Early one afternoon my wife had looked through our store of keepsakes, the kind that we went through and really decided that we wanted to keep. Its contents make up a somewhat decent-sized old-fashioned-looking chest. She found a frame that my sister, her Confirmation sponsor and college friend, had give to her at some point. The words, written in beautiful calligraphy, read thus: “For I know well the plans I have in mind for you, says the LORD, plans for your welfare, not for woe! Plans to give you a future full of hope.” This was an important frame to her and to me as well, but it had been stowed away ever since we made a big move a couple of years ago. That day it surfaced as its message would be useful in communicating something God wanted to say to us.

After the day had passed and we…