AI-narrated recordings
The publishers barred ministries from recording the devotionals and posting them on YouTube, which left us without audio.
Other ministries chose to narrate devotionals generated by AI. We built a process in which AI only reads each devotional's real text, without changing anything. It may still make a few mistakes, and these recordings are not posted on YouTube.
Producing them every day is costly. Thank you for your support and patience.
Reading options
Verse:He leads me beside peaceful streams. He renews my strength. He guides me along right paths, bringing honor to his name. —Psalm 23:2, 3, NLT
At the age of fifty-four, I was retired on disability after working for twenty-one years at the Internal Revenue Service. Suddenly cast out of management ranks with no immediate plans for the rest of my life, I was filled with misgivings and anxiety over the unwanted drama in my life. I moved to Florida in the USA, but after six months found myself uprooted again to Lansing, Michigan, USA, where my mother resided.
Neither of these moves were planned.
Jimmy and Rosalyn Carter’s book Everything to Gain—Making the Most of the Rest of Your Life helped change my thinking. It forced me to consider that if the president of the United States could find purpose after the American people had thrown him out of office, I should be able to make sense of my forced early retirement and do likewise.
For a year and a half, I worked as a secretary-bookkeeper for one of the Adventist church schools. Then I found a job as a tax preparer for a tax franchise, and during the off-season I became an accountant for the franchise’s year-round clients.
I worked at a certified public accountant office and spent several years working for temp agencies. At church I was a co-organizer for singles, taking camping trips and canoe trips and enjoying fall colors in northern lower Michigan.
It was fun to provide Thanksgiving dinner for Michigan State University students who could not go home for the holidays. I also trained for a chaplain assistant position at a local hospital. My physical health improved, and I no longer needed medication.
Though at first I did not understand why retirement had been thrust on me, I now saw how the Lord had worked in my life all along.
I became the women’s ministry leader and headed up the communications committee at my church. The grief I felt at being turned out to pasture turned to gratitude. Fast-forward thirty years—I have my own business preparing taxes for about eighty to ninety clients. Every day I walk five miles. My youngest son lives with me in California, helps with my computer and internet problems, and drives me around on California highways.
We love to work together in the kitchen, preparing our favorite vegan dishes. When we let God, He renews our strength and guides us along the right paths. With God life is good!
Patricia Hook Rhyndress Bodi