With a message inspiring hope and confidence in Christ for BYU–Hawaii students, acting school President R. Kelly Haws and his wife, Sister Connie Haws, addressed the university community in the first devotional of spring semester.
President Haws followed, testifying of the healing power of Christ and how all who “remember His name” receive comfort and guidance.
A touch of Jesus
A woman who had suffered for years with a blood condition “spent every cent she had trying to be healed,” said President Haws, citing a passage from Mark 5:25-29.
He invited students to think about her loneliness, longing and despair.
Despite her feelings, the woman pressed through crowds of people to touch the hem of Jesus’ clothing, having faith she would be healed, and she was.
President Haws quoted a student who said “it’s amazing what just one touch of Jesus will do.”
But beyond the lone woman who touched the hem of Jesus’ garment, President Haws noted an “unfamous” later scripture passage, Matthew 14:35-36, with similar wording about people who had traveled to see Jesus on the Sea of Galilee.
They also had faith that a touch of Jesus’s garment would heal them.
“Just one touch” of Jesus with faith in His healing power will provide emotional, mental or spiritual healing, said President Haws, quoting President Oaks’ October 2006 general conference remarks.
Jesus is ‘the first and last of our lives’
In the Haws family, “we say that life goes better if the last thing that touches the floor at night, and the first thing that touches the floor in the morning, is our knees,” said President Haws.
Instead of thinking about homework, sports or meetings, he aims to remember the name of Jesus Christ first thing in the morning.
Relating the phrase a “labor ... to perform” from 1 Nephi 17:41 to the woman with the issue of blood, President Haws noted that her labor to perform was simply to touch Jesus’ garment.
“Our labor is to remember His name,” he said.
Remembering Jesus invites the Holy Ghost, but actions and thoughts show that He is the first and last in our lives, said President Haws, expanding on Doctrine and Covenants 110:4.
When Jesus Christ comes again, “every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that He is the Lord.”
“Why not do so now,” he asked students, inviting them to take more time to “draw just a little closer to Him” through consistent scripture study, prayer, searching words of prophets or letting Christ’s name “linger in your mind as you climb into bed at night.”
Remembering invites the Holy Ghost
Small Christ-centered changes bring about renewed strength, refreshed hope and reinvigorated confidence.
He quoted a poem from his sister-in-law:
“Seek more Jesus in everything you do—
For the more you seek Him, the more you’ll find,
More Jesus in your heart, your life, your mind.”
President Haws testified of the healing power of Jesus Christ.
Like the woman in the crowd, all are able to reach through the “noise and confusion” toward Jesus Christ, regardless of circumstance.
“You don’t need a perfect life to touch His garment. In fact, He calls us to reach to Him in our imperfections.”
Ultimate road map
In her remarks, Sister Haws shared, “While driving to Honolulu, I noticed how much I rely on my phone’s map to get around the island.”
She quoted from President Dallin H. Oaks’ April 2017 general conference remarks, that Heavenly Father’s plan is “the ultimate road map.”
Like a smartphone map, “‘the plan of happiness’ is the ultimate road map to get us through the storms and floods that come into our lives,” Sister Haws said, referencing Alma 42:8.
While driving home one day, Sister Haws encountered severe storms that produced dangerous road conditions. Her phone’s map guidance advised her to make a detour due to a road closure.
Though other drivers continued on the road, Sister Haws had the impression to follow the map’s guidance and not the other drivers.
“The storm became treacherous,” she said, yet she made it home safely after a long, white-knuckle drive thanks to the spiritual promptings she had received and alerts from her phone.
‘The perfect way home’
Heavenly Father’s plan has many names.
“He never calls it the ‘plan of justice.’ He never calls it the ‘plan of unhappiness.’ It’s certainly not called ‘the great plan of me,’” said Sister Haws.
Instead, the scriptures refer to His plan as the plan of deliverance, salvation, redemption, happiness, mercy, restoration and the great plan of our God.
Despite storms, dangers, uncertainty and confusion on life’s roads, the plan of God provides “the perfect way home” because of Jesus Christ.
“He is the perfect guide.”
“He has made the way possible because of His personal, infinite Atonement. Next time you feel lost in the storms of your life — like I was lost and scared in the big storm — follow Him. He is the perfect answer.”
