“The right thing at the wrong time is the wrong thing.”
I read this quote by Joshua Harris many years ago, and its accuracy has never stopped striking me. So often, our deepest struggle is not that we are doing bad things, but that we are doing good things at the wrong time.
A clear and humorous example brings me back to my years offering spiritual direction to college students. If they had a major exam the next morning, so many of them would end up meticulously cleaning their rooms instead of studying! Now, cleaning your room is a good and right thing to do. But if you do it when you are supposed to be studying, it becomes the wrong thing.
I also chuckle when I think of dinners with married couples. Every now and then, a wife will gently kick her husband under the table because he has said something untimely. What the husband said may have been completely true and good, but because it came out at the wrong moment, it only caused his wife embarrassment.
As the book of Ecclesiastes reminds us, “There is an appointed time for everything” (Ecc. 3:1). The Prophet Haggai, writing in the post-exilic era, was likely familiar with this beautiful truth: that for everything there is a season, and that God has ordained all things from His sovereign wisdom. (The word “ordain,” coming from the Latin ordo, beautifully signifies a “row, rank, or series.”)
Haggai spoke his message to the Jews who had recently returned from the Babylonian exile. His core message was a call to put God first by prioritizing the rebuilding of His temple, which lay in ruins, over personal comforts and material pursuits.
“Is it time for you to dwell in paneled houses, while this house lies in ruins?” (Hag 1:4)
You and I can easily sympathize with these people. They were trying to rebuild their lives after being exiled for decades. They hadn’t overtly rejected God, nor had they forgotten Him. They were simply trying to put the pieces back together: rebuilding their homes, re-establishing their farming, and caring for their livestock. But I wonder if, amid their legitimate needs, they got carried away and struggled to properly order their priorities.
Haggai pointed out that the community’s economic struggles and poor harvests were a direct result of neglecting God’s house. No matter how much time and energy we pour into our actions, if we forget the Lord, we become like a stripped screw spinning in place—leaving us tired, cranky, and disappointed.
The solution, however, is often simple and close at hand. Just as inserting a wooden toothpick into a stripped hole gives a screw something new to grip and bite into, so it is with our days. Inserting the “fresh air” of time with the Lord gives us a new anchor, making our subsequent work all the more effective.
Isn’t it a common experience that, when we are hyper-focused on a project, we risk developing tunnel vision? We stop noticing the people, needs, and world around us. Or, on the flip side, how often do we lose sight of our true priorities because smaller, unimportant tasks distract us?
I often recall my parish priest, Don Giorgio, reminding our congregation that “the most important thing is that the most important thing remains the most important thing.” He was a man of incredible clarity. He knew exactly what came first, and what could—and should—wait.
We see this same clarity in the Gospels. In Luke 9:51-56, the apostles ask Jesus, “Lord, do you want us to call down fire from heaven to consume them?” wanting to punish the Samaritans for not welcoming Him. As the great Italian author Don Fabio Rosini points out, Jesus doesn’t waste a single moment on this vindictive request. He stays entirely focused on His mission. Don Fabio advises that we must stay grounded in our core priorities, or we will live a life dictated by constant interruptions. Being obedient to our priorities requires us to say no—no to unnecessary detours, and no to wasting time.
The words of the Prophet Haggai invite us to pause and look inward: How do we relate to the priorities in our lives? Are we good at discerning what we need to do, and when? Or do we allow external pressures and expectations to dictate our daily agenda? Do we remember to give God His due, even when our current tasks feel like they could consume every waking hour?
Haggai was not blaming the returning exiles for wanting to settle down and build homes. Rather, he was gently rebuking their misplaced priorities—the way they withheld the time, talent, and treasure needed to also rebuild the Lord’s Temple.
One of the great temptations we face is the belief that if we give something away, we will be left with less. We worry that if we dedicate 30 minutes a day to prayer or spend an hour a week visiting an elderly relative or volunteering, we won’t have enough time for the rest of our heavy workload.
In my experience, the exact opposite happens. The more time I freely give to the Lord and to those in need, the more He enhances the quality of the time I have left. Mathematically, yes, I may have less time in the day. But qualitatively, the time left to accomplish what is on my plate becomes much greater and more fruitful.
This past summer, I was blessed to spend three weeks visiting my dad in my hometown. Since my mom’s passing two years ago, his health has declined rapidly. At 91 years old, dealing with advanced Alzheimer’s, he now lives in a beautiful nursing home just a mile from the house where I grew up.
Every afternoon, I would spend two hours with him, pushing his wheelchair through a stunning rose garden that he “helps” water. Francesco, the gardener, knows him well by now. Every so often, he will hand my dad the hose, making him feel like he is actively contributing to the beauty of the place. In a worldly sense, Francesco is “wasting time” with my dad, pausing his own duties for 30 seconds just to hand over the hose. But he understands that making an elderly resident feel useful is a higher priority than just completing a task.
The Prophet Haggai offers this same encouragement to the People of Israel, and to us:
“Be strong, all you people of the land—oracle of the LORD—and work! For I am with you—oracle of the LORD of hosts.” (Hag 2:4)
The Lord is entirely ready to bless our endeavors and our labor. May we never be afraid of “wasting time” on Him, or on the vulnerable people around us. As we set our priorities in their proper order, we will find that the blessings of the Lord begin to flow abundantly.
This month’s meditation is by Sr. Raffaella Cavallin, AVI.
