“Put this aside,” a term used in cooking, is necessary here. “A bruised reed He will not break and a dimly burning wick He will not extinguish …” (Isaiah 42:3). Put this aside, we’ll use it later …

We experience gratefulness in life for various things and in varying degrees. I was over-the-top grateful to find myself at the wedding of my adopted nephew David Santos earlier this month. David had suffered disappointment and loss that could have caused him to despair of life.

He had lost his mom, Myrna, my decades-old best friend, and his sister Lizette in a car accident on the Garden State…