Artificial Intelligence & the Christian Lawyer

The content of this article was delivered on October 1, 2024, at the University of Chicago.

1.

What will it mean to be a lawyer in the post-AI legal world? More specifically for us today: What will it mean to be a Christian lawyer in the post-AI world?

To answer these questions, we need to start with a clear understanding of what Generative AI (Gen AI) is going to do to the legal sector. This is difficult, not least because we don’t yet know what this technology is fully capable of doing — and because its capabilities evolve and advance every time a new version or adaptation is released.

It’s even more difficult because almost every informed observer of AI development says there’s at least one quantum leap forward in this technology on the way, possibly more. So, we could be in the position of 19th-century farmers who are just getting their heads around the steam-powered plow, thinking about all the ways it will change their daily lives, when someone drops a combine harvester in their cornfield.

But what we do know now is this: Generative AI is going to significantly affect, and could potentially transform, the way legal work is done. ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and other Large Language Models are essentially “words and language machines,” conducting text-based reasoning and analysis and generating enormous amounts of content. That’s a problem for us, because “words and language machines” is also a pretty good way to describe lawyers.

There are already studies and reports suggesting that up to 47% of the billed work of law firms, especially large firms and especially junior lawyers, is susceptible to Gen AI — that is, document drafting, review, summary and analysis work that lawyers bill in hours, this technology can do in seconds. I need hardly tell you that for a profession that sells its work by the lawyer hour, that’s a problem.

These are results based on tests using the large “frontier models.” But there are law-specific versions of Generative AI as well, trained on legal datasets and enhanced with the use of retrieval-augmented generation, designed to produce content geared for the legal market. 

These legal AIs aim to avoid, or at least minimize, the recurring Gen AI problem of hallucination — one that landed a New York lawyer on the front page of The New York Times when he submitted AI-hallucinated cases to a judge hearing his case. These AIs are in their relative infancy, as is this entire area of technology. But they are getting better, and lawyers are getting better at using them, and they are not going away. They ought to be able to match the effectiveness of the general-purpose models. It’s not out of the question that they might surpass them.

The impact of generative AI in legal work is usually confined to this “efficiency” play, the ability to get legal tasks done in a sliver of the time humans require. But there’s also an “effectiveness” play, which I think could eventually be just as important — the ability of this tech to carry out sophisticated legal reasoning and strategic analysis, to assist lawyers through advanced role-play in simulated hearings and negotiations, and to function as a sounding board and idea generator when looking for innovative options to solve client problems.

In short, Generative AI is like no technology that’s come along before. I think it will prove as impactful as the invention of the personal desktop computer and the development of the internet, each of which brought about fundamental changes to the way lawyers did their work. You will be the first cohort of lawyers to start your careers with AI as part of the legal workplace.

That creates risk for you, obviously. But it also creates opportunity. The thing about Generative AI is that it doesn’t come with an instruction manual telling you how it works. So, you’ll also be the first cohort of lawyers to figure out what this tech can actually do. The more adept you become at that, the more attractive you ought to be to potential legal employers, at least in the short run.

The thing to keep in mind about Gen AI is that, unlike every single new technology that preceded it, Gen AI wasn’t built to do something, like a word processor or a combine harvester. It was built to be something, a signpost or evolutionary step on the road to AGI (Artificial General Intelligence) and ASI (Artificial Super-Intelligence). And that makes Generative AI a unique, and uniquely powerful, technology.

2.

Now, I want to leave aside discussing AI’s impact on law firms, lawyers, and legal work. I’ve written plenty about it at my Substack, which is free to read, and I’m happy to discuss it in more detail afterwards. But I want to move this conversation towards you, and the legal careers you’re about to undertake — especially if some of you, after hearing the way this presentation started, are wondering if you’re even going to have a legal career at all.

On that point, I can tell you this: There are two broad possible outcomes for the development of AI in the legal space.

The first is that AI will be a disruptive force in that it upsets some old routines around legal work, forces law firms to reconsider their pricing and compensation systems, blows a hole in the billable hour, and so on. But in this scenario, that disruption will be limited — the basic model of the lawyer as a human problem-solver, transaction-enabler, and dispute-resolution-representative, hired by clients to solve their problems, will continue. We’ll be high-tech lawyers, augmented lawyers with super-fast desktop assistants — but we’ll still be lawyers, as you and I generally understand them.

The second potential outcome is that AI will be an absolutely transformational force. It will develop the capacity to carry out 70%, 80%, or even 90% of what lawyers have traditionally done. It will provide legal information, generate legal documents, and even deliver legal advice. That would change everything about the legal sector — massively reducing the cost of legal assistance and advice and essentially eliminating most of the work lawyers have always done.

I don’t know which one of these scenarios is more likely. I do know that the first one doesn’t worry me all that much. If AI gives the internal architecture of the legal services industry a thorough renovation, well, that’s a long overdue development. If that’s what AI does to the legal profession, you’ll be fine — you and the law firms where you work will figure it out and adjust.

The second scenario — the doomsday-for-lawyers scenario — is the one I want to spend the balance of my remarks on. Because I don’t actually think it’s doomsday at all. I think it’s an opportunity for liberation — for lawyers, for clients, and for people who’ve never even had the chance to be clients. And I think it’s going to give those of us who call ourselves Christian lawyers a chance to express our faith through our profession more than ever.

3.

Someday, maybe sooner than we think, a machine will be able to provide people with most of what lawyers provide now. AI-powered machines will give people legal information, documentation, and recommendation. When people ask the question, “What does the law say about my situation, and what options are available to me?”, AI will give them the answers — in a matter of seconds, for a tiny fraction of what lawyers would have charged them.

But that’s not all people will want. It never has been. A machine can tell them: This is what the law allows, suggests, or even recommends. But people have always come to lawyers seeking more. They ask us critical questions like “What do you think I should do?” “What does the best course of action seem like?” “Will you help me navigate that course?” “Will you speak to others for me?” “Will you deal with others on my behalf?” “Will you accompany me on my journey?”

These are things that humans ask other humans to do for and with them. People will come to you for everything they can’t get from the machine. They will ask for your insight, counsel, and honesty. They will seek out your wisdom, consolation, and integrity. Your livelihood as a lawyer will be based on these elements of your character and personality. Your fulfilment as a lawyer will arise from your trusted relationships with people by which you guide, advise, and support them.

And that’s liberation, for you. Liberation from the transactions and technicalities and constant revisions of endless documents. Liberation from the screens and files and dockets and emails that dominate lawyers’ lives. Liberation to form genuine professional businesses relationships with human beings and invest your time and energy with them. Real connections with real people whose lives you can improve with your talent, skills, and character.

But that’s not all. Millions of people will also be liberated from the prison of unmet legal needs and unavailable legal help. AI has the potential to bring literally millions of people inside the legal system for the first time, even if only just inside the doors. And you will have the opportunity to meet them there as they enter and to help guide them closer towards their goals — to achieving legal compensation for their injuries, legal vindication of their rights, and legal means for their prosperity. They will be able to draw closer to the law; you will be able to bring them nearer to justice.

And you will be liberated to both defend and advance the rule of law. To defend it against enemies who should be all too clear to you right now — who work tirelessly to subvert justice at every opportunity, who lie relentlessly to undermine faith in our institutions and in each other, and who believe one set of rules applies to us while no set of rules should ever apply to them.

But also, to advance the rule of law, to make it a floor, not a ceiling — not only ensuring that no one is above the law, but also that one should ever be beneath it. To state clearly: “These are all the rights and privileges that the law affords, and no one is entitled to less.” To work towards a society in which the justice that is today available to the rich, the corporate, and the privileged is equally available to everyone. Imagine a justice system like that. It’s not impossible. And a liberated legal profession can lead the way.

4.

Now, you will notice that everything I’ve identified here, all the keys to the post-AI legal profession, also fully reflect what Jesus calls us to do and who Jesus instructs us to be — as lawyers, but more importantly, as beloved children of God.

When we are forming personal relationships with each other, we are loving our neighbor and strengthening the body of Christ on Earth. When we are helping others with our wisdom, advice, and integrity, we are deploying the gifts of the Holy Spirit.  When we are tending to the legal needs of the poor and the outcast, we are following the example of Jesus in the streets of Capernaum and Bethesda. And when we are defending justice and upholding the law, we are doing so alongside Jesus, who came not to abolish the Law or the Prophets, but to fulfill them.

AI will come to the law and do what it will. My advice to you is not to focus on the artificial but on the human. The unassailable qualities of a lawyer are our most human ones: judgment, wisdom, character; courage, kindness, and concern. It’s a cliche that you can do anything with a law degree; but I think in the future it will be more accurate to say that you can do anything with the intellectual rigor and analytical sharpness of a legally trained mind and the courageous capacity of a legally informed heart. Keep your minds and your hearts open to the needs of others and the Son of God, and you’ll be fine.

And look, don’t fret about what the future will bring. Take it from someone who keeps getting called a “futurist.” All that really matters is the present, this moment when time touches eternity, the “now” that God gives us in which to do good. Remember what Jesus told us about the ravens, and the lilies of the field, and how much more is promised to us from the overflowing love of God.

Go make the world a better place and do it in the name of Jesus. Go be a Christian lawyer.

Thank you.

Jordan Furlong is a legal sector analyst, author, and advisor working to accelerate the arrival of a new and better legal system. Over the last 25+ years, he’s been (variously) a lawyer, legal journalist, law firm consultant, and international keynote speaker. He live in Ottawa, Canada, with his wife and two teenagers.