Trenton Hickman, an associate professor of English, explains that, despite the world’s view that religion inhibits forward thinking, faith and humility in God lead to greater understanding and enhanced scholarship.
At a devotional on the campus of Brigham Young University, Trenton Hickman, an associate professor of English, explained how life achievements are furthered by faith and humility.
We have been given, Hickman said, “through the grace of Christ’s Atonement, the chance to receive the gift of the Holy Ghost in our reading, writing, and speaking in ways that will open our eyes to new knowledge and to better ways of thinking about the challenges that beset us.”
Hickman said, “In our day, we luxuriate in an unprecedented omnipresence of information but paradoxically distrust this information more than ever because of its potential for manipulation or deceit.…Under these conditions, some in our time allow cynicism to convince them that we have no way of knowing anything for sure.”
Despite the confusions the world offers, the Lord provides a solution: “And when ye shall receive these things, I would exhort you that ye would ask God, the Eternal Father, in the name of Christ, if these things are not true; and if ye shall ask with a sincere heart, with real intent, having faith in Christ, he will manifest the truth of it unto you, by the power of the Holy Ghost. And by the power of the Holy Ghost ye may know the truth of all things” (Moroni 10: 4-5).
Hickman explained that this scripture “frames a pattern for how earnest seekers of knowledge about a wide variety of subjects may be led to truth.”
He said, “If the acquisition of knowledge is an act of humility and faith on our part that is powered by personal revelation from the Holy Ghost, then we need to do all we can do to take full advantage of the gift of the Holy Ghost in our lives.”
Quoting Joseph Fielding Smith, Hickman added: “Now the Lord would give us gifts. He will quicken our minds. He will give us knowledge that will clear up all difficulties, and put us in harmony with the commandments that he has given us, and with a knowledge that will be so deeply rooted in our souls that the knowledge can never be rooted out, if we will just seek for the light and the truth and the understanding which is promised to us, and which we can receive if we will only be true and faithful to every covenant and obligation pertaining to the Gospel of Jesus Christ.”
Hickman related his own experience of how humble and faithful inquiry leads to inspiration and knowledge in his professional life. He had the opportunity to publish an essay in a prominent university press, but he struggled to revise the essay to fit what the editor wanted. Hickman said, “If I couldn’t revise the essay to the reviewers’ and editor’s satisfaction, it would not be included in the book and the project would move forward without my work in it.
“Finally humbled, or perhaps compelled to be humble by the humiliation of the process, I knelt down in my office and prayed for Heavenly Father’s help, asking that the Spirit would impress upon my mind what I needed to do to make the necessary changes to the essay so that it would be publishable.”
At the close of his prayer, Hickman said, “I had concepts coming into my mind as if a faucet had turned on in my brain, and I raced to jot down these ideas before they were lost.” He reorganized the essay, added some new information, and resubmitted it to the editor. “It made it into the book, one which now sits on my shelf as a tangible reminder of an experience that was entirely more unusual for me than it should have been,” Hickman said.
“I do not know to this day Heavenly Father’s specific opinion of my interpretation of Theodore Roethke’s poetry and its place in the development of American poetry in the middle of the twentieth century. What I do know, though, is that he cares about me, and he cares that I be able to disseminate this knowledge to which he led me in the service of my family, my department, and my profession,” Hickman said. “I testify that he likewise cares about you and your pursuit of knowledge, and he will open your eyes to new ways of thinking about the intellectual challenges you face if you will allow the Spirit to provide you the revelation that you need in your sphere to advance your work.”
He said that sometimes individuals think spirituality might inhibit academic inquiry. “To really think new thoughts, they might erroneously reason, we need to free ourselves from the tyranny of commandments and faith, pressing boldly into areas of intellect to which faith has previously blinded us,” Hickman said. “In my experience, nothing could be further from the truth.…faith always involves humbly asking that the Spirit take me from what I know into what I haven’t yet discovered, wherever that takes me, strengthened by my belief.”
Hickman concluded, “It is my hope that we will have the humility, the faith, the charity, and the willingness to receive the gift of the Holy Ghost necessary to be able to see our respective corners of the world shine like transfiguration in our own intellectual and academic inquiry.
“May we ever pursue true knowledge, eventually finding for ourselves in the journey that all truth indeed is part of one great and eternal round, capacious enough to explain all the mysteries of the universe.”
To read the devotional in its entirety, visit speeches.byu.edu.
—Stephanie Bahr Bentley BA English ’14