The Farmer Who Tried to Feed the Landlord

In 2019, a young tenant farmer outside Lancaster, Pennsylvania named Marcus Behr wanted to impress the landowner who had generously leased him four hundred acres at well below market rate. So Marcus boxed up a bushel of his finest sweet corn, drove it to the owner's estate, and left it on the porch with a handwritten note of thanks.

The landowner, David Graber, called him that evening, laughing warmly. "Marcus, I own eleven thousand acres across three counties. I have more corn than I could eat in ten lifetimes." Then his voice softened. "But that note you wrote — where you told me what this land means to your family, how your kids are learning to work the soil — I read that three times. That's what I wanted."

Marcus had it exactly backward. He thought the gift was the corn. The gift was the gratitude.

This is the heart of Psalm 50. The Almighty summons heaven and earth and makes an astonishing declaration: "Every animal of the forest is Mine, and the cattle on a thousand hills." He does not need our offerings. He owns it all. What stops Him in His tracks is not ritual sacrifice but a heart that says, "Thank You — and I mean it." The one who offers thanksgiving as a sacrifice, the psalmist tells us, truly glorifies God. Not because the Almighty is lacking, but because genuine gratitude is the one thing we can give that He does not already possess.