There Should Be a School in Zion

 

To my daughter,

               I want to encourage you today to continue doing all you can to learn and become well educated. The things you are learning in school, at church, and at home are not just tasks to get through but knowledge that can help you your whole life. The Lord revealed how important education is in His eyes in a revelation to the Prophet Joseph Smith. He said, “Behold, I say unto you, concerning the school in Zion, I, the Lord, am well pleased that there should be a school in Zion, and also with my servant Parley P. Pratt, for he abideth in me” (Doctrine and Covenants 97:3). The Lord here said that He wants a school to be a part of Zion, and I believe He still wants that today. The prophets and church have put an enormous focus on education, from classes in church to seminary for high school students and universities and institutes for college students. And I am not just talking about spiritual education here—the Lord wants you to learn everything that you can that is good and useful. President Brigham Young said it this way: “Not only does the religion of Jesus Christ make the people acquainted with the things of God, and develop within them moral excellence and purity, but it holds out every encouragement and inducement possible, for them to increase in knowledge and intelligence, in every branch of mechanism, or in the arts and sciences, for all wisdom, and all the arts and sciences in the world are from God, and are designed for the good of his people.” In other words, we should seek to learn everything that we can—even fractions!  

                As I was growing up, President Hinckley was the prophet and I loved to listen to him speak. One of the topics he often spoke about was the value of education, and he inspired me to want to get as much schooling as I could. Here are a few of the statements he made about learning: “You belong to a church that teaches the importance of education. You have a mandate from the Lord to educate your minds and your hearts and your hands…. The Lord wants you to educate your minds and hands, whatever your chosen field…. There can be no doubt, none whatever, that education pays. Do not short-circuit your lives. If you do so, you will pay for it over and over and over again…. It is not enough just to live, just to survive. It is incumbent on each of us to equip ourselves to do something worthwhile in society—to acquire more and more light, so that our personal light can help illuminate a darkened world. And this is made possible through learning, through educating ourselves, through progressing and growing in both mind and spirit.” I know that to be true and I know that my life has been immeasurably blessed because I tried to follow his counsel to gain an education. There is so much for all of us to learn, and I urge you to keep striving to do your very best in school and to learn all the things that you can. Pray to your Father in Heaven for help in those subjects that are difficult for you, and with His Spirit to guide you there is not anything you cannot learn!

Love,

Dad