When Did You First “Get” a Testimony?
Our lesson in Relief Society last week was from the Gordon B. Hinckley manual, “The Precious Gift of Testimony.” The teacher asked a question that I’ve been pondering ever since then: “When was the first time you felt like you had a testimony?”
There were a few seconds of silence. I tried to pinpoint the first time I knew I had a testimony, but couldn’t. The teacher shared her own experience. A member of the church her entire life, she went through a small rebellious period in her late teens/early 20s. She said she couldn’t remember when her own moment was of, “Aha! I have a testimony!” But she could recall a spiritual experience she had when she was 22 that she has never forgotten.
How Many Paths?
I’ve heard people say before that a “convert’s” testimony comes WHOOSHBANG ALL AT ONCE because they haven’t been exposed to a lifetime of truth before like someone who’s a lifelong member, so when it does happen, it’s memorable. But I think we do ourselves a disservice to compare those two things.
This made me think about Lehi’s vision of the tree of life. Even though he describes the path as one path that he sees his friends and family on too, we are not all on the same path. We, hopefully, are all headed in the same direction – toward the tree and the joy of eternal life – but we are all on separate paths with different goals and individual footsteps. While our destination is the same, the journey we take to get there is different from anyone else’s.
I suppose if we think of that path as being the same for everyone, meaning it’s defined as the standard gospel ordinances, then okay, that’s a path we should be all be on. But for now, I picture it as many different paths that we all take headed to the same destination. And even if the “path” were the same, we would all get there at different times. Some people don’t “find” the path until they’re more advanced in age. Others find it in their youth. Or some might be on it from birth, then take a little detour before wandering back onto it at a later stage.
So maybe that’s why I’ve heard it said that new converts feel more of an aha moment than lifelong members – because it’s easier for them to pinpoint the exact moment they find that “path” and know it’s a good one. Maybe?
My Own Failed Attempts
But I still think it’s a disservice to us to think of gaining a testimony as one point in time. So on Sunday I thought about my own experience of gaining a testimony, and could not come up with one defining moment. I remember being a young 15-year old at a stake girls’ camp and thinking being in the great outdoors would be a perfect opportunity to get a testimony. I imagined myself like a young Joseph Smith (yes, I know the math is off), going off by myself into a grove of trees and having my heart pierced through with a bolt of light so that I would know beyond any doubt that the church was true.
To no one’s surprise (except perhaps 15-year old me), that did not happen. If anything, I grew somewhat bored with the exercise when the expected lightning bolt of revelation did not come.
Even when I served a mission, there were aspects of my testimony I wasn’t completely solid on. (Although, that was probably more about the MTC experience and the extreme twitchiness I feel when surrounded by a tonload of Mormons than it was about my own conversion.)
I had a rotten experience with a new ward I moved into several years ago that made me question ever wanting to attend church again, but that had nothing to do with the gospel. In fact, it’s probably that testimony of the gospel that had already taken root in my heart that made me keep going back even under some unpleasant circumstances.
Gestalt, Layers, and Added Upon
During that Relief Society lesson, another woman raised her hand and said she didn’t know that there was one aha moment for her either, but that she thinks of her testimony of an accumulation of moments when she understands a gospel principle or concept, and then gains understanding of yet another one. In that way, she sees her testimony as more of a whole made up of many parts, or something that can continue growing, instead of being marked by one moment in time.
Yep, that resonates with me. That’s what feels right. There is a word in German that perfectly encompasses that idea: gestalt: “…a whole that is perceived as more than the sum of its parts.” That aligns perfectly with the idea of this site, Added Upon. We are all a whole made up of parts. No one of us is defined by one experience, but are who we are because of the sum of our parts. And that sum will keep changing and evolving because our experiences change each day. As long as we’re still alive, change happens, and that value x keeps evolving too.
A perfect illustration of gestalt is cake. (I can illustrate almost any point with food, especially chocolate.) Think about all the ingredients that go into a cake – flour, sugar, butter, milk, etc. (Or if you’re me, a Duncan Hines mix in a box. But the point still stands – even from a box, there’s still a lot of stuff that goes into that mix.) All of those ingredients individually are just that – simple ingredients, that by themselves, don’t really mean much, nor can you do much with just one of those things by itself.
But then when you put all those plain and somewhat tasteless ingredients into a bowl, mix them up in the correct order, you get a delicious cake. And that cake is probably great. But you know what would make it even better? Another layer on top of that first layer. Of course you need frosting or a cream filling to connect the two layers. Then maybe another layer after that. And another layer of frosting or a nice ganache. All of those things by themselves are just whatever. But put them together, and you’ve got a delicious (and probably messy!) cake. Mmm….testimony cake.
When Is a Testimony?
“Testimony” is not a stagnant thing defined by a historical moment. Rather, it is a living thing built on many cumulative experiences.
“Testimony will come to you in pieces as parts of the whole truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ are confirmed. Testimony requires the nurturing by the prayer of faith, the hungering for the word of God in the scriptures, and the obedience to the truth we have received. You will come to feel light growing in your life. It will not come without effort. But it will come as your testimony grows and you choose to nurture it.” (Henry B. Eyring, “A Living Testimony,” April 2011.)
Yes, a testimony is a living thing, something to be nourished, strengthened, and fed. (See Alma 32.) As we take care of it and look for and cherish those experiences, our own spirituality will be added upon, layer upon layer, until we no longer can remember when we knew, only that we now know.
