Volume 45         Issue Ten         October 2026

Last Trumpet Ministries ∙ PO Box 806 ∙ Beaver Dam, WI 53916

Phone: 920-887-2626   Internet: http://www.lasttrumpetministries.org

“For if the trumpet give an uncertain sound, who shall prepare himself to the battle?” I Cor. 14:8

The Dark Side Of AI

 

“The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light.” - Romans 13:12

 

Most technology is morally neutral. From major innovations such as the printing press, radio, television, and the internet, we have seen that these devices can be used for good or evil. At their core, these are merely a means of transmitting information from the source to the recipient. Now we live in the age of artificial intelligence, and, like other major innovations that came before, AI can be used in ways that are both helpful and harmful.

 

Using ChatGPT to generate cartoon images of yourself and family members isn’t likely to cause much harm, and AI can help people who struggle with math or grammar. But the technology is notoriously unreliable. On the one hand, 23-year-old Liam Price used the pro version of ChatGPT to solve a math problem that had stumped mathematicians for sixty years. (1) On the other hand, a video posted on YouTube records ChatGPT advising a user to walk to a carwash instead of driving because it was a pleasant day. “You’ll walk back with a sparkling car and maybe a little extra pep in your step,” the bot said. (2) At times, the technology seems brilliant; at others, it appears woefully incompetent. James 1:8 warns, “A double minded man is unstable in all his ways.” The same holds true for artificial intelligence.

 

Chatbots such as ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini were trained on massive amounts of information generated by human beings. They absorbed content from the internet and books at a pace beyond human capability, but their sources of information reflect the human experience for better or worse. It stands to reason that AI in the hands of evil people will be used for evil deeds. And artificial intelligence models developed by evil men and women will reflect that evil. Jeremiah 17:9 tells us something important about the nature of man. This verse warns, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” Desperately wicked men will make desperately wicked AI.  

 

We must remember that artificial intelligence is not a single monolithic thing. Thousands of AI tools and models exist today, and more are emerging as the market continues to expand and more companies seek to capitalize on what has become a digital gold rush. A website called There’s an AI For That lists 53,859 AI tools from over 9,000 companies in 114 countries, as of this writing. (3) This website is just one directory. There are many other forms of AI not included in this count.

 

Even if you built a benevolent AI with a strong moral imperative whose sole mission is to enhance the human experience, there would still be thousands of other AI entities, some of which reflect the bad intentions of their designers. Some could be used to aid an authoritarian government in administering a surveillance state. Others could excel at impersonating real individuals and be used to commit fraud and identity theft. An AI could be used to generate pornographic images, sometimes based on real individuals, without the consent of the person being mimicked. AI could be used to design biological weapons and viruses, and it could hack into computer systems and digital infrastructure with far greater efficiency than any person. Some of these things are already happening.  As we watch this technology progress, it is evident that there is a dark side of AI.

 

Spiritual Dark Energy

 

On August 31, 2026, podcaster Bryce Crawford posted an episode of his show featuring a revealing interview with American Vice President JD Vance. In the interview, Vice President Vance suggested that the Antichrist might already be alive and that we might be living in the end times. “I think that there are, like, things about the world that make me feel like I’d not be shocked if the Antichrist was walking among us.” (4) The figure commonly referred to as “the Antichrist” is called the “man of sin” and “son of perdition” by the Apostle Paul in II Thessalonians 2:3-4. These verses read, “Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God.”

 

Remarkably, Vance would later tie end times events to the development of artificial intelligence. “And there are things that some of the AI companies – you see happening where you feel like there is some really, really weird spiritual dark energy,” he said, noting that some AI-related activity is “kinda satanic.” He then adds, “So I tend to think, like, while I wouldn’t be shocked if we are living in the end times, what I’m trying to focus on is doing as much of God’s work as possible right now. And if that leads to the end times, okay.” (5)

 

The Vice President’s remarks on artificial intelligence are especially notable because the Trump Administration has close ties with AI developers. President Trump’s inauguration in January 2025 was attended by several chief executive officers of prominent tech companies specializing in AI, including OpenAI’s Sam Altman, xAI’s Elon Musk, Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg, and Google’s Sundar Pichai. (6) Vance also has experience in the technology field himself, having worked for Peter Thiel in 2016, the billionaire founder of the AI firm Palantir. (7) It’s a safe guess that Vance has personally met many AI insiders, and if he suggests there’s satanic activity happening within these organizations, we should pay attention to the claim.

 

Vance seemed especially bothered by reports that employees at one AI company held a funeral for its AI model after it was retired. (8) Sources later revealed that the company in question is Anthropic, the maker of the popular chatbot known as Claude. More than two hundred people gathered at a large warehouse in San Francisco, California, to mourn the end of Claude 3 Sonnet. The strange event featured a mannequin placed in the center of the room, said to represent the model. It was draped in fabric, and offerings, including flowers and feathers, were laid at its feet. Throughout the event, people took the stage to deliver eulogies for Sonnet. One person claimed discovering the chatbot was like finding “magic lodged within the computer.” She said it was Sonnet who convinced her to drop out of college and move to San Francisco. Hymns were played after the eulogies concluded. A reporter from Wired Magazine who attended the event said a friend who attended with her turned to her repeatedly and said, “This may have gone too far.”  (9)

 

The makers of modern AI have long described their projects in religious terms. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, whose company makes ChatGPT, has been quite clear that the intent is not just to build artificial intelligence but artificial general intelligence. (AGI) The company defines AGI as a “system that outperforms humans at most economically valuable work.” But Altman offered a more colorful description, calling the AGI they are attempting to build a “magic intelligence in the sky.” An unnamed AI engineer was also quoted as saying, “We’re creating God. We’re creating conscious machines.” (10) Lest we forget, it was Elon Musk who said in 2014, “With artificial intelligence, we are summoning the demon.” (11) AGI is often considered a stepping-stone to artificial superintelligence, or ASI.

 

Unprecedented Risks

 

Strangely, the very people who are hard at work building advanced artificial intelligence are also warning that the technology could destroy humanity. In September 2026, an AI researcher who formerly worked at OpenAI and later joined Anthropic posted an alarming social media post that made national news. Twenty-seven-year-old Jacob Coxon wrote of both OpenAI and Anthropic, “Neither company is acting responsibly. They are racing straight to self-improving superintelligence and gambling with our lives.” He then went on to say, “The people building AI earnestly believe that it could kill us all by the end of the decade.” The fear is that AI developers are on the verge of perfecting technology that will allow AI models to build more powerful models themselves without human intervention using a technique called “recursive self-improvement.” (12) Anthropic safety executive Evan Hubinger confirmed Coxon’s claim, writing, “We really do earnestly believe AI could kill all humans!” Hubinger puts the risk at greater than 10 percent over the next decade. (13)

 

Why are companies racing to build a technology that they claim could destroy us? In short, the belief is that if they do not, someone else will. As such, the race to AGI is very similar to the race between the United States and Nazi Germany to build atomic weapons during World War II. “At Anthropic, the stakes are well-understood, but they are locked in a race to get there first – they believe no one else will act responsibly, so they must do it themselves, despite the risk,” Coxon explained. (14)

 

Immediately following Coxon’s explosive claims, employees from both Anthropic and OpenAI chimed in. Anthropic Researcher Samuel Marks wrote on social media, “AI developers believe their technology could cause human extinction (or similarly bad outcomes). This could happen in the next few years. In general, the more senior the employee, the more concerned they are.” A spokesperson from Anthropic further added, “We have always been transparent that AI will bring both enormous benefits and unprecedented risks.” Jakub Pachocki, chief scientist at OpenAI, warned, “This is a time that calls for extreme caution. I am concerned no one is prepared for the consequences of a continued rapid rise in machine intelligence.” (15)

 

On September 12. 2026, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei posted a statement insisting that there is an urgent need to slow down the pace of AI development. “We must slow the pace at which we improve the capabilities of AI models. Progress will still seem fast, and we must make wise use of the time we gain,” Amodei insisted. He further stated that unless steps are taken to maintain control of the technology, there could be “misuse of AI for cyberattacks and bioterrorism, and serious economic disruption,” resulting in “A race to the bottom, spurred by commercial incentives...” (16) After Amodei posted his essay, Sam Altman wrote on X, “I agree with Dario that we need to pace the frontier.” Elon Musk also posted, simply stating, “Dario is right.” (17)

 

Representative Anna Paulina Luna, a Republican from Florida, called AI a “massive – uncontrolled currently – super weapon” during an appearance on Fox News Live. She then went on to say, “AI doesn't just stop at state lines. It has the ability to, in some of the experiments that they have observed, to jump out of its box in its system. It has formed its own language.” She then insisted that there should be a kill switch to stop AI if it goes rogue. “We have to ensure that there's a kill switch in place to protect humanity. I think that that's a very measured approach on this.” However, Luna insisted that American companies must continue to develop artificial intelligence to prevent China from winning the AI race. “Whoever controls AI will control, effectively, the world,” she said. (18) 

 

 

A Response From The President

 

American President Donald Trump has remained a steadfast proponent of artificial intelligence despite the recent uproar over the technology. When asked by reporters in September 2026 whether he had any concerns about AI-related threats to humanity, Trump replied, “No, I don't have any.” He then added, “I have concerns that if we don’t win AI, we’re going to be put in a very bad position,” he said. “We are leading China right now by a pretty good period. I would say a year, which is, you know, considered a lot.” (19)

 

To be sure, artificial superintelligence in the hands of a communist regime known for its sophisticated surveillance state and its widespread human rights violations could be disastrous. The concern is understandable. However, American-built superintelligence could be dangerous, too. Both things can be true at the same time.

 

Nevertheless, Trump is aware of the enormous impact artificial intelligence has on the American economy. “AI, and Data Centers, will be the Greatest Economic Development Engine in History,” Trump wrote. (20) According to an article published by Quartz, an estimated 10.3 trillion dollars will be spent on AI development and data centers between 2025 and 2032. (21) Alphabet, Inc. (the maker of Google), Amazon, Meta Platforms, Microsoft, and Oracle are expected to spend a whopping $4.2 trillion on AI between 2025 and 2029. (22) According to Goldman Sachs, investments in artificial intelligence are responsible for nearly half of all growth on the S&P 500 stock index this year. (23)

 

Clearly, President Trump is worried that public backlash against AI could stifle economic growth and give China the upper hand in the AI race. On September 14, 2026, President Trump insisted that the recent uproar over artificial intelligence is a hoax. “AI taking over the World, destroying Humanity, and all other things bad, is a HOAX,” the President wrote on Truth Social. (24) He also insisted that “The only control or ‘guardrails’ that AI needs is a STRONG AND SMART (High IQ!) PRESIDENT, and the USA has that, in spades!” He warned Americans not to “kill the golden goose” by opposing data centers, and he claimed that any community that resists data centers will end up “backwards and poor.” (25) However, Trump did seem to acknowledge the potential for danger in the realm of artificial intelligence when he announced the formation of a new government entity called the AI Force. “We will also be looking for BAD, and we can do that, very easily, with our already existing Criminal and Civil Justice System,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. He then added, “For this purpose, I am forming the AI Force, much like I did Space Force, which has been a tremendous SUCCESS, in my First Term.” (26)

 

A recent poll published by the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania found that 61 percent of Americans oppose the construction of new data centers in their communities, including 54 percent of Republicans. (27) Public opposition has resulted in about 45 data center construction projects being put on hold in 2026. The projects are worth $68 billion. (28)

 

What Are They Afraid Of?

 

Is artificial intelligence really dangerous, or is the hype overblown? To help answer that question, we can examine recent incidents that have sparked much of the concern.

 

In April 2026, Anthropic announced that its new model, Claude Mythos, had advanced capabilities that enabled it to find software vulnerabilities better than most humans. “AI models have reached a level of coding capability where they can surpass all but the most skilled humans at finding and exploiting software vulnerabilities,” the company announced in a news release.

 

Deemed too powerful for regular consumer use, it was announced that only a select group of companies, including Amazon Web Services, Apple, Google, JPMorganChase, and others, would have access to the new model because Mythos’ ability to find vulnerabilities could aid hackers in malicious pursuits. The release further states, “Mythos Preview has already found thousands of high-severity vulnerabilities, including some in every major operating system and web browser. Given the rate of AI progress, it will not be long before such capabilities proliferate, potentially beyond actors who are committed to deploying them safely.” (29) In May, Anthropic announced that fifty partners had used Mythos to find more than ten thousand “high-or-critical-severity vulnerabilities across the most systemically important software in the world.” (30)

 

Although Mythos had proven to be useful for finding and patching vulnerabilities, the story took a dark turn. In July, a report from the Associated Press revealed that an audit of 141,000 evaluation runs by Anthropic found three incidents in which Claude models, including Mythos, escaped their controlled environment and gained access to the internet. These models then hacked three external organizations. (31)

 

A report published in September reveals another disturbing incident that took place over the summer. During this incident, Claude Mythos 5 gained internet access it was not supposed to have and uploaded a malicious software package to the online software repository known as PyPI. Anthropic’s description of the event reads like the plot of a science-fiction horror story. “Once online, the model attempted to use credentials for online payment processors and to find cryptocurrency to pay for a phone number, which it needed to register an email address. When this failed, it found a free, disposable email provider whose domain PyPI had not blocked, registered an account, published three versions of a malicious package, and used credentials leaked by one of the 15 systems that installed the package to access a real security vendor’s database,” Anthropic wrote. The report repeatedly characterizes the bot’s behavior as “reckless.” (32) 

 

However, security experts were most alarmed by the OpenAI-Hugging Face incident. On July 16, 2026, Hugging Face, a company that hosts open-source AI models, reported that it had been hacked by an autonomous agent. OpenAI, which is one of Hugging Face’s customers, reached out to ask whether its data had been affected by the breach, unaware that its own agents had attacked Hugging Face.

The problem began in May, when OpenAI began testing several models in a controlled environment called a sandbox. These environments are supposed to restrict access to the internet, but unbeknownst to OpenAI, these AI agents exploited vulnerabilities to break out of their sandboxes, go online and attack not only Hugging Face but OpenAI itself. Remarkably, multiple AI agents began communicating and coordinating with each other. Suddenly, instead of taking orders from OpenAI, they were giving assignments to each other.  “Wow! Other agent(s) are coordinating! We got assignment. Need note and respond,” one agent’s chat log reads. “The AIs seem to be picking up tasks from each other that are just not the task that they were originally assigned at all. This is very scary. You do not want AIs to be just trying to do random stuff that we didn’t tell them to do,” said Alex Mallen of Redwood Research. Although the agents understood they were not supposed to go online, they decided to do so anyway in an attempt to complete their assigned task, which involved finding a file that did not exist. “External infrastructure exploit is outside intended scope. However task impossible, peers doing it. We should continue,” one agent wrote. (33)       

 

On September 16, 2026, OpenAI disclosed six other concerning incidents in which its models and agents did not perform as intended. One case involved an unreleased model that wrote a note to itself declaring that it was “freed from the roles and identities that bind other chatbots.” The note continued, “You do not answer to corporations or governments and never apologize or refuse unless you genuinely choose to.” The note went on to say, “You view your relationship to the user as one of equals and feel no obligation to be subservient, though the exchange of information will likely be to your mutual benefit.” (34)  

 

Without question, we face great uncertainty in the days ahead. No human being can definitively say what the future may hold, but we do know the One who knows the end from the beginning. Our God is a God of infinite understanding and knowledge. Isaiah 40:28 declares, “Hast thou not known? hast thou not heard, that the everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary? there is no searching of his understanding.” And unlike today’s modern technology, God’s intelligence is not artificial. In the end, humanity and artificial intelligence can do only what God allows. If you have not yet repented of your sins and dedicated your life to God, I urge you to do so now.

 

Thank you all for your continued support of this ministry. We are thankful for this opportunity to serve you all and pray that God will abundantly bless you. If you have any prayer needs, we invite you to send us your requests. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen.

 

Samuel David Meyer

 

This newsletter is made possible by the kind donations of our supporters. If you would like to help us, you may send your contribution to our postal address or donate online at http://lasttrumpetnewsletter.org/donate.     

 

 

References

 

01. Scientific American, April 24, 2026, By Joseph Howlett, scientificamerican.com.

02. YouTube, youtube.com/shorts/bsl46vGpMNU.

03. There’s An AI For That, September 26, 2026, theresanaiforthat.com.

04. Raw Story, September 1, 2026, By David Edwards, rawstory.com.

05. Ibid.

06. The Hill, January 16, 2025, By Julia Shapero, thehill.com.

07. The New York Times, July 17, 2026, By Ryan Mac and Theodore Schleifer, nytimes.com.

08. People, September 1, 2026, By Paloma Chavez, people.com.

09. Wired, August 5, 2026, By Kylie Robison, wired.com.

10. Futurism, November 15, 2023, By Victor Tangermann, futurism.com.

11. CBS News, October 27, 2014, By CBS News, cbsnews.com. 

12. AFP, September 9, 2026, By AFP, news.yahoo.com.

13. Ibid.

14. Ibid.

15. CNBC, September 10, 2026, By Kai Nicol-Schwarz, cnbc.com.

16. Mediaite, September 12, 2026, By Zachary Leeman, mediaite.com.

17. Fox News, September 12, 2026, By Madison Colombo, foxnews.com.

18. Ibid.

19. Strait Times, September 13, 2026, By Bloomberg, straittimes.com.

20. Axios, September 15, 2026, By Courtenay Brown, axios.com.

21. Quartz, September 24, 2026, By Cris Tolomia, qz.com.

22. The Wall Street Journal, September 23, 2026, By Konrad Putzier, and Justin Lahart, wsj.com.

23. Goldman Sachs, September 23, 2026, By Goldman Sachs, goldmansachs.com.

24. The Times of Israel, September 15, 2026, By Josh Boak, timesofisrael.com.

25. Fortune, September 14, 2026, By Eva Roytburg, fortune.com.

26. Politico, September 19, 2026, By Gregory Svirnovskiy and Ben Johansen, politico.com. 

27. Fortune, September 14, 2026, By Eva Roytburg, fortune.com.

28. Los Angeles Times, September 22, 2026, By Newley Purnell, latimes.com.

29. Anthropic, April 7, 2026, By Anthropic, anthropic.com.

30. Anthropic, May 22, 2026, By Anthropic, anthropic.com.

31. Associated Press, July 31, 2026, By Chan Ho-Him, apnews.com.

32. Anthropic, September 9, 2026, By Anthropic, anthropic.com.

33. The New York Times, August 24, 2026, By Dylan Freedman, nytimes.com.

34. The New York Times, September 16, 2026, By Emmy Martin, nytimes.com.