This year, the BYU Museum of Art celebrates 20 years of the acquisition of the Carl Bloch painting, Christ Healing the Sick at Bethesda. In 2001, The Wheatley Institute’s founders, Jack and Mary Lois Wheatley brought this painting, the first of many Carl Bloch paintings, to the BYU Museum of Art.

Justin Collings, professor of law and associate dean at BYU Law School, delivered this devotional address on February 1, 2022.

“Weigh success not in gain, but in improvements to the world.”

Latter-day Saints provide something of a case study in the fruits that come when prosocial faith is provided space to live out its ideals.

Too often we use the yardsticks of wealth, power and prestige to measure success. But those three measures all rely heavily on the unruly variable of luck. If we define the American dream as success reliant on luck, we have taken agency out of the pursuit such a dream.

“People that worship regularly are having more gratitude, they’re having more joy, they’re having more opportunities to serve and look outside themselves...the more you care for others, the more happy you end up being.”