The chairman of the BYU Center for Entrepreneurship board of directors urged BYU-Hawaii students and faculty in the Jan. 29 devotional to consistently offer personal prayers and make personal covenants with the Lord.
"I sense your desire to be faithful, to love our Heavenly Father, to love the Savior, and to walk in obedience to their commandments," said Larry Linton, a businessman from Portland, Oregon, and a member of the President's Leadership Council of major donors to the university.
Linton, who is in Laie for the annual BYU-Hawaii entrepreneurship conference, said, "I sense your struggles to continue faithful in consistent daily prayers, consistent daily scripture reading, staying morally clean, finding your eternal companion, paying a full and completely honest tithing, and your struggles to get through school."
He reminded the devotional audience that "the struggles of Enos as recorded in the Book of Mormon" and Joseph Smith's first vocal prayer provides us with strong examples of how the Lord answers prayers.
"Can you sense the power of a sincere vocal prayer?" he said. "You are talking heart to heart with God. How can you not be sincere and pray earnestly and with real intent?"
Linton noted that his mother had taught him to pray as a little boy, and that at six years of age he used that faith to find a lost ball. "It may not sound like a lot to you, but to me, as a little boy, I came to know first-hand, that there is a real Heavenly Father, that He hears and answers prayers. It was so amazing. I never forgot that experience. It was the beginning of my everlasting faith and trust in Heavenly Father. What a blessing that became as I continued to say my prayers through grade school, junior high, high school, college, a mission, courtship and now marriage and family life," he said.
Yet, Linton admitted he had "struggled to gain the habit of consistently saying my morning prayers . . . during my thirties with so many pressures and responsibilities."
Inspired by counsel from his stake president, he knew he needed to change. "So in mighty prayer I made a covenant with God that I would from that time forward say my morning prayers. I have kept that covenant. I cannot tell you all the blessings that have come from consistent morning prayers," he said.
He explained that an experience at Philmont Scout Ranch inspired him to overcome "my struggle to read the scriptures every day."
"I had been slack in my daily scripture reading," Linton said. "I had explained it away. I was too busy. I had too many responsibilities. I was still living a good life — on and on. But at that very moment, my life changed. I promised: I made a covenant with Heavenly Father that I would never again be slothful in daily scripture reading. What a blessing that has been. Everything has gone better, because I made a covenant and have kept that covenant."
Linton also told of "struggles to learn the law of tithing" while he was a financially desperate LDS Business College student.
With his funds almost gone and no job prospects, he prayed and made a personal covenant to "pay a full and honest tithing for the rest of my life." The next day he was inspired to go to the Utah Genealogical Society and apply for a job. "I had an interview and I got the job that day," he said.
"I am so grateful," he added. "And all my life, I have kept that covenant."
"Have you ever needed something so great, that you've been driven to your knees and poured out your heart, maybe in a vocal prayer, and in the course of that prayer made a covenant with Heavenly Father?" he asked.
Linton shared how he made a similar covenant while trying to find his future eternal companion as a student at BYU. He promised "to stay clean and pure in thoughts and actions, to be morally clean in every way, to keep the highest standards of dating, and to show respect to all young women."
About a year later, the Lintons married in the temple. "I am so committed to my covenant with Heavenly Father that we do not kiss on the lips until the sealer in the Arizona LDS Temple tells us you may now kiss as man and wife," he said. The couple now has nine children and 10 grandchildren.
Linton said he has also made personal covenants enabling him to give more time for "spiritual things, like service projects, going the second mile in home teaching, spending more personal time with [his] young Priests, [and] other acts of charity."
"I share these very personal stories with you to touch your hearts," Linton said. "I pray with all my heart that you'll have many, many heart-to-heart talks with your Heavenly Father. When you're impressed by the spirit to do so, you'll make your own personal and mighty covenants with your loving Heavenly Father."