Idaho
‘God is not silent,’ testifies Elder Clement M. Matswagothata to BYU–Idaho students
Clinging to one’s faith in Jesus Christ — no matter how much or how little faith — can help weather questions and doubts, said Elder Clement M. Matswagothata, a General Authority Seventy, at a BYU–Idaho devotional Tuesday, March 10, in Rexburg, Idaho.
Elder Matswagothata shared his experiences, teachings and testimony about navigating doubts and questions while still continuing to build faith.
He also emphasized the importance of building upon one’s faith and taking questions and doubts to the Lord. With patience in the Lord’s timing, these questions will be answered because “God is not silent.”
“Do not let one unanswered question cancel a hundred answered prayers,” Elder Matswagothata said. In times of trouble, “keep walking with Christ.”
‘Does God still speak?’
Growing up in Botswana, Elder Matswagothata had been raised in a place where heaven had “often felt close.”
Though Elder Matswagothata was not born into the Church, his family members had always been committed to the Lord. Through their firm faith, he learned his own.
With this conviction, Elder Matswagothata sought to deepen his knowledge of God. Reading passages from the Bible about prophets that spoke to their people, he wondered, “Does God still speak?”
This questioning resulted in an urgent search, leading him to contend with religious leaders about personal belief. But his faith was not won with words. ”I always walked away feeling empty inside,” he recalled.
While Elder Matswagothata was warned against meeting with missionaries of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, he saw an opportunity.
“I asked them the same question I had asked many in the past: ‘Do you believe in a God who speaks — like He spoke to Adam, to Moses, to Isaiah, to Elijah and to my favorite prophet, Samuel?’”
The missionaries then relayed the experience of Joseph Smith, another young boy who had the same question.
Elder Matswagothata received a “settled, confident, personal witness” that “God the Father and His Son, Jesus Christ, appeared to the boy Joseph Smith and called him to be a Prophet.”
Learning by the Holy Ghost
Elder Matswagothata explained that testimony is “spiritual knowledge placed into a person’s heart and mind by God,” and it is not perfect knowledge.
“The Lord has never required omniscience as the price of discipleship,” he said.
To wondering disciples, he assured them that “faith and questions can coexist,” but they still require “some steps of faith.”
The real enemy to faith in Christ is not questioning, Elder Matswagothata said, but to “drift.”
This slow, turning away from the Savior happens when people “decide to skip once, then twice, then often — until what used to feel normal and natural, like praying daily and searching the scriptures, starts to feel distant,” he said.
To counter drift, covenants “keep us connected to Jesus Christ,” even when faced with spiritually turbulent times.
Elder Matswagothata then shared his own faith-testing experience.
As a missionary, he met with a man that pressed him on the Church’s restriction on priesthood and temple blessings, noting that Elder Matswagothata was of African descent. He had never heard of the restrictions before.
“It felt as if everything I had known about God, His Son, Jesus Christ, and the witness of the Holy Ghost was suddenly harder to reach,” he said.
Seeking comfort, Elder Matswagothata met with his mission president, who invited him to return and bear testimony to the man. He did.
In that moment, “I felt the Lord’s reassurance fill me — almost from head to toe — with ‘peace … which passeth all understanding,’” he said, citing Philippians 4:7.
This experience taught him that unknowns should “not erase what the Holy Ghost had already taught.”
Anchoring faith
“The adversary will always raise questions faster than we can answer them,” said Elder Matswagothata.
“A resilient testimony isn’t built by collecting perfect answers — it’s built by staying with Christ” through study, prayer and acting in faith “and allowing Him to teach you according to His will and timing.”
Elder Matswagothata offered three “anchors” of faith in Christ.
First, stay close to the Savior.
Second, stay grounded in truth by looking for it in “trustworthy places,” such as teachings of living prophets and apostles and scriptures.
And third, stay with the Spirit by choosing “music, media, friendships and habits that invite the Spirit to be with you.”
Elder Matswagothata cited Jesus’ words in John 6. When Jesus taught “a hard saying,” many disciples went away.
Jesus asked the twelve apostles, “Will ye also go away?”
“Everyone faces a ‘Will ye also go away?’ moment. How will you answer yours?” asked Elder Matswagothata.
God’s work will move forward–on a worldwide and personal level.
“Here I stand — a simple man from the African continent — bearing witness of eternal truths and watching that inspired prophecy unfold.”
The Idaho State Police say that Robert Giesick, 40, from Billings is the man missing in a crash on State Highway 55 near Cascade, about 80 miles north of Boise.
A pick-up truck driven by Giesick ended up in the Payette River after a head-on crash with another pick-up truck.
Watch Idaho crash story here:
Idaho state troopers identify Billings man missing in traffic accident
“I was able to find some people that saw a male, an adult man, swimming for the shore from the truck,” said Idaho State Trooper Richard Knapp, who attempted to rescue Giesick. “Unfortunately he didn’t make it. He got swept downriver. Witnesses lost sight of him, and that was the last time anybody saw him.”
Knapp says search crews looked extensively for the 40-year-old, but after 24 hours, it became a recovery effort for the Idaho Mountain Search and Rescue Unit.
After that on Monday came the monumental task of removing the pickup truck from the raging water.
“It was an intensive a recovery, honestly, our operators were tested, their knowledge was tested,” said Mark Boisvert, Code Red Towing owner. “They said it was a very extreme recovery for them, more than usual.”
Idaho business owners have less than a month to decide how to comply with a new state law criminally banning trans people from using restrooms that align with their gender identity.
The law is set to take effect July 1, which would make it a misdemeanor for the first offense and a felony for subsequent offenses within five years.
It’s currently being challenged in federal court by the ACLU of Idaho.
On Tuesday, a panel sponsored by Idaho Employment Lawyers encouraged companies to prepare now as if the law will remain in effect as litigation continues.
Cody Earl, a lawyer for St. Luke’s Health System who spoke on the panel in his personal capacity, said there are several paths businesses can take.
Converting all bathrooms into single-use, gender-neutral facilities is one option, though it could be costly for larger businesses. Earl said companies could take other steps to make the transition more affordable.
“Even if it is a gender-specific restroom, [adding signage] that indicates where the closest gender-neutral restroom is so you could at least show that you’re giving employees an option or a choice,” he said.
Simply adding locks and only allowing one person at a time to a multi-stall bathroom is another choice, though panelists said that could be problematic for businesses with large amounts of customers, like restaurants and bars.
Idaho Employment Lawyers owner Pam Howland said companies also need to consider how this will affect their staff.
“This could definitely create some culture issues,” said Howland. “Do you have the policies you need to ensure your expectations as an employer of respect and civility are being followed? Possibly code of conduct provisions related to that? How about privacy?”
Those policies could include limiting or outright banning recording at the workplace.
Another legal wrinkle to complying with the law, the panel said, is that precedent in both the U.S. Supreme Court and 9th Circuit Court of Appeals prohibit discrimination based on someone’s gender identity.
Gender dysphoria, a mental health designation that causes severe distress to someone when their sex doesn’t align with their gender identity, has been considered a protected condition under the Americans with Disabilities Act in certain cases.
Republican state lawmakers argued earlier this year that Idaho needs to take this first-in-the-nation step to protect women and girls when they use the restroom in private businesses.
A 2025 study out of UCLA hasn’t found any increased risk to safety by allowing transgender people to use restrooms aligning with their gender identity.
A federal court in Boise will hear arguments over whether to approve or reject a preliminary injunction on June 5.
Copyright 2026 Boise State Public Radio
Remember that 250 years ago, nobody had ever heard of Idaho, and the name was mostly made up by an entrepreneur who impressed the federal government with an exaggeration about his knowledge of indigenous culture. But a large number of people who live in the state can trace ancestry to the colonial era, and I believe most Americans still have a love of country, even if some polls give an indication they may not quite know how to express it.
I Was at the Heart of the Bicentennial
Looking back 50 years, I was in Washington, D.C. at the beginning of July. Washington also didn’t exist in 1776. My memory is that its reputation as a hot, sticky swamp was well earned. I traveled there with a history club from school. On a rattling old yellow bus. The city was packed, and many of the people on the streets were foreign tourists. It told me that despite the anti-Americanism common on streets elsewhere around the world, we were still fascinating others.
We’re Still One Nation
1976 was a unifying experience and followed a very turbulent previous 15 years. Some people fear the 250th jubilee won’t bring us together. Look, those rent-a-mobs you see on TV and online are actually a small fraction of America. Picnics in the park don’t make news. Riots and tear gas get the attention of newsrooms. There are still far more picnics.
The recent Memorial Day commemorations were reverential. Independence Day 2026 is going to be a party. The media focus will be on President Trump and a festival far away. Meanwhile, across Idaho, grills will be fired up, and we’ll be proud to be Americans.
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