The Human Touch (Part 2): The Art of Spiritual Discernment When AI Has All the Data

In this episode of the Healthy Church Staff podcast, Todd Rhoades discusses the balance between data-driven decisions and spiritual discernment in church management. With the growth of AI and data analytics, there's a temptation to rely solely on metrics, which can overlook the personal and spiritual aspects of decision-making. Todd emphasizes the importance of listening to the Holy Spirit and considering spiritual intuition alongside data, especially when hiring staff or making major church decisions. • Increasing reliance on data and AI in church management. • Dangers of ignoring spiritual discernment when using data. • The role of the Holy Spirit in decision-making. • Importance of spiritual intuition over purely data-driven decisions. • Challenges of balancing information and spiritual guidance. • Encouragement to consult spiritually mature individuals in decision-making.

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Transcript

Data Says Yes Spirit Says Wait

SPEAKER_00 0:11

Your church management software just delivered exactly what you wanted to do. It's like the perfect report. You've got your attendance, you've got your trends, you've got your giving patterns right next to it. You've got your engagement metric, everything points to hiring that new new candidate that you've been interviewing. You're well under the process, you've already had three interviews, the numbers say yes, the analytics report backs that up. The budget says yes, the timeline says yes. Everything points to, yeah, pull the trigger, but something, there's just something in your spirit that says, wait. You can't put your finger on it. There's no data point for what you're sensing. Does that sound familiar? We're going to talk about that today here on the Healthy Church Staff Podcast. My name is Todd Rhodes. Thanks for joining me. I'm your host here on the Healthy Church Staff Podcast and one of the co-founders, along with my co-founder Matt Steen, over on ChemistryStaffing.com. I think this is starting to happen, and it's been happening over the years at churches everywhere, especially now that we're just absolutely drowning in information. It's possible to be drowning in information and also starving for wisdom. This week we're talking about AI and how to implement and how we should and shouldn't implement AI in ministry. And let me tell you, AI can tell you what happened, but AI cannot and will not ever be able to tell you what God is doing. Metrics reveal patterns, but miss the person behind the pattern every time. Let me repeat that. Metrics reveal patterns, but metrics will miss the person behind the pattern almost every time. Your analytics dashboard doesn't have a Holy Spirit column, people. And we need to remain open to the Holy Spirit. That little nudge that you had that said to wait, man, that's the Holy Spirit talking, just like he's always talked. And sometimes when we get all this data, we forget about that simple nudge of the Holy Spirit. We're starting to make decisions without even considering that. And we're losing something in the process. We're outsourcing our spiritual intuition to algorithms. And when the data conflicts with our spirit, when we get that gut check, sometimes we trust the data more than we do the spirit. We've forgotten that God moves sometimes against the metrics. Matter of fact, God tells us to do some things, sometimes that are total opposite of the metrics. That's the kingdom of God, right? That still small voice now sometimes gets drowned out by the loud, really clear metrics and the loud, really clear spreadsheet. We're becoming managers of information instead of shepherds of people. Now listen, the data is not the enemy. That information absolutely is a gift. And I am a data, I'm a spreadsheet guy. I love metrics. I love information. But just because you have the information and that information is a gift, doesn't mean that information tells you solely what you need to do. Every major decision needs to start with this question. Not what does the spreadsheet say? Not do we have the money to do it? Not does this seem to make sense? The question, every major decision that you should make in your church, every major decision should start with this question. What is God doing here? Seriously, what is God doing here? What does God want to do here? Not what do the numbers say, but what is the spirit saying? Build in these little prayer pauses before we you review any analytics and ask your team, what are you sensing? What are you sensing that we can't measure? And then trust the collective discernment of mature believers over solo data analysis. When your gut conflicts with the data, explore it. Don't dismiss it. Let's go back to our youth pastor scenario, the story I told you at the top of the podcast today. You know, that youth pastor that all the metrics said, man, you've got the you've got the budget. This looks like a great candidate. The candidate looks perfect on paper, but something feels off. Don't hire the candidate. That sounds weird coming from somebody that owns a staffing firm. Sure, I want you. If you're our client, I want you to hold, uh, I want you to hire the candidate, right? But every once in a while we'll get somebody that uh a church that will present a candidate to, and they'll come back and they'll say, and it's always aggravating for me initially, right? They'll come back and say, Todd, everything, man, everything looks good. We love this person, but there's just a there's just this check in my spirit. There's just something that says, This, not right now. Maybe pause. Maybe we need to dig a little bit deeper. If something feels off and you sense it in your spirit, that's probably the Holy Spirit telling you to take a little break here and to pray a little bit more. Maybe your best volunteer is showing up, it seems distance. Distant, you need to have that conversation. The program metrics look great, but sometimes people just get disconnected, and your metrics aren't going to show that, but your spirit's gonna sense that people are just disconnected. Trust what you're saying, what you're sensing. Maybe your team is hitting goals, but morale is dropping. The numbers will lie sometimes. Here's your bottom line: God gave you spiritual discernment for all the things that can't be measured. And AI, hear me now, AI will never be able to replace the Holy Spirit's whisper in your ear. So here's the challenge. And it's tough. This week I want you to identify one decision that you're making primarily based on data. Okay? And before you finalize, whatever decision that is, maybe it's a regular decision that you just rubber stamp. Maybe this week, before you finalize it, spend some time in prayer asking God what he sees that you might be missing. Then ask maybe two spiritually mature people on your team or two people that you really respect that are spiritually mature, the exact same question. Here's the deal: you're not a data analyst, you're a shepherd. Trust the wisdom that God has given you and don't let the algorithms drown out his voice. That's what we're talking about this week. We're talking about AI and the series this week on the podcast I'm calling the human touch. And today we're talking about that spiritual discernment that AI is not ever going to give you. So, AI, let me play my cards here. AI is gonna change a lot of things in church. And I'm looking particularly at how AI is gonna change staffing, and it's gonna change the type of person that you hire and the things that you look for as far as qualities and experience and just raw talent in the future. No doubt that it is. But when it comes to metrics and making decisions based purely on spreadsheets and numbers, AI can't do that. You need to be open and sensitive to the Holy Spirit because the Holy Spirit is still talking if you listen. All right, that's it for today. I would love to be able to help you talk through some of this, maybe on your team, maybe how AI is going to affect your team. Uh, would love to be able to do that. Maybe you're looking to hire somebody. I'd love to be able to be a resource for you on that. You can reach out to me anytime. Podcast at chemistry staffing. Podcast at chemistry staffing.com. You can check out my website at todd.church. And I would just love to be able to work with you if there's any way that makes sense. Uh and if not, man, just keep listening to the podcast. I love getting emails from people that listen to the podcast. Got a couple this week that were very encouraging. So if the podcast is a blessing to you, or maybe you just want to fight with me a little bit, that's fine. Just be nice. Podcast at chemistry staffing.com. All right, that's it for today. We will be back here tomorrow, continuing our series on the human touch. Tomorrow we're going to talk about building real relationships in an automated world.