Brothers and sisters, it is a surreal experience
to be standing here talking to you today.
Forty-eight years ago I first set foot on
this campus as a seventeen-year-old freshman.
I remember attending BYU devotionals in the
Smith Fieldhouse (because there was no Marriott
Center yet), listening to speakers just like
you are doing.
Things have changed a lot since then.
The female students were not allowed to wear
pants on campus—yes, we were cold all winter
long.
We whitewashed the Y on the mountain every
year with a very long bucket brigade, and
the Y was lit with real fire.
David O. McKay was the prophet, Lyndon B.
Johnson was the president of the United States,
and I had lost a good friend in the war in
Vietnam.
The good news is that I did graduate from
BYU.
The bad news is that it took me forty-one
years to do it.
By showing this picture I'm really putting myself out there, I know, but
that's how happy I was. I don't recommend that educational strategy for any of you.
I can assure you that there is nothing in
my life that could possibly have given me
the notion that someday I would be standing
at a podium in the Marriott Center delivering
a devotional address.
Just as with so many events that have taken
place in my life during the past three and
a half years, I truly relate to Sister Marjorie
Pay Hinckley, who often said that she was
“wondering how a nice girl like me got into
a mess like this.”
Maybe there are some lessons to be learned
from this.
The month of December is the birth month of
the Prophet Joseph Smith.
With that as inspiration, I would like to
talk about three principles inspired by events
from the early life of Joseph Smith that might
be of value in your current situations and lives.
President Gordon B. Hinckley once quoted Reverend
Edward T. Sullivan, who said:
When God wants a great work done in the world
or a great wrong righted, he goes about it
in a very unusual way.
He doesn’t stir up his earthquakes or send
forth his thunderbolts.
Instead, he has a helpless baby born.
After a long period of apostasy and spiritual
darkness, the time had come to fulfill the
promises of the Lord that the Church of Jesus
Christ would be restored to the earth with
all of the keys and authority found in the
original Church in Christ’s day.
How would the Lord accomplish this great task?
A baby was born.
On December 23, 1805, a poor farmer’s wife
by the name of Lucy Mack Smith gave birth
to a baby boy who was named after his father,
Joseph Smith.
He was their fourth child—he had two older
brothers and an older sister.
Who could have guessed that this little obscure
baby boy born in a small rented log house
in the woods of Vermont to a family of very
meager means would one day be described liked this:
And so we can learn our first lesson from
Joseph Smith’s simple beginnings.
I testify that Joseph Smith was foreordained
in the premortal life to be the prophet of
the Restoration.
He was born with certain gifts and abilities
that he worked hard to develop.
He took advantage of every possible opportunity
to learn and grow.
He was willing to stretch and extend his capacity—all
of which helped him fulfill his mission.
I also testify that each one of you came to
earth foreordained to accomplish certain things.
Just as there didn’t seem to be anything
very remarkable about that little baby boy
born in the woods of Vermont, it is perhaps
hard to understand that you have the potential
to make a great difference in the world.
I assure you that every single person sitting
in this audience today has the capacity to
become a mighty tool in the hands of the Lord
in accomplishing deeds of eternal worth.
I suspect that if we could see ourselves as
the Lord sees us, we would all be astounded
by our potential.
Each of you, both men and women, need to understand
that you have been given great opportunities
for a uniquely balanced education.
My hope for you is that you don’t sell yourselves
short.
We, as a people, put a high priority and premium
on marriage, motherhood, and ­fatherhood—and
rightly so.
Eternal families stand front and center in
our theology and doctrine.
The role of mother or father is the most important
calling you will ever have in this life and
in the next.
This is the time to be earnestly seeking for
an eternal relationship, but it is also the
time for education and preparation.
All of you should be aiming for the stars!
Stretch yourselves.
Take advantage of every opportunity to grow,
to learn, to gain experience, and to further
your education and learning.
There may never be another time in your life
in which the opportunities for expanding your
intellectual capacities will be available
like they are at this phase of your life.
Everyone has a different path for his or her
life.
In all your learning, learn to listen to the
promptings of the Holy Ghost, which will help
you make important decisions regarding your
future.
When and if marriage opportunities come, you
will be a better wife or husband, mother or
father, because you have taken advantage of
this time to educate yourself.
If marriage is delayed for you, your life
will be richer, and you will have more to
contribute because you took advantage of every
opportunity for learning and knowledge.
One of the first scriptures I ever memorized
was from Doctrine and Covenants 130:18–19:
The only things we take with us into the next
life are the desires and character traits
we have developed, our family relationships,
and the knowledge we have gained.
May we let that be our guide for where we
spend our time and efforts in this life.
May we realize that now is the prime time,
“through [our] diligence and obedience,”
for the “gaining knowledge” phase of this
equation.
Intelligence and knowledge are not just educational
in nature.
They also involve the quest to perfect ourselves
in all areas of our lives.
Are you living up to your potential and being
true to your knowledge of who you are?
Too often we become content with mediocrity
in our standards, in our behavior, in our
relationships, and certainly in our quest
for spiritual and intellectual enlightenment.
If you are not living up to the privileges
you have been given in this life, now is a
good time to reevaluate where and who you
want to be now and in a few years and to begin
making the changes that will help you rise
above the commonplace, which the world finds
acceptable.
Joseph Smith was many things, but one thing
he never settled for was being average or
mediocre!
And just as Joseph Smith was chosen to come
at a specific time and place to fulfill the
mission the Lord had in mind for him, you
have also been chosen to come to the earth
now and have been and will yet be given gifts,
abilities, experiences, and opportunities
that will help you fulfill the mission the
Lord has in mind for you.
Prepare yourselves, follow the promptings
of the Holy Ghost, and dare to reach for the stars!
The second lesson I want to talk about from
the early life of the Prophet Joseph comes
from his experiences with the First Vision.
We are all familiar with the great spiritual
truths that burst upon the world as a result
of young Joseph’s experience in the Sacred
Grove on that spring day in 1820.
The heavens were once again open, and the
true nature of the Godhead was revealed.
But have you considered the sudden and irreversible
changes that this experience caused in the
life of a fourteen-year-old boy?
Here is Joseph’s own description of the
after­effects of this great event on his
social standing in the community:
Some few days after I had this vision, I happened
to be in company with one of the Methodist
preachers, . . . and . . . I took occasion
to give him an account of the vision which
I had had.
I was greatly surprised at his behavior; he
treated my communication not only lightly,
but with great contempt, saying it was all
of the devil, that there were no such things
as visions or revelations in these days; that
all such things had ceased with the apostles,
and that there would never be any more of
them.
I soon found, however, that my telling the
story had excited a great deal of prejudice
against me among professors of religion, and
was the cause of great persecution, which
continued to increase; and though I was an
obscure boy, only between fourteen and fifteen
years of age, and my circumstances in life
such as to make a boy of no consequence in
the world, yet men of high standing would
take notice sufficient to excite the public
mind against me, and create a bitter persecution;
and this was common among all the sects—all
united to persecute me.
Think back to your fourteen-year-old self.
How would you have reacted if all the trusted
adults outside of your family began to make
fun of you and persecute you?
Would you begin to doubt yourself?
What about our current culture?
We all have devices that have the capacity
to dispense a con­stant stream of information
as well as misinformation to us wherever we
may find ourselves—­waiting for the bus,
sitting in a classroom, or sitting at home
in our room.
What filters do we have in place for deciding
what to pay attention to, what to believe,
and what we let influence us?
Let me read Joseph Smith’s words describing
the filter he used as he was pummeled with
opinions and persecution:
I had actually seen a light, and in the midst
of that light I saw two Personages, and they
did in reality speak to me; and though I was
hated and persecuted for saying that I had
seen a vision, yet it was true; and while
they were persecuting me, reviling me, and
speaking all manner of evil against me falsely
for so saying, I was led to say in my heart:
Why persecute me for telling the truth?
I have actually seen a vision; and who am
I that I can withstand God, or why does the
world think to make me deny what I have actually
seen?
For I had seen a vision; I knew it, and I
knew that God knew it, and I could not deny
it, neither dared I do it; at least I knew
that by so doing I would offend God, and come
under condemnation.
Even at the tender age of fourteen, Joseph
relied upon what he knew that he knew to stand
up to the skeptics surrounding him.
I believe we also receive help from the Lord
as we exercise faith in what the Lord has
given us in our lives.
We have been baptized and have entered into
a covenant relationship with our Heavenly
Father.
Many of you have made sacred covenants in
the temple.
As we keep moving forward with faith, we are
promised by the Lord:
I will go before your face.
I will be on your right hand and on your left,
and my Spirit shall be in your hearts, and
mine angels round about you, to bear you up.
I love the lesson from Oliver Cowdery’s
experience described in section 6 of the Doctrine
and Covenants.
The Lord asked Oliver to think back on a time
when his prayers had been answered and he
had received a feeling of peace.
The Lord then asked him, “What greater witness
can you have than from God?”
I believe the Lord wants us to remember the
times when we have felt the Spirit and then
use our past experiences to strengthen us
and enable us to defend our faith.
You have received the promise of help in times
of need.
You have at times felt the Spirit in your
lives.
And you have experienced the joyous fruits
of living the gospel.
When opposition comes or you are going through
a trial in which it is hard to feel the Spirit,
remember the times when you have received
that witness and hold on to your faith with
both hands and all of your strength.
In the most recent general conference, Elder
Ronald A. Rasband said:
I encourage you . . . to recall, especially
in times of crisis, when you felt the Spirit
and your testimony was strong; remember the
spiritual foundations you have built.
He goes on to say:
Never forget, question, or ignore personal,
sacred spiritual experiences.
The adversary’s design is to distract us
from spiritual witnesses, while the Lord’s
desire is to enlighten and engage us in His
work.
When you are confronted with questions, skepticism,
and doubts coming from the outside world,
take the wise advice of an apostle of the
Lord, President Dieter F. Uchtdorf: “First
doubt your doubts before you doubt your faith.”
Each of you has surely received at some point
in your life a witness from God similar to
that of Oliver Cowdery.
Don’t be too quick to reject those experiences
in favor of something you read on the Internet.
Let the Holy Ghost be your filter for truth.
Elder Neal A. Maxwell once observed, “Some
insist upon studying the Church only through
the eyes of its defectors—like interviewing
Judas to understand Jesus.”
I urge you to seek truth from pure sources
that you know you can trust—the scriptures,
the words of the living prophets, and the
whisperings of the Holy Ghost.
I urge you to learn from the strength and
steadiness of a fourteen-year-old boy who
trusted what he had seen and felt and never
wavered in his faith.
Another of the great lessons we learn from
Joseph Smith’s life has to do with repentance.
He was a very young prophet of only twenty-two
years of age and was early in the process
of translating the Book of Mormon when he
gave into peer pressure and made a significant
error in judgment.
It resulted in the loss of the first 116 pages
of the translation of the Book of Mormon.
He was chastised severely by the Lord, who
told him:
You should not have feared man more than God.
. . . Thou wast chosen to do the work of the
Lord, but because of transgression, if thou
art not aware thou wilt fall.
Put yourself in the shoes of this young prophet.
Can you imagine how he must have felt as this
whole episode unfolded?
Perhaps he understood that he had been entrusted
with something of indescribable eternal importance
and that he had let the Lord down!
Can we not all relate to those feelings?
We are all human, which means we are all going
to sin and make mistakes.
Listen to what the Lord told Joseph in this
same section just a few verses later:
But remember, God is merciful; therefore,
repent of that which thou hast done which
is contrary to the commandment which I gave
you, and thou art still chosen, and art again
called to the work.
What healing balm those words must have been
to the Prophet Joseph.
He knew that there was hope and that the Lord
is loving and forgiving and will always allow
us to start again.
The ability to repent of our sins is one of
the most basic and yet glorious doctrines
of the gospel!
It is a gift extended to all of God’s children,
and it is possible because of the Atonement
of the Savior Jesus Christ.
His invitation is tender and personal and
filled with love.
He has said to all:
It is easy to think of the principle of repentance
as a negative thing, as something we need
only for the really serious sins—those that
require a visit to the bishop’s office.
Sincere repentance is certainly a necessary
part of overcoming serious sin, but, in reality,
repentance should be part of our daily thoughts
and behavior.
“It is a change of mind and heart that gives
[us] a fresh view about God, about [ourselves],
and about the world.”
Daily course correction is what helps us progress,
improve, and change, day by day and year by
year.
The Atonement of Jesus Christ is what makes
it possible for us to both overcome serious
mistakes and to be better people today in
our habits, relationships, and thoughts than
we were yesterday.
It is a joyous blessing and gift that gives
us hope.
Without repentance, there is no hope—only
despair.
As we look at Joseph Smith’s experience
with the lost 116 pages, we see that he learned
from his mistakes.
You will notice that from this point on he
didn’t badger or question the Lord when
he didn’t like an answer he had received
in prayer.
I am guessing that the way he felt when he
thought he had lost his prophetic call was
something he remembered for the rest of his
life.
He was asked to do some hard things and some
unpopular things, but he never wavered.
I think we would all love to be more like
the Prophet Joseph and learn from our mistakes.
Nevertheless, take heart in the Lord’s promise
that, despite our sins, “his hand is stretched
out still”—and it always will be.
I love the Prophet Joseph Smith.
His life, example, and experiences provide
a rich resource for our learning and understanding
of gospel principles.
I have mentioned only three today: striving
to be the best we can be, holding on to our
faith in the face of criticism, and making
repentance a part of our daily lives.
A close study of the life of this prophet
of God will yield many more rich and important
life lessons.
I would like to share my personal testimony
of the Prophet Joseph Smith and explain why
it is essential that we each come to know
for ourselves that he was the divinely called
prophet of the Restoration.
When I was a young girl of about seven or
eight years of age, I loved to read.
One Sunday afternoon I was looking for a book
to read and found a small volume on our bookshelves
called From Plowboy to Prophet by William
A. Morton.
I took the book down and began to read a simplified
version of the life and experiences of Joseph
Smith.
I read in that simple little book about how
a young man was prompted by a verse of scripture
to seek answers to his questions and went
into the woods to ask the Lord which church
he should join.
I read the account of how that unpretentious
farm boy was visited by God the Father and
His Son, Jesus Christ, in a display of glory
and light brighter than the noonday sun.
Certainly I had heard the story before, but
it was in reading the account that day that
I remember first feeling a confirmation from
the Holy Ghost that this was true.
I felt the confirmation in my heart.
I was thrilled to think that the Lord speaks
to His children on earth and that we have
prophets in our day.
It was the beginning of my conviction and
testimony of the restored Church of Jesus
Christ being established in these latter days.
It was in the beginning a childlike faith,
but it was enough.
Later, as a seminary student, I read the Book
of Mormon.
I really didn’t have to ask if it was true.
As I read, I felt that now-familiar warmth
and confirmation from the Spirit that this
was everything Joseph Smith had claimed it
to be and that it was a confirmation of his
mission.
If the Book of Mormon is true, then it is
further proof that Joseph Smith is a prophet
of God.
Later in my life I was called to be an early-morning
seminary teacher, and that year the course
of study was the Doctrine and Covenants and
Church history.
All of our children were in school during
the day, and I found myself sitting at our
dining room table each day with every book
about Church history I could lay my hands
on.
I sat for hours every day immersed in reading
everything I could about the life of Joseph
Smith, the early accounts of Church history,
and the revelations received.
I couldn’t get enough.
I was riveted.
It is interesting that as controversial questions
have arisen in more recent times about Joseph
Smith and some aspects of Church history,
I feel grateful for that time in my life.
I read all of those things years ago as I
studied the life of Joseph Smith and the history
of the early days of the Church.
I am already familiar with many of the slanderous
reports made by the Prophet’s detractors
in his time, so when they begin to resurface
as “new information,” my response is,
“Really?
This old stuff again?”
Accurate knowledge together with faith is
the best defense against skepticism.
We are encouraged to include in our testimonies
that Jesus Christ is the Savior of the world
and that Joseph Smith is the prophet of the
Restoration.
I recently found a statement by Elder Bruce
R. McConkie that explains why.
He said:
Elder McConkie went on to say that there have
always been testimony meetings, and if we
had lived in the days of Adam or Enoch, we
would have testified of their true callings
and linked them to the Savior.
And so I testify to you that Jesus Christ
is our Savior and Redeemer and that Joseph
Smith was called and foreordained before this
world was to stand at the head of this dispensation
as the legal administrator with the keys and
authority for this period of time.
He is the revealer of the knowledge of Jesus
Christ and of salvation for our day.
I testify that from Joseph’s life we can
learn many important gospel lessons to inspire
and guide our lives.
I testify that the Book of Mormon is a true
record and that it stands as a second witness
of the mission of Jesus Christ.
I testify that The Church of Jesus Christ
of Latter-day Saints is the Lord’s kingdom
on the earth today.
I know of these things through the power and
testimony that has come through the Holy Ghost.
I so testify in the name of Jesus Christ,
amen.
