Photo and Commentary ©2025 by Maylan Schurch
Sabbath, July 19, 2025
Not far from where I live are these two houses. At first glance, you might say, “Aha. One family waters its lawn and one doesn’t. Interesting.”
And you would be right. But I know some additional backstory which, to my mind, brings this photo up to the level of a parable.
Look at the lawn on the right. As you can see, it looks beautiful. And on most days you can see not only the lush grass but a garden hose sprawled across it. And in the mornings as well as the evenings, the householder stands holding that hose, irrigating the grass to its very corners.
But roll back the video a few years, and this lawn looked quite different. Its grass was mowed short, but there were large bare patches on it. I would see the man standing out there, toiling disconsolately over those brown spots, trying to get them to grow. But nothing he tried seemed to work.
But then – and it might’ve been during the pandemic – the man hired a cheerful group of landscapers to scrape off the old grass and lay down sod. And the homeowner has determined to keep that lawn looking beautiful, and that’s why it looks way it does today. He’s made it high on his priority list.
Now shift your gaze to the other lawn. This family has three children, and neither the dad nor the mom has retired (which is the case with the man with the lovely lawn). The dad also works on the family’s cars, keeping each one finely tuned in every way. Though in past years, he or another family member could be seen sporadically irrigating their lawn, during the past couple of years he has decided to let the lawn go brown – like mine, and like my neighbor’s to the left, and like several other lawns in our cul-de-sac.
Again, it’s a matter of priorities. There are obviously no biblical commands about lawn care, but Jesus did insist that we think carefully about what’s important.
For two crisp, thought-provoking Bible verses about priorities, click the following link: