My dear brothers and sisters, Sister Clark and I are grateful to be with you on another great day at BYU-Idaho. I love you with all of my heart.
The preparation for this talk has been a time to reflect on our wonderful experience at BYU-Idaho. This talk will be a very personal reflection on the hand of the Lord in this school, and in our lives.
We live in a turbulent time, a time of great darkness and evil, but this is also a time of great light. It is a glorious time. The Lord Jesus Christ works in our lives, redeeming, healing, and strengthening us with His love and His power, that we might have joy in this life and eternal life in the world to come. He is working miracles all across the world to hasten His work, gather scattered Israel on both sides of the veil, build up His kingdom, and establish Zion in preparation for His Second Coming.
This university is an important part of that work. From its beginning in 1888 as the Bannock Stake Academy, through its many decades as Ricks College, and through the last 25 years as BYU-Idaho, this school in this valley has been in the hands of the Lord.
Doctrine and Covenants 84:88 captures what the Lord has been doing here. Speaking of His faithful servants, the Lord said, “And whoso receiveth you, there I will be also, for 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.” [1]
The Lord has gone before this school, preparing the way, protecting, guiding, and blessing those who study and work here. He has been in the details of the spiritual and educational character of this place. The Holy Ghost ministers on this campus. He is in the hearts of the great people who have built, are building now, and will yet build this school. And legions of angels have worked and continue to work on this project under the direction of the Lord. I know that is true.
And so, my dear brothers and sisters, when we walk around this campus and enter a classroom or a gathering place of any kind, we are on hallowed ground. This is a sacred place.
The Lord Jesus Christ has prepared this school for this time, for all of us who are here now, and for everyone who will yet come here. We are His disciple leaders and His great work. That means the process the Lord has used to develop BYU-Idaho is at work in our lives. The verse we have just read contains promises and prophecies about what the Lord will do to strengthen and bless us if we are true to our covenants. I want to share today what these interconnected promises mean for us.
Promise #1: I Will Go Before Your Face
This certainly means that the Lord will be out in front of us, preparing the way before us. But note that the Lord used the phrase “before your face” rather than “before you.” When we are on the Lord’s errand, serving Him, following Him, going “before your face” means that He and His gospel should light our way; we should “look unto [Jesus Christ]” [2] and focus on Him. As President Russell M. Nelson has taught, “There is nothing easy or automatic about becoming such powerful disciples. Our focus must be riveted on the Savior and His gospel. It is mentally rigorous to strive to look unto Him in every thought. But when we do, our doubts and fears flee.” [3]
And the Lord really does go before us, preparing our way. In fact, in the most important sense, He has gone before us in His atoning sacrifice, taking upon Himself our sins, heartaches, infirmities, sorrows, and mistakes long before we experience them. [4] He knows our path because He has walked it. [5] And He really does prepare the way for us to accomplish His purposes in our lives if we choose to follow Him every day.
Sister Clark and I had that very experience when we first met at BYU in 1970. About two years before we met, I was a missionary in Germany, and Sue was about to begin her senior year at BYU. She had just moved into a great new apartment, much closer to campus, when the Spirit whispered to her, “You’re in the wrong place; go back.” She did but did not know why. I moved into Sue’s apartment complex in the fall of 1970, and we were put into the same family home evening group. On our very first date, we went for a walk, and the Spirit whispered to Sue, “This is why.” She knew, and I knew too, that the Lord had put us together. We still had to choose, but He went before her face and mine.
This happened long before we arrived at BYU-Idaho, but it is a BYU-Idaho story. When we served here, students often asked Sister Clark, “How did you meet President Clark?” She would say, “Well, when I met him, he wasn’t President Clark!” And that is true. Here is another truth: an important reason I became President Clark was that I followed the guidance of the Lord and married Sue.
Promise #2: I Will Be on Your Right Hand and on Your Left
This promise surely means that the Lord will be with us in our mortal journey. He promises to be close to us, and He invites us to be close to Him, to walk with Him. [6] Think about what that means. When we are on His errand, serving Him, trying to do what is right, our Savior and Redeemer offers to be by our side with His love, light, power, and grace.
The invitation to walk with Him is, therefore, an invitation not to trust in the arm of flesh, especially our own, but rather to trust in Him. When we rely on Him and act with faith in Him, He will redeem, heal, and strengthen us on our journey.
Jesus Christ is in the details of our lives. Remember what the Lord said to Abraham: “I know the end from the beginning; therefore my hand shall be over thee.” [7] The Lord knows our hearts, our desires, our fears, and our hopes. He also knows our strengths, our weaknesses, and our divine potential. He blesses us with experiences, inspiration, and guidance that are perfect for us to become what He knows we can become.
I know this promise is true. The Sunday before my first official day as dean of Harvard Business School, I learned that then-Elder Henry B. Eyring would arrive in Boston that evening to visit his son John who was a student at the school. Nudged by the Spirit, I suggested to John that his father should stay on campus at the dean’s house so that John, his wife, Jenny, and Elder Eyring could have breakfast with me the next morning.
After breakfast, Elder Eyring and I went outside and walked toward my office. He stopped, put his hand on my shoulder, and told me that my appointment was a calling, and that I should treat it like a calling. What he said was spiritually powerful, and I took it to heart and never forgot it in my 10 years as dean. On my first official day, the Lord put an Apostle in my life at that moment to give me a message that guided my service there and prepared me to go to BYU-Idaho.
Promise #3: My Spirit Shall Be in Your Hearts
This is a promise about the gift of the Holy Ghost, one of the most important gifts we receive from our Heavenly Father in mortality. This gift, the right to the constant companionship of the Holy Ghost, is transcendent. Because of the Atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Holy Ghost can do miraculous things. He can witness to our souls of the Father and the Son, [8] teach us and guide us into all truth, [9] comfort us, [10] warn us of spiritual and physical danger, [11] bless us with revelation, [12] spiritual gifts, [13] and spiritual power, [14] sanctify our hearts, [15] work a mighty change in our hearts, [16] help us develop Christlike attributes, [17] and become more and more like our Heavenly Father and His Beloved Son.
We should all cherish the gift of the Holy Ghost. But sometimes we are not open to the gifts the Lord desires to give us. We do things that drive the Spirit away, or we let pride and selfishness harden our hearts and turn us away from the Holy Ghost. We do not hear Him or feel His influence, even though it is our right and privilege to have Him with us.
But Promise #3 is that if we consistently look to Jesus Christ, keep our covenants, repent, and try to be better, the Holy Ghost will be in our hearts. Our capacity to hear the voice of the Lord will increase, and the fruits of the Spirit—Christlike attributes of love, joy, peace, patience, righteousness, humility, and faith—will grow in us. [18] And the Lord Jesus Christ will work miracles in our hearts, strengthening our commitments to be His true disciples and deepening our desires to become more and more like Him.
Sister Clark and I know this promise is true. In October 2004, Elder David A. Bednar was sustained as a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles; BYU-Idaho needed a new president. One of my colleagues, also a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, stopped me at school and asked if I would be interested in the president’s job at BYU-Idaho. I said, “If President Hinckley asked me to do it, I would do it. But I don’t think it makes sense professionally.”
As soon as I said those words, I got a sick feeling in my stomach, and the Spirit whispered to me, “Wrong answer!” I went home and told Sue, and she looked at me and said, “Well, we better think about that.” From that moment until the phone call from President Gordon B. Hinckley on May 25, 2005, Sue and I had a marvelous experience. Little by little the Lord changed our hearts. Through the power of the Holy Ghost, the Lord educated our desires to want what He wanted. [19] It happened! By the time President Hinckley called us, we really wanted to come here. We are so grateful that the Lord in His mercy changed our hearts so that we could come to BYU-Idaho.
Promise #4: Mine Angels Will be Round About You to Bear You Up
This is a promise about the Lord’s messengers, His holy angels. Angels play a crucial role in the Father’s plan of salvation. Sometimes, they take action—stop the mouths of lions, [20] roll away the great stone blocking the tomb, [21]carry the golden plates, [22] and many other things. More often, they comfort, testify, guide, chasten, call to repentance, warn, counsel, and teach in glory and power.
Some angels are seen; some are unseen. Some come from the other side of the veil as resurrected beings, or spirits, and some are mortal beings on this side of the veil. They are all sent by the Lord.
When the Lord promises us that His angels will be all around us to bear us up, I believe that means that we are literally surrounded by angels. Here is what I mean. First, as Nephi taught, “Angels speak by the power of the Holy Ghost; wherefore, they speak the words of Christ.” [23] But he also taught that we can speak with the tongue of angels when we truly receive the Holy Ghost. [24] We are the angels the Lord sends on His errands, and so are people in our families, teachers, friends, bishops, Relief Society presidents, and ministering brothers and sisters.
Second, I believe the Lord also sends our departed ancestors—parents, grandparents, cousins, uncles, aunts—to comfort, help, guide and strengthen us, especially when we face serious difficulty, and especially when we do family history and serve and worship in the house of the Lord.
Finally, I believe that the Lord sends His living prophets and apostles to testify of Him, and to guide us and comfort us with divine power. Remember, “whatsoever they shall speak when moved upon by the Holy Ghost shall be scripture … the word of the Lord … the voice of the Lord and the power of God unto salvation.” [25] They are angels, the messengers of the Lord, and with the technologies we have at our fingertips, they are all around us.
Brothers and sisters, I believe in angels. On a day at BYU-Idaho when I was worried and feeling discouraged, Kathy Webb, my wonderful executive assistant, told me that Elder Richard G. Scott was on the phone. He was the chair of the Executive Committee of the Board of Education and I had gotten to know him well.
I picked up the phone and Elder Scott said, “Kim, I am calling to tell you I love you and that you are doing a great job. Goodbye.” Click! That was it. But as soon as he hung up, I heard in my mind the words of a familiar hymn:
“Fear not, I am with thee; oh, be not dismayed, / For I am thy God and will still give thee aid. / I’ll strengthen thee, help thee, and cause thee to stand … / Upheld by my righteous, omnipotent hand.” [26]
I knew that was the Lord’s message for me. That day, Elder Scott was the angel the Lord sent to deliver it.
Conclusion and Testimony
These four promises are promises of the Lord to each of us. If we turn to Him, follow Him, and are true to our covenants, He will fulfill His promises to us. These are promises of great spiritual power. He is working with His power on BYU-Idaho, and He is working in our lives; He is working in your lives. These two processes of spiritual power, one involving BYU-Idaho, and one involving you, are deeply intertwined, because you are here! You live and work and study inside the miracle that is BYU-Idaho. Sue and I had that very experience ourselves. Let me conclude with a story about the BYU-Idaho Center and miracles.
In 2007, I took to the Board of Education a proposal to build an athletic facility that could also double as an auditorium. It used collapsable bleachers and chairs and could handle about 10-12 thousand people. It was about half the size of this building. It would not start until the new Manwaring Center was complete. The Board approved it. A couple of days later, I got a call from President Gordon B. Hinckley. He said, “Brother Clark, I have been thinking about your building.” He then talked with me for a few minutes about the possibility of making it bigger and building it sooner. And then something quite extraordinary happened. All of a sudden, his voice got much louder and much stronger as he said, “Brother Clark, I am here to tell you today to build it bigger and build it now.” He was emphatic!
And so, we did. It was not easy to get it approved, and not easy to build it. This beautiful and sacred place was built on time and under budget only with the help of legions of angels. I am so grateful that President Hinckley, a prophet, seer and revelator, foresaw that we had to build it much bigger and much faster. However, I have come to understand that his urgency about what he saw was not only about this building, but also about building up the kingdom of God and establishing Zion on this campus, and in the world.
That is our charge, brothers and sisters, our covenant promise, and our destiny. The way ahead will not be easy, but it will happen. Oh, brothers and sisters, I declare with all the energy of my soul, that Jesus Christ is the Living Son of the Living God. He knows you and loves you. If ever there should come a time when building the Kingdom and establishing Zion seems daunting, hardly possible, I hope you will turn to Jesus Christ with faith and trust in Him. If you do, He will go before your face, He will be on your right hand and on your left, His Spirit will be in your heart, and His angels round about you to bear you up. I leave you with that witness and my love for you, and for BYU-Idaho, in the sacred name of Jesus Christ, amen.
Notes
[1] Doctrine and Covenants 84:88.
[2] Doctrine and Covenants 6:36.
[3] Russell M. Nelson, “Drawing the Power of Jesus Christ into Our Lives,” Ensign or Liahona, May 2017, p. 41.
[4] Alma 7:11–13.
[5] See Isaiah 53:4–5; Alma 7:11–13.
[6] Doctrine and Covenants 88:63; Moses 6:34.
[7] Abraham 2:8.
[8] 2 Nephi 31:18; 3 Nephi 28:11; Doctrine and Covenants 2:27.
[9] John 14:26; John 16:13; Alma 30:46.
[10] John 14:26.
[11] Doctrine and Covenants 8:2–5.
[12] Doctrine and Covenants 8:2.
[13] Doctrine and Covenants 46:11-26.
[14] Moses 6:61.
[15] 3 Nephi 27:20.
[16] Mosiah 5:2.
[17] Galatians 5:22–23.
[18] Galatians 5:22-23.
[19] For more on the idea that the Lord can educate our desires, see Neal A. Maxwell, “The Education of our Desires,” University of Utah Institute of Religion, January 5, 1983, https://radiobeloved.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/neal-a-maxwell-1983-the-education-of-our-desires.pdf; see also Joseph F. Smith, Gospel Doctrine, 5th ed. (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1939), p. 297.
[20] Daniel 6:22.
[21] Matthew 28:2.
[22] Book of Mormon, “Testimony of the Three Witnesses.”
[23] 2 Nephi 32:3.
[24] 2 Nephi 31:13; 32:2.
[25] Doctrine and Covenants 68:3–4.
[26] Robert Keen, “How Firm a Foundation” Hymns of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, p. 85.
About Elder Kim B. Clark
Elder Kim B. Clark was sustained as a General Authority Seventy on April 4, 2015. He was released on October 5, 2019. At the time of his call, he had been serving as the president of BYU–Idaho since 2005. He served as a member of the Fifth Quorum of the Seventy, Idaho Area, from 2007 to 2014. He also served as the Commissioner of the Church Educational System.
Elder Clark received a bachelor of arts, a master of arts, and a PhD, all in economics, from Harvard University. He became a faculty member at the Harvard Business School in 1978 and was named dean of that school in 1995. He served in that capacity until the summer of 2005, when he was named the president of BYU–Idaho.
Elder Clark has served in a number of Church callings, including full-time missionary in the South German Mission, elders quorum president, ward executive secretary, counselor in a bishopric, bishop, high councilor, and counselor in a stake mission presidency.
Kim Bryce Clark was born in Salt Lake City, Utah, on March 20, 1949. He married Sue Lorraine Hunt in June 1971. They are the parents of seven children.