Are we replacing the work of the Holy Spirit with algorithms? Éric Célérier rejects that false choice. He believes divine intelligence can renew our human intelligence, so we can use artificial intelligence in the right way.
Éric is a French technologist and ministry pioneer who has blended technology and theology for decades. He launched the French ministry TopChrétien, founded Jesus.net, a global cooperation of 130 ministries in 40 languages, and started a media group that now includes 20 companies. Today he's building Hello Bible, an AI Bible companion designed for the roughly 95% of Christians who don't read Scripture daily. He's also developing an open-source Christian LLM for chatbots, Bible translation and education.
We recorded this conversation at Missional AI London, after Éric's talk introducing the idea of "divine intelligence."
God wants to renew our intelligence, and that renewal begins with repentance and continues as we seek His wisdom.
Two of Éric's favorite biblical figures are Daniel and Joseph. Both were remarkably wise long before ChatGPT, and both were men of prayer. Daniel advised kings in the most powerful empires of his day. Joseph went from prison to second only to Pharaoh. Both, Éric says, had divine intelligence.
Daniel told Nebuchadnezzar that there is a God in heaven who reveals secrets. Éric believes God still wants to renew our intelligence, and the first step is repentance: metanoia, a change of mind. But renewal doesn't stop there. We go on to discover God's wisdom through the Bible, through the Holy Spirit revealing it, and simply by asking. As James 1:5 says, if anyone lacks wisdom, let them ask God, who gives generously.
People sometimes tell Éric he's very smart. He insists he's "just a simple Frenchman with a broken accent." But fine-tuning models and building a global AI Bible companion demand intelligence. His conviction: with divine intelligence, whose name is the Holy Spirit, we can renew our human intelligence and use artificial intelligence well.
AI isn't a rival to the Holy Spirit; it's something humans make, and Scripture shows that Spirit-filled people can make things God fills with His presence.
Some people frame AI as an attempt to replace the Holy Spirit. Éric's answer: if they knew how much he needs the Holy Spirit to do his work, they'd never say that. We can't set machine learning against the Spirit. The Holy Spirit is God; everything else is made by people.
That raises a question about the word "artificial." To many, it means fake. But everything humans make, from a microphone to the shirt he's wearing, is artificial in the original sense. Éric traces the word to its Latin roots, meaning made with art or skill.
That leads him to Bezalel, whom Scripture describes as filled with the Spirit of God, with wisdom, understanding and skill for artistic craftsmanship (Exodus 31:1–5). Bezalel crafted the Ark of the Covenant and furnishings for the tent of meeting. And God filled what he made with His presence, speaking to Moses there and resting His glory on the ark. A human-made object became a place of divine encounter.
Today's builders work with algorithms instead of gold and wood, but they can still create spaces where God speaks and acts.
Can we make things for God where His presence will dwell? Éric says yes. We now build with computers, science and algorithms. With the Holy Spirit and renewed intelligence, why not build spaces for divine encounter?
That's his aim with Hello Bible: not to replace the Holy Spirit, but to create a space for the Spirit to speak and act in people's lives through the Word of God.
Éric's practical advice for builders is simple: put God at the beginning, pray for wisdom and do things with God, not just for Him.
Éric admits he hasn't always lived this out. When you're good at something, it's easy to rely on your own strength. But unless the Lord builds the house, we labor in vain (Psalm 127:1). Genesis opens with "In the beginning, God," and only then comes creation. Made in God's image, we create too, and entrepreneurs create ideas and wealth. So put God at the beginning. As a friend once quipped, don't even say "Amen" when you pray in the morning; save it for the end of the day.
In practice, Éric starts each day by opening the Bible and letting God's Word speak to him, then asks God to bless his work. Don't rely only on your own intelligence, he urges. Some great Christian business leaders have received ideas and inspiration in the night, so why not you?
The interviewer reflects that AI is often described as climbing from data to information to knowledge to wisdom. Éric flips that. Proverbs 8 describes wisdom as present before creation itself. That wisdom is something we can ask for in every area: work, marriage, parenting, even managing our health.
Éric's only schooling before AI was a cooking school in his youth. Then AI sent him back to school, at MIT ("a miracle, or maybe because I was paying") and at Polytechnique. He prayed for wisdom, and God gave him what he needed to learn. Pray with faith, he says, and God can make you the Joseph, Daniel or Bezalel of your generation, "and that's working for women too."
At the Christian Economic Forum, a gathering of business leaders tackling issues like poverty and human trafficking, someone wrote Éric a card of encouragement with a simple line: "Do things with God." It became a word of wisdom for him. Doing things for God is one thing; doing them with God is quite different.
This conversation builds on Éric's talk at Missional AI London 2025, where he first introduced the idea of divine intelligence. You can find it in the Missional AI Video Library under London 2025.
Listen to the full episode with Éric Célérier on the Missional AI Podcast, and subscribe so you don't miss future conversations.
Registration is now open for the Missional AI 2026 Global Summit, April 7–9, 2026, in Silicon Valley. We're expecting around 1,000 leaders exploring AI in ministry, with early-bird pricing and hotel discounts available now. Register at missional.ai.
This episode was made possible in partnership with Gloo, the technology platform connecting the faith ecosystem.