I’m starting to think differently. Some things matter much less than they once did. I’ve lost my appetite for putting time and money into things that really amount to nothing. At this point in life, I’d rather invest in something meaningful and lasting.

It’s not complicated. People over things. Christ died to save people. He loves us and has given us all things richly to enjoy. But at the end of the day, we have to leave it all behind. Other people are all we can take out of this world.

But most of us are captivated by petty things, things like grass and silverware.

On a 3-mile walk one afternoon, I passed the yard of an elderly couple overseeing the installation of an in-ground sprinkler system. You probably know the type: little black heads that pop out of the ground on a timer.

These white-headed people were meticulously pointing out where the sprinklers needed to be angled more or less to spray the grass and shrubs just so. In response to each instruction, the landscape guys, Latinos wearing bright-colored T-shirts, ran around making adjustments. On the return home, I found them still at, the sun dropping low in the sky.

• I thought about our dismal attempts at growing a first lawn as new homeowners. In our next home, we promptly put in warm season Zoysia grass plugs, a thick, slow-growing, mostly weed-free variety that filled every bald spot. It’s tan-colored in cool weather and a hearty green in the August heat when all the fescue lawns are brown.

Grass is a low priority in my life these days. If I live to get really old and have disposable income, I hope to God that I am not pouring money into watering dirt.

My time, your time, here is too limited to fixate on cultivating something that’s ultimately cut down. “The grass withers, the flower fades. But the word of God stands forever.” (Isaiah 40:8)

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While admiring heirloom jewelry at a shop, I overheard a customer discussing the purchase of an estate silver service valued at about $3,000. That’s $3,000 worth of forks, knives, spoons and serving pieces. It was weighty-looking stuff, polished to a shine that begged for sunglasses, clearly intended to be a family treasure.

At that moment, I wondered how much of the precious things we pass down will be turned into cash with no familial sentiment. Do Millennials even cook regularly let alone know how to set a fine dining table with that kind of cutlery?

A better question: how many hungry people could be fed by converting pricey forks into food donated to soup kitchens, food banks, and rescue missions?

• I’m resisting the impulse to accumulate. I’m de-cluttering, gifting, learning to live more simply. I’d rather have treasure in heaven, where God is and where I expect to be.

Nothing wrong with beautiful lawns, fine dining, heirlooms. They’re just temporal, earthly. Better to hope in God, who is eternal, and to “do good, be generous and willing to share.” (I Timothy 6:18)

Grass is simply a reminder: time is short.

“As for man, his days are like grass

As a flower of the field, so he flourishes

For the wind passes over it, and it is gone,

And its place remembers it no more” Psalm 103:15-16