Reading Rebecca's post really got me thinking, especially what she said about planning. I was reminded of a C. S. Lewis quote, which I heard from Neal A. Maxwell on a KBYU rebroadcast of something about a million years ago:
Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on: you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently He starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of — throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were going to be made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace. He intends to come and live in it Himself.
Though this quote is used to explain adversity (when bad things happen to good people), I think it can apply to us as we work to follow the promptings, or SGBDs, as they come. Our plans may be good, but God's plans are always better, in fact they are the best.
In D&C 46: 7 we learn a pattern for receiving inspiration:
But ye are commanded in all things to ask of God, who giveth liberally; and that which the Spirit testifies unto you even so I would that ye should do in all holiness of heart, walking uprightly before me, considering the end of your salvation, doing all things with prayer and thanksgiving, that ye may not be seduced by evil spirits, or doctrines of devils, or the commandments of men; for some are of men, and others of devils.
Section 47 expresses the will of the Lord relative to governing and conducting church meetings. However, I think that verse seven can be applied anytime we seek the Lord's guidance. This is how we become subcontractors in His work of making each of into a "palace" fit for Him to inhabit.
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