Here Today, Gone Tomorrow?

At Whit's End, Connie worries about the decision facing Mitch. Agent Bourland wants him to join the FBI, but Mitch has not decided whether to leave Odyssey. Before Connie and Whit can discuss it further, Officer Burke arrives with a shocking request: Whit must come to the police station for questioning about a hit-and-run accident.

Mitch hurries over after Connie calls him. Whit soon returns and explains that a used Toyota Tercel connected to the accident has been purchased in his name. He could not have been driving it because he was in Chicago at the time. Someone has obtained enough of his personal information to use his address, phone number, and bank account, and the police believe that his identity has been stolen.

Whit begins canceling his credit cards and changing his bank accounts. Mitch suggests that they visit the dealer who sold the car, even though the police do not expect the lead to go far. Connie joins them, eager to interrogate a suspect, but Mitch assigns her the safer role of silent cop.

At Honest Erwin's used-car lot, Erwin insists that the buyer had identification and cash that seemed genuine. His required copy of the driver's license contains a blurry photograph, perhaps deliberately made difficult to recognize. Erwin also remembers that the buyer arrived in a white pickup truck with all-terrain tires and a cracked windshield. An older woman waited inside, and Erwin thought he heard the man call her Mom.

Mitch explains that the police may not devote many resources to an identity-theft case in which no one was injured. Still, every purchase creates another chance for the thief to make a mistake. He urges Whit to inspect his latest bills while Agent Bourland presses Mitch for an answer about the FBI by the end of the week.

While shopping with Joanne, Connie admits that Mitch seems pulled in both directions. She and Mitch have prayed for guidance, but neither can recognize a clear answer. Joanne recalls how reluctant she had once been to leave the life and ministry she loved in Chicago. After falling in love with Jack and moving to Odyssey, however, she found a life better than the one she had imagined. Joanne cannot choose Connie's path for her, but she assures her that God is present and will guide her when the time is right.

Whit discovers a bill from Ted's Appliances for an expensive television he never bought. Because the purchase was made online, Mitch asks Bourland for authority to do preliminary work on the FBI's internet-fraud investigation. He then finds that several new credit cards have also been opened in Whit's name. The television's delivery address may finally give them somewhere to look.

Mitch also searches Whit's computer for traces left by an intruder. He explains to Connie that a computer's identifying address can act like a fingerprint, though a skilled hacker might conceal it. As the search runs, he and Connie drive to a restaurant by the lake and return to their uncertainty about his future.

Both of them have begun treating every coincidence as a possible message. A sermon about Ruth leaving home seems to say that Mitch should go, while a passage about remaining in Babylon seems to say that he should stay. Even the restaurant's initials, FBI, become part of their anxious argument until Mitch points out how ridiculous it is to choose a career according to a pancake house.

Back at Whit's End, the computer search produces an answer that makes no sense. The hacker's trail leads to Mitch's own computer. Someone has not merely stolen Whit's identity; the criminal has deliberately made Mitch appear responsible. Whit realizes that their enemy must know them both and want to hurt them both.

Inside Lakeview Prison, a guard secretly supplies a prisoner named Charles with computers and internet access. The guard worries about the risk and asks when he will be paid, but Charles promises that far more than money awaits them. For Charles, the scheme also offers the sweet taste of revenge.