February 17

They say the economy is in a tailspin but there’s one time and place you’ll never prove it, and that’s dinner time at a restaurant—any evening, any restaurant. They’re always filled with customers! Even in these trying financial times, people do not confine themselves to their own thrifty kitchens. They prefer dining out.

Isaiah 1:19 tells us, “If you are willing and obedient, you shall eat of the good of the land,” and we have appropriated that promise to ourselves—big time—in our society. We’re not merely into cheap fast food joints, we’re into fine restaurant dining. We prefer eating out to preparing our meals in our own kitchens.

Even in tough financial times, we maintain our habit of eating out frequently, of eating the good of the land, but God had so much more for us in mind when He conveyed that promise to us. He has lavished our land with blessings, many of which are clearly delineated in our Constitution. They are rights for which our forefathers laid down their lives. They are concepts of freedom which we have endeavored to share with the rest of the world.

Yet we have become complacent about these inalienable rights that our founding fathers knew came to all men through the endowment of our Creator. We have lived in the privilege of them for so long that we have begun to take them for granted. We have not required the keepers of our history to assure the accurate chronicling of our nation’s special blessings. We have become satiated on the good of the land and do not value it or the Provider of it.