Follow all promptings IMMEDIATELY!

About six months ago, we were staying in the mission home for HurriConference and we got to watch the biopic of President Monson's life.  I remember the story of the time that President Monson received a prompting to leave his "important church meeting" and go visit a particular member of the Church.  At the time, he brushed that prompting aside.  But the prompting kept coming.  And so finally, belatedly, he decided to heed the prompting.  He excused himself from the meeting and rushed to the hospital bedside of his friend, only to find out that his friend had just passed away.  Before passing away, the friend had been asking for him.  Because he did not respond immediately to the prompting, he missed out on a chance to be an instrument in God's hands.

I kinda feel that way today.  Yesterday morning I felt like we should stop by Nicki G's house before going to church, just to make sure that she was up and determined to come to church.  But I felt like going to ward council was more important.  

We had already updated our ward mission leader about what help we wanted from ward council.  If we had stopped by Nicki's house, we would have found her feeling like she couldn't attend church because she woke up late and thought she needed to be at the church building by 8:30.  We would have been able to reassure her that sacrament meeting does not begin until 9 AM, and we could have stayed with her, offering emotional support as she continued to get herself and her 12-month old baby ready for church.  She would have come to church and listened to a powerful talk about forgiving those who have hurt us.  She would have felt the Spirit.  

Instead, I ignored a prompting, and my stubbornness negatively affected one of Heavenly Father's children.

Luckily, Heavenly Father *has* given us the doctrine of repentance.  During the sacrament, I had a chance to talk to my Father about our morning.  We made plans to go see Nicki next Sunday at about 8 AM.  And I learned pretty much the same lesson that President Monson learned early on in his life.