSomething Big Is Happening,\u201d and it made the rounds at my university. His argument is straightforward and unsettling: AI capabilities are compounding at a rate most people haven\u2019t begun to grasp.<\/p>\n

My first response to the essay was agreement. AI\u2019s cognitive capabilities are extraordinary and accelerating rapidly. The business students I\u2019m training will graduate into a world where AI proficiency isn\u2019t a competitive advantage\u2014it\u2019s the baseline.<\/p>\n

But then I had a nagging sense that something was missing from his argument. Shumer\u2019s entire framework is built around capability. And nowhere in his article does he ask the question that helps me understand how to approach AI as a Christian educator: What does a human being bring to the table that an algorithm never will?<\/p>\n

That question keeps running through my mind.<\/p>\n

Identity, Not Intelligence<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have made [man] a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honor\u201d (Ps. 8:5).<\/p>\n

This verse names what the entire AI conversation is missing. Human beings aren\u2019t merely cognitive agents. We\u2019re creatures who have been crowned\u2014not because of our processing speed but because of whose image we bear. Our distinction isn\u2019t intelligence. It\u2019s identity. We\u2019re image-bearers of the living God.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re creatures who have been crowned\u2014not because of our processing speed but because of whose image we bear.<\/p>\n

John Calvin and the Westminster Larger Catechism both teach<\/a> that God created humanity with knowledge of God, righteousness, and holiness\u2014qualities that were corrupted by the fall but are being restored through the gospel.<\/p>\n

The apostle Paul tells us this: \u201cPut on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator\u201d (Col. 3:10). He reinforces this in Ephesians 4:24, where he calls believers to \u201cput on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.\u201d<\/p>\n

Through the Holy Spirit\u2019s ongoing work, believers are being progressively restored in genuine knowledge of God (not data about God but relational, covenantal knowledge of the living God). This is accomplished through the sanctification process, and it produces something that no machine ever will\u2014wisdom.<\/p>\n

Grow in Wisdom<\/p>\n

AI can process vast amounts of human knowledge in a matter of minutes, but it cannot fear the Lord (Prov. 9:10). It cannot exercise the kind of judgment that flows from a life being shaped by the Holy Spirit over years of prayer, repentance, suffering, and obedience.<\/p>\n

I teach in a business school at a Christian university, and I see this play out tangibly. When my students and I are working through a complex business problem, AI gives us data, patterns, and potential insights at light speed. But then comes the part AI cannot do\u2014discerning what actually matters.<\/p>\n

As image-bearers of God, we can make judgments that weigh what\u2019s best for a community\u2019s long-term flourishing. We can consider business a calling, a platform for the Great Commission, not just profit maximization.<\/p>\n

The same wisdom that sets us apart from AI can also be applied to AI. How do we train the next generation to wield this extraordinarily powerful tool without being mastered by it? How do we produce graduates who are both excellent with AI and deeply formed by the wisdom of God?<\/p>\n

It starts with understanding what the Bible teaches about the human heart.<\/p>\n

Apply Wisdom to AI<\/p>\n

A pattern repeats throughout Scripture:<\/p>\n

1. A new tool arrives.<\/p>\n

2. It gives humanity a new capability.<\/p>\n

3. The human heart quietly shifts its trust from God to the tool.<\/p>\n

Consider the brick: \u201cCome, let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly\u201d (Gen. 11:3). The brick was a technological innovation in the ancient Near East\u2014a man-made building material that replaced natural stone and allowed for more efficient and grandiose structures. It was a useful innovation for humanity and, by itself, morally neutral.<\/p>\n

But look at what happens next: \u201cCome, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves\u201d (v. 4). Making and using bricks wasn\u2019t the sin. But the bricks did provoke sin. They gave the people at Babel a capability that made them feel like they didn\u2019t need God anymore. Sound familiar?<\/p>\n

The golden calf takes the pattern further. Remember the story of the Israelites taking the gold they\u2019d carried out of Egypt and fashioning a replacement for God (Ex. 32)? Centuries later, when Stephen retells the story in Acts 7, he delivers a diagnosis relevant to our cultural moment: \u201c[They] were rejoicing in the works of their hands\u201d (v. 41).<\/p>\n

The pattern keeps going. When Israel demands a king in 1 Samuel 8, they want the centralized power the surrounding nations have\u2014armies, chariots, institutional strength. But in so doing, they\u2019re rejecting God (v. 7). Through Jeremiah, God condemns their folly when he says, \u201cCursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his strength, whose heart turns away from the LORD\u201d (Jer. 17:5).<\/p>\n

Throughout the Bible, the tools change\u2014brick, gold, chariots, horses, human kings\u2014but the heart doesn\u2019t. And AI may be the most seductive version of this temptation that humanity has ever encountered.<\/p>\n

Way Forward<\/p>\n

One more piece of the Babel story is critical for this conversation.<\/p>\n

Genesis 11 ends with confusion, scattering, and the failure of humanity\u2019s grand project of self-made glory. And then, Genesis 12 opens with God calling Abraham.<\/p>\n

At Babel, humanity says, \u201cLet us make a name for ourselves.\u201d To Abraham, God says, \u201cI will make your name great.\u201d<\/p>\n

Babel\u2019s project is human self-sufficiency through technological achievement. Abraham\u2019s project is divine redemption through covenant faithfulness.<\/p>\n

At Babel, humanity tries to reach the heavens by their own effort. With Abraham, God reaches down and initiates a relationship of grace.<\/p>\n

The gospel doesn\u2019t reject human capability. It reorients it. Abraham was wealthy, resourceful, and capable. God didn\u2019t call him to abandon those qualities. He called him to submit them to a larger story\u2014God\u2019s story of redeeming all things through a coming Messiah.<\/p>\n

The same is true for our students. They don\u2019t need to reject AI. They need to be formed by a story bigger than AI. We were made to be fruitful and to multiply, to fill the earth and subdue it (Gen. 1:28). That cultural mandate was given before the fall and reaffirmed after it (Gen. 9:1-7). AI can be a powerful tool in service of that mandate\u2014if it\u2019s used by people who know who they are in Christ.<\/p>\n

Crowned, Not Coded<\/p>\n

What does this mean for those of us teaching the next generation\u2014in classrooms, at home, and in church?<\/p>\n

We should teach them what Scripture says about the human heart before they ever open an AI platform. Let them see that this isn\u2019t a new problem; it\u2019s the oldest problem in the book.<\/p>\n

We should teach the next generation what Scripture says about the human heart before they ever open an AI platform.<\/p>\n

Before our students can use AI wisely, they need to know who they are. They need to see themselves clearly in Scripture\u2019s story\u2014as image-bearers of God, corrupted by the fall but being restored in Christ, called to participate in God\u2019s redemptive mission in the world. They need to understand that their identity isn\u2019t built on what they can produce but is found in Christ.<\/p>\n

When a student understands that, AI takes its proper place. God, in his common grace, has always allowed fallen humanity to produce tools of remarkable power. AI is no different\u2014and in the hands of a student formed by Scripture, AI becomes\u00a0what it should be: a powerful tool of common grace in service of the cultural mandate. The young person who knows where she stands in redemptive history won\u2019t be mastered by the tool, because she\u2019s already mastered by her Lord.<\/p>\n

Our students will need to be know how to use AI at a high level in the jobs of the future. But even more, they will need to be the kind of people who can use it without being mastered by it. They will need to be shaped into young adults who know that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and that no amount of artificial intelligence can replace the real thing.<\/p>\n

The question before Christian educators and parents right now isn\u2019t whether AI will reshape the world. It will. Shumer is right about that. The question is whether we\u2019ll form a generation that knows the difference between the brick and the Builder.<\/p>\n

They rejoiced in the works of their hands. May our students rejoice in the work of his.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Earlier this month,\u00a0I read an essay that I can\u2019t stop thinking about. Matt Shumer, an AI startup CEO,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":306666,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[365,363,364,111,139,69,145],"class_list":{"0":"post-306665","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-artificial-intelligence","8":"tag-ai","9":"tag-artificial-intelligence","10":"tag-artificialintelligence","11":"tag-new-zealand","12":"tag-newzealand","13":"tag-nz","14":"tag-technology"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/306665","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=306665"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/306665\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/306666"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=306665"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=306665"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=306665"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}