Right foundation
E-mail story
It's easy. Send a link to the story you were just reading to a friend. Just fill out the form on this page and we'll send it along.
Your name and e-mail address are transmitted to the recipient. Otherwise, it is considered private information; see Privacy policy.
REXBURG, Idaho — The BYU-Idaho campus was bathed in late summer sunshine as Elder Jay E. Jensen of the Seventy addressed graduates Friday, August 19.
Elder Jensen, who is also executive director of the Curriculum Department and editor of the Church magazines, began his address by speaking of the ongoing transition at BYU-Idaho as President Kim B. Clark assumes leadership, while interim President Robert M. Wilkes moves on to become president of the Billings Montana Temple.
"Great giants have presided over this university," he said. "President Clark, we are confident you have been raised up for this very day and, with heaven's help, will see clearly. Similarly, all of us are better today and are raised higher because of those who have gone before. The hand of the Lord is upon us and upon this work."
Elder Jensen then admonished graduates to "lay the right foundation." He recalled Brigham Young's direction in building the Salt Lake Temple — that the structure could not go up until there was a foundation "to endure through the Millennium."
Likewise, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is built on an enduring foundation, he said. "Essential foundation stones that have been part of every gospel dispensation from Adam to Joseph Smith," he continued, "include revelation, scriptures, priesthood and priesthood keys, and ordinances and covenants."
Elder Jensen presented four suggestions that would help graduates strengthen the foundation stones in their lives and the lives of their families:
- Increase in personal righteousness.
- Pay a full tithe and a generous offering.
- Seek the blessings of an eternal family.
- Be a person of integrity.
To increase in personal righteousness, he referred to the pattern of living he saw as a child in his home where his father "was a righteous priesthood holder . . . assisted by my mother — his companion, partner and counselor."
Elder Jensen said, "The private religious practices that we saw at home and that became the foundation of my life, include personal kneeling prayer, night and morning; kneeling family prayer night and morning; daily personal study of the scriptures, especially the Book of Mormon; reading regularly the words of the prophets and other Church leaders in the Ensign and other Church publications; and fasting as counseled the first Sunday of the month and at other times as needed."
Elder Jensen continued with the second of his four suggestions, to pay a full tithe and a generous offering. "The most important financial decision you will make in mortality is to pay a full tithe and a generous offering. Paying tithing opens the windows of heaven to both spiritual and temporal blessings."
Third, Elder Jensen reminded graduates of the blessings of an eternal family as " . . . the basic unit of society. More important, it is the basic unit of eternity."
He added: "Sister Jensen and I believe that you do not fall into love nor do you fall out of love. You either work your way into love or you work your way out. Marriages succeed to the degree that couples work at it the Lord's way."
Fourth, to be a person of integrity is the end result of what is taught by living the BYU-Idaho honor code, said Elder Jensen.
"We have every expectation that you have obeyed these truths in the honor code because they are the foundation of a Christlike character, not only for the time enrolled here but for the rest of your lives." He continued, "You are true followers of Jesus Christ, His disciples under sacred covenant to be men and women of honor and integrity."
President Wilkes also addressed the graduates. He spoke of the ongoing changes occurring at BYU-Idaho. "The process of change before us is difficult to define. . . . The irony of definition comes with the fact that the university will move forward — very much the place it has always been for well over 100 years and, at the same time, we are clearly aware that it will never be the same again."
A total of 708 graduates received degrees. There were 426 bachelor's degrees and 282 associate degrees awarded, marking the first summer graduation in which four-year degrees outnumbered two year certificates.
