Cwic Clips- LDS Faith Crisis, Doubt & the Two Types of Knowledge

Clip from 'Faith, Hope & Charity'

- LDS Faith Crisis

- Doubts about the church and gospel

- There is an intellectual knowledge and an experiential knowledge

Full episode-  https://youtu.be/bwUM3l0Lz7A 

LDS Mormon

I'll tell you a little bit about my

experience with I wouldn't call it a

full faith crisis but I will say that

there were several things that really

bothered me I was going through my later

20s into early 30s when the internet was

just coming around I remember sitting in

my basement waiting for a web page to

download about every 30 seconds I was on

prodigy which was an internet service at

the time and I started you know I

remember surfing the internet very very

very slowly and I remember eventually

finding certain sites and information

about the church and things that

bothered me a little bit there are

things that I was not taught in church

they're things I didn't learn through

the books that I read while I was on my

mission and afterward and I had made a

definite effort after my mission to

continue studying the gospel on a

regular basis and have followed through

on that ever since then but this was new

information and it and it hurts me it

bothered me it pulled at me and at times

it really caused a tumult in in me

spiritually and I would wonder about it

and these were facts right this was

information that either I didn't quite

understand yet or that flew in the face

in some cases of things that I

believed were true and I you may have

possibly gone through something like

this yourself or maybe are going through

something like this yourself and you

have been online especially or you've

talked to others or you go into reddit

or you listen to certain podcasts or you

see certain YouTube videos and all it

takes is a little seed of doubt you've

probably noticed that that just a little

seed of doubt can cause real real

problem and I saw several of my friends

and others around me that went through

this process also and did end up in a

full faith crisis and several of them

did

leave the church I remember being in an

elders quorum and having somebody that I

knew very well it was a little bit older

than me just bringing up point after

point after point in elders quorum of

things that he had read online and was

in chat rooms on and that the elders

quorum president and the teacher and

anybody else in that room probably

couldn't answer at that point very few

could have answered it at those

questions at that point and he left the

church and several others have done that

I didn't end up doing that and I think

that there were a couple of reasons for

that I think each of us by the way has

to go through some kind of trial some

kind of spiritual trial of testimony of

our faith because that's the only way it

grows and we have to really look very

deep inside eventually and press

ourselves as to what we really are going

to rely on and how we are going to live

each day in what type of faith system

we're going to live and this of course

happened with me and I remember as I

would look at these facts that were

online whether it was about the Book of

Mormon or the Book of Abraham or of

course the never-ceasing stones that are

hurled at Joseph Smith I finally came to

a couple of conclusions number one I did

a lot more studying and I said to myself

I'm just gonna keep studying I'm gonna

keep looking into these sayings I'm

gonna keep pondering them and trying to

understand some of these things and

number two what I realized what that was

that there were two different types of

knowledge one was a knowledge of facts

things that or non facts the things

that I could read online or somewhere

else

in a chat room somewhere and number two

there was my personal experience and

what I realized over time was that the

personal experience was much stronger

than anything I could read or learn or

whether it was good or bad and the

personal experience is what brought me

through that faith crisis or those

those difficult times

I knew based on my experience that as I

tried certain principles out in the

gospel as I as I leaned on the Lord as I

focused more and more on prayer as I

studied the Scriptures more on a regular

basis as I focused on my family and

relationships that were around me that

this worked and it worked in a way that

it cleaned up my life more it made my

life better it made my relationships

better it strengthened my testimony and

it strengthened my faith and I had gone

through a mission and I had seen

people's lives change for the better and

I had seen them rely on principles that

were brought forth through the restored

gospel and not just in Christianity in

general and not just in an existence of

God though that was part of it of course

but through the restored gospel through

Joseph Smith and I can't deny those

things and I don't I can't deny what I

felt I can't deny what I saw I can't

deny the what I know those individuals

went through and what I went through as

I as I passed through those experiences

and any amount of fact or fiction that

is thrown at me has got to go up against

that and I can then take that fact or

fiction and I can work through it and I

can spend some time and eventually try

and fit it into a puzzle and see if it

fits or if it doesn't fit now if I don't

have that experience if I don't have the

personal day-to-day spiritual experience

where I have learned to lean on the Lord

and lean on gospel principles then my

belief is not going to carry me through

it's not going to be enough I have to

have experience with success I have to

have experience with success in gospel

principles and then I can start looking

at things things these things a little

differently and little by little grow

that puzzle or that tree if you will if

we're talking about Alma and his

experiment little by little that can

grow more and more and as these pieces

of the puzzle come in I can fit them in

somewhere or you know what they don't

fit or I put them on the shelf and wait

and to try and study a little bit more

and see if I can fit them into things

there is no question that we don't know

everything that the brethren don't know

everything and that the books that are

written by General Authorities and

Mormon scholars don't have all of the

answers but the more you study these

things and especially the scriptures the

more you delve into them the more you

start seeing certain patterns and you

start seeing a puzzle that forms and you

start understanding what is fact and

what is fiction and you start saying to

yourself well I already know that this

is true now I have leaned on all of this

I know this intellectually and you can

say something that doesn't make any

sense and it's gonna bounce off because

too much of it is already true too much

of the puzzle is already in place I can

see enough of the puzzle that is sound

and true that if you try and put

something in that says the puzzle is a

different image I already know you're

wrong and I know that from personal

experience I know that from being told

by the spirit I know that intellectual

from studying and so that to me is how

faith is built