Trust Inspiration
I was teaching a group of little boys in both Primary and Cub Scouts. I came to know them well as they stopped by for cookies on their way home from school several times a week. Once we all understood each other, I found them to be friendly, cheerful and fun to be with. However, after a time, I began to notice a change in them. They became quieter and more anxious. After Cub Scout meetings, they often pleaded to be allowed to stay at my home until my husband returned from work and to have him take them home, even though they all lived in my neighborhood. I was puzzled but they insisted nothing was wrong and informal conversations with their families revealed nothing.
It was my habit to read over my lesson manual each Sunday afternoon. I always studied the next week’s lesson in detail and then read the next two or three lessons as well, to start getting them into my head. We were studying the lives of the prophets, and the lessons took a lot of study time. One Sunday, I reached into my Primary bag for my lesson manual and it was gone. I knew it had been in my bag when I left the classroom, but I looked around the apartment and couldn’t find it. I decided to stop by the church on Wednesday during Mutual and check the lost and found. Somehow Wednesday came and went and I forgot to get the book. I decided I could prepare the lesson from memory. After all, I had read it over many times in the past several weeks, and I had books on the prophets at home I could use to check the details. I could not remember which prophet we were supposed to learn about. In fact, I couldn’t remember which prophet I had taught about on Sunday, either. My mind was a complete blank. The Spirit was whispering, but I was not listening. I was too busy trying to remember which prophet we were on.
Every day, I tried to remember. I even prayed, but since what the Spirit was telling me had nothing to do with which prophet we needed to learn about, I didn’t listen. The still, small voice was louder now, but my hearing was getting worse as the week progressed and I began to feel panicky. How could I face those boys with no lesson?
When Sunday morning came, and I still had no recollection of the prophet we should study, and no lesson plan, I decided to get the chart with all the prophets' pictures on it and do a review. By now, I was no longer even thinking about asking God for help. I had never shown up for Primary unprepared before, and I was so nervous I couldn’t have heard the Spirit if it had been screaming at me.
I began a review and asked the children to tell me what the prophets taught us. They called out several ideas, and then one boy said, “Don’t take drugs.” The other children turned and glared at him and the anger in the classroom was so strong, I could feel the Spirit leave the room for just a moment. But then it returned and I asked, “Do you boys know anyone who uses or sells drugs?” The boys stared at their feet in silence and one boy said angrily, “We don’t want to talk about this.”
Ah-hah! I could hear the Spirit now, and it was telling me that this was what I was supposed to be learning from the boys today--something I could have known sooner if I had been listening. But it also told me to change the subject and move on. I did, but that afternoon, my manual was in plain sight on my bookcase. I knew it had been removed from my home because otherwise I would have taught the lesson in the book and never found out what I was supposed to learn. This time when I prayed, I really listened and learned what to do.
When the boys came to Cub Scouts that week at my apartment, they found the carpet covered with newspapers. I told them we were going to sit on the floor, eat cookies and make anything they wanted from homemade clay. As they worked and ate, I gently told them that we needed to discuss the person they knew who used and sold drugs. I told them God wanted them to discuss it, and finally they did. A boy in the neighborhood had been hitting them every day because they would not take the drugs he offered. He waited for them down the street from my house. They hadn’t told anyone because he came from a respected family and they thought they wouldn’t be believed. I was able to go to the bishop and receive help and protection for my boys.
That week I learned a valuable lesson. Although we are counseled to teach the lesson in the manual, we are also instructed to trust inspiration in order to teach children, not lessons. There are times when God needs us to focus on the special needs of a student or class, and we can only know when those times are by listening.
By Terrie Lynn Bittner