Hawaii Reserves, Inc. President & CEO R. Eric Beaver encouraged BYU-Hawaii students in his November 14th devotional address to use eternal perspectives in their studies as they develop knowledge and character.
Beaver, who met and married his wife, Sharon, while studying at BYU-Hawaii, stressed that knowledge and character are “two significant aspects of our earthly experience that we will take with us when we exit mortality.”
Frequently citing scriptures, Beaver, who is also President of the Laie Stake and a 1994 graduate of the J. Reuben Clark Law School at BYU, said the Lord “has commanded you and me ‘to seek learning by study and also by faith.’ What better setting than a Church university to carry out that charge.”
“Learning all that you can now while studying is your full-time occupation. Consider your status as full-time students a luxury. Acquiring knowledge is both an expanding and endless experience,” President Beaver said. He used Elder Neal A. Maxwell’s phrase, the “inexhaustible Gospel,” to illustrate that “the first fruit of attaining knowledge is the realization that the more you come to know, the more there is to know.”
“Knowing that you don’t know all things, or even a few things, is the beginning of humility, the door to knowing more. Absent humility, the scriptures warn, ‘knowledge puffeth up,’” President Beaver continued, relating a lesson from his youthful surfing days: “Sharp coral heads are most dangerous in shallow water. In your studies, let humility bring depth. If you skim, you will get tiny scraps.”
What does the Lord expect us to know? President Beaver asked. “In a word, everything,” he said, emphasizing that first “obtaining gospel knowledge is of eternal consequence. Spiritual knowledge gives purpose, direction and meaning to our ‘temporal know-how’ and ‘secular competencies.’ Consider the fact that the Savior went to the seashores to find builders for his kingdom. He needed men with spiritual understanding. He did not go to the great secular institutions of the day, nor did he look in the synagogues for professional clergy to find his disciples.”
“The apostles were uneducated men by the secular standards of the time and place. But, by the Spirit they knew Christ, believed in Christ and followed him, while the Pharisees tried foolishly to ensnare the Master by asking senseless and silly questions about the law, based on their shallow and twisted interpretations.”
President Beaver said while it’s important that one’s education enables them to sustain families, “you and I, as graduates or affiliates of this University, will need more than mere secular survival skills to become the kind of men and women President McKay envisioned at the beginning of this university:
‘. . . men and women whose influence will be felt for good towards the establishment of peace internationally.’ “Has there ever been a greater need for peace in the world?” he asked.
“In our pursuit and attainment of knowledge, let us remember President Kimball’s teaching that ‘…it is not so much what we know that is important, as what we do and what we are.’
‘Godly knowledge teaches us that our great objective in life is to build character. In fact, we learn that the building of faith and character is paramount, for character is higher than intellect, and perfect character will be continually rewarded with increased intellect.’
“To me, this means that, ultimately, righteous character is the only thing to which pure knowledge will stick or bond,” President Beaver said. “My guess is that you are being tested daily, even on a Church campus, to see if you will be men and women of integrity, of noble character. Most of you will not face huge character-testing examinations. More likely, it will be the small quizzes that will shape the person you become.”
“Be ‘exceedingly diligent’ in your efforts to learn ‘by study and by faith,’ and thereby become men and women of true nobility,” President Beaver said in conclusion. “These are the things we can take with us: knowledge and character. Pack well.”