Day Fifteen - Lessons on priorities

So yesterday I came into my office after lunch to a message that someone had stopped by over the lunch hour looking to talk to the pastor about a benevolence issue. I was told that this person would stop by around 1:30 again to see me. So I went into my office at about 3 minutes to 1 and thought to myself, "Excellent! I can sit down and do my midday prayers and be done before this person returns"

Less than a minute later this person comes back for their meeting.

I need to confess that while I was happy to have a pastoral visit - and am always happy to have people stop by - for some reason (clue-the reason was a sinful attitude) the timing really frustrated me. I saw this person as an interruption into my sanctified time with God in prayer that I have grown so desperate for over the last two weeks, rather than an opportunity to encounter Jesus. I was able to shake the resentment within the first couple minutes of our meeting but God wanted me to learn something out of that experience.

When I was able to help this person on behalf of the church and we bid our goodbyes there was a nagging sense of wrongness in my soul. Something simply wasn't as it should be, but I went back about the task of preparing for today's Lenten service at the church. It wasn't until about 40 minutes later when I realized that I hadn't returned to my midday prayers (that just about an hour earlier I was so frustrated to be taken away from) that God revealed to me exactly what was bothering me. Here is what was waiting for me in prayer:

The Refrain for the Midday Lessons
I have been young and now I am old,* but never have I seen the righteous forsaken, or their children begging bread.
Psalm 37:26

The Midday Psalm
Happy Are They Who Consider the Poor and Needy Happy are they who consider the poor and needy!* the LORD will deliver them in the time of trouble. The LORD preserves them and keeps them alive, so that they may be happy in the land;* he does not hand them over to the will of their enemies. The LORD sustains them on their sickbed* and ministers to them in their illness.
Psalm 41:1-3

The problem was that I made something more important in my heart than a person. That I loved my discipline (even for a short few moments) more than I loved my fellow human being. That for a short time there I was in my heart one of the goats (read Matthew 25:31ff for an explanation of what I mean). I guess my sanctification is still ongoing and I still have a lot to learn through this discipline of prayer.

May the Lord continue to teach me as I try my best o follow.
Happy Lenting.