Various problems, overheating and stall at idle

The other day i let my 88 Xj idle for five to ten minutes, then drove the short distance home, when i got there the engine temp light was on (no guage). It wasn't too horably hot so i figured it was just cranky at me for leaving it running, the next morning on my way to work it stalled at red lights, stop signs etc. usually taking a lott of cranking to start back up. I figured it couldn't hurt to change the fuel fillter, i did that and it helped the stalling problem a little, but did not completely fix it. Im not sure wether or not the problems are related or not, any ideas would be helpfull.