Thank you President Balof
and to each of you here for making this year, our first at byu,
an exciting and beautiful year in our lives.
I'd like to thank those who perform so beautifully with that
outstanding music for it has set the very mood that i had prayed for.
Wilford Peterson in an essay called the art of living
as stated: "the art of thanksgiving is thanks-living. It is gratitude in action,
it is thanking god for the gift of life by living it triumphantly,
it is thanking God for opportunities by accepting them as a challenge to achievement,
it is thanking God for inspiration by trying to be an inspiration to others,
and it is adding to our prayers of thanksgiving acts of thanks living." When i first read these
words I tried to think of individuals that I had known who lived by that code and found that
every prophet of this dispensation that i've read about or had known
seemed to live in that manner. Let me read the words again:
"The art of thanksgiving is thanks-living. It is gratitude in action, it is thanking God for the
gift of life by living it triumphantly, it is thanking God for opportunities
by accepting them as challenges to achievement, it is thanking God for inspiration by trying
to be an inspiration to others, it is adding to our prayers of thanksgiving
acts of thanks-living." President David O. Mckay has counseled church members
"Thanksgiving is the beginning of gratitude. Gratitude is the completion of thankfulness.
Thankfulness may consist merely of words. Gratitude is shown in action."
Some of the beautiful words of that psalm that were just sung to us stress in english
"know ye that the Lord He is God. Be thankful unto Him and bless His name."
And again the Lord through his great prophet King Benjamin has taught us that there are more than
just thoughts and prayers to proper thanksgiving, and I quote, "I say unto you my brethren that if
you should render all the thanks and praise which your whole soul has power to possess to
that god who has created you and preserved you, and has caused that you should rejoice...and
if you should serve him with all your whole souls yet she would still be unprofitable servants.
...for all that he requires of you is to keep his commandments;
...if you do keep his commandments he doth bless you and prosper you." If we are truly thankful
brothers and sisters our acts will be witness to our thankfulness. Thanksgiving Day has always
been designed to be a religious experience. A day to know the Lord and to bless his name.
364 years ago, Governor William Bradford declared a three-day fast and a small group of pilgrims
gathered to "worship and give thanks to god." Two years later in 1623 on July 30th,
the first official Thanksgiving Day was set up for "the special purpose of prayer."
During the revolutionary war, there were some eight special days
of thanks which were observed for "special blessings that had been received."
On November 26, 1789, more than 100 years after the first special day of prayer
president George Washington issued a special proclamation for a day of "giving thanks."
About 100 years later in 1863, President Abraham Lincoln designated the last Thursday in November
as "a day of thanksgiving and praise to our benevolent father." Now
after more than three and a half centuries, we still celebrate a Thanksgiving Day. But
in our hearts is there sufficient thankfulness to really give praise to our benevolent maker?
Does this thankfulness result in showing any true gratitude?
Do we do any more than say a thanksgiving prayer over a traditional thanksgiving feast? Or
are some of our prayers in some of our lives like those described by the poet robert burns
"three mile prayers and one half mile graces?" Have we learned to say thank you and to show
thank you? I like these words. They seem to suggest action.
If you hear a kind word spoken of some worthy soul you know, it may fill his heart with
sunshine if you'd only tell him so. If a deed, however humble, helps you on your way to go,
seek the one whose hand has helped you. Seek him out and tell him so. If your heart is touched and
tender toward a sinner lost and low, it might help him to do better if you'd only tell him so.
President Gordon B. Hinckley has taught us the "absence of gratitude is the mark of
a narrow uneducated mind it bespeaks a lack of knowledge and an ignorance of self-sufficiency."
Thankfulness may indeed be measured by the number of words we use.
Gratitude, however, must be measured by the nature of our acts.
Richard L. Evans has said "Gratitude has not even been born until it actually has been converted
into words and deeds." Each of us should look for ways of saying thank you to each other
and we should look for ways of saying our thing and showing our thankfulness to the lord
by keeping his commandments. In the past, I have not always been able
to say or show my thankfulness the way that I really wanted to. Some years ago
almost every morning I found myself arriving in the parking lot of a certain institution at the
same time as another individual. It was early in the morning, usually very dark and very quiet,
and we were alone most of the time. As we walked from our vehicles into the buildings,
this individual was one of the finest persons I've ever known. I looked up to him. I loved him. I
admired him, yet I'd never told him so. Each time we entered that building and climbed onto that
elevator together, I found myself tongue-tied. I could hardly stammer good morning, much less
"oh how i admire you or thank you for all that you have done and are doing for me.
After one of these mornings, I arrived in my office disgusted with my inability to
express my appreciation. In desperation, with a great desire just to say thank you,
I took a pen in hand and in the long hand wrote a short note and expressed my feelings. Hurriedly,
i addressed the envelope and quickly mailed the note before my courage failed me.
A very few days later, I received a very sweet short three sentence note. I could
tell he'd personally typed it out on that old typewriter he kept by his desk. It read "Dear Dee,
that was one of the sweetest notes I've ever received and I appreciate hearing from you. I
am indeed grateful to be close to you, and I hope that we may see each other once in a while. May
the lord bless you and assist you in all of your efforts. With kindest wishes. Faithfully yours...
While I've known this individual and worked closely with him for a long period of time,
this was really the beginning of a choice and wonderful friendship
with this special person, President Spencer W. Kimball. Oh how President Kimball blessed my life
because i took the time and had the courage to say thank you. Think how the lord then
desires to bless each of us as we show our thankfulness by keeping his commandments.
For he tells us that as we abide the law we will receive the blessing. How long has it been since
any of us have really expressed a sincere and specific thank you to someone near or dear to us:
to our parents, to a faculty member, or a student to a roommate, or to the lord? My grandson taught
me a lesson about saying thanks. Jared, who is now eight years old, lives in Hong Kong.
As he has grown up, he's heard his father and me talk about our fishing trips. He's
even accompanied us a time or two on short trips, but because of his age, he'd never caught a fish.
Two years ago as his parents prepared for home leave, they noticed that Jared prayed
every evening that he could go fishing, and he continued to so pray when the family arrived in
the United States. We arranged for that fishing experience we visited Jackson Hole and found a
place on the snake river where Jared could indeed catch some fish and he did. He caught several.
I'll admit that he wasn't very interested in baiting his hook or taking the fish off the hook
when they were caught. Nevertheless, he seemed to enjoy the experience.
I was interested in the report Jared would make to his father in heaven that night.
It was very short. It was only four words long but it expressed true thankfulness. He said
thanks for the memories each of us has been given: the very special experiences
and memories. Wouldn't it be nice if we could find a way to say thanks for the memories? Alice
Carey in her poem "Nobility" writes "true worth is in being: not seeming, in doing,
each day that goes by, some little good--not in dreaming of things great things to do by and by.
For whatever men say in their blindness, and spite of the fancies of youth,
there's nothing so kingly as kindness, and nothing so royal as truth.
We get back our meat as we measure, we cannot do wrong and feel right, nor can we give
pain and gain pleasure, or justice avenges each slight. We cannot make bargains for blisses,
nor catch them like fishes and nets; and sometimes the things our life misses
help more than the things which it gets. For good life not in pursuing, nor gaining of
great nor of a small, but just in the doing and doing as we would be done by is all.
In our "doing and doing" each of us can truly say thank you to those around us
by simply living that golden rule. I would like to conclude these remarks
this morning by stressing three sentences from the mission statement of this great university:
"All students at Brigham Young University should be taught the truths of the gospel
of Jesus Christ. Any education is inadequate which does not emphasize
that his is the only name given under heaven whereby mankind can be saved.
Certainly all relationships within the Brigham Young University community
should reflect devout love of God and a loving genuine concern for the welfare of our neighbor."
If we do have this loving genuine concern for others, Brigham Young University will
continue to be like no other place on earth, and so it should be. Remember, as important
as saying thank you, is it is more important to show our thankfulness in the way we live.
We need to give others some reason to say thank you to us. May we show our thanksgiving this year
by our thanks-living. For the Lord God has said: "and he who receiveth all things with thankfulness
shall be made glorious; and the things of the earth shall be added unto him, even one hundred
fold, yea, more. May we be so blessed, I pray, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
you