"So you shall keep the commandments of the Lord your God by walking in his ways and by fearing him. 7For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and springs, flowing out in the valleys and hills, 8a land of wheat and barley, of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, a land of olive trees and honey, 9a land in which you will eat bread without scarcity, in which you will lack nothing, a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills you can dig copper. 10And you shall eat and be full, and you shall bless the Lord your God for the good land he has given you." (Deuteronomy 8:1-10).

I'm currently reading a book on the American West, appropriately titled "The Undiscovered Country: Triumph, Tragedy, and the Shaping of the American West" by Paul Andrew Hutton, a historian out of the University of New Mexico (distinguished professor emeritus) (Dutton Penguin Random House, 2025).

In the book, he writes of Daniel Boone taking settlers through the Appalachians via the Cumberland Gap into what would become Kentucky and the abundance of the land. Early in our history as a nation, still not settled, those who saw the untapped potential of this bountiful land certainly understood the potential it promised. There was the experience of awe when seeing this land for the first time noted in the book. The move westward, through the late 1800s, shaped our nation and our people in many ways.

The lesson for today comes from Deuteronomy and is another assigned reading for Thanksgiving.

God has given to us in abundance. The land has been fruitful for us and for many generations and has impacted the world due to its bounty. May we continue to "love our neighbors as ourselves" by sharing in this abundance, as we did this year with our food baskets put together by the youth for Lubbock Impact and our work every summer at the South Plains Food Bank.

Pray we praise God from whom all blessings flow, and that we as a people continue to give thanks daily and annually for these blessings. As we observe Thanksgiving, pray we remember all we have and give thanks to God, who supplies us in abundance.