The chapel filled up fast. I was surprised to see that every age attended the service. The chapel was filled with children and babies. In my church experiences, the children usually attend a separate age appropriate class while their parents attended the main service. Here, the entire family attended the service. This may be nice in theory, but this caused many distractions throughout the service. There were children crying and laughing, running up and down the aisles, and parents going in and out of the chapel to soothe their children; it was slightly chaotic. The family next to me had a toddler eating a clementine for the first half of the service and then she fell asleep the second half (and the only reason I know she fell asleep was because
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I have now learned that the majority of a Mormon service is the Bearing of Testimonies. This is when the service is handed over to the members to give testimonies in front of the entire congregation. Nothing is planned, and member can go in front of the congregation at random. During these testimonies, these people shared stories and personal experiences regarding The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. People also shared why they believed in the prophets Joseph Smith, Nephi, and President Thomas Spencer Monson. The first woman spoke on how she can’t believe that her friends believe that Joseph Smith “made up” The Book of Mormon. One little boy—who was holding a sheet of paper—went in front of the crowd to repent his sins. Another man talked for fifteen minutes about how important it is for the members of the Mormon Church to homeschool their children, as you see the “best results” with them. These testimonies seemed to last forever. Finally, the bishop said to open the hymn book for a “Closing Hymn”. We sang the hymn, and everyone got up and left. I was astonished. The entire service was nothing like I had expected. Where was the scripture? Where was the lesson? Yes, there was a reference to Christ and the many Mormon prophets, but there was never once a reading of scripture or an overall lesson. To me, there was no sense of organization other than the two hymns at the beginning and the closing
I have now learned that the majority of a Mormon service is the Bearing of Testimonies. This is when the service is handed over to the members to give testimonies in front of the entire congregation. Nothing is planned, and member can go in front of the congregation at random. During these testimonies, these people shared stories and personal experiences regarding The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. People also shared why they believed in the prophets Joseph Smith, Nephi, and President Thomas Spencer Monson. The first woman spoke on how she can’t believe that her friends believe that Joseph Smith “made up” The Book of Mormon. One little boy—who was holding a sheet of paper—went in front of the crowd to repent his sins. Another man talked for fifteen minutes about how important it is for the members of the Mormon Church to homeschool their children, as you see the “best results” with them. These testimonies seemed to last forever. Finally, the bishop said to open the hymn book for a “Closing Hymn”. We sang the hymn, and everyone got up and left. I was astonished. The entire service was nothing like I had expected. Where was the scripture? Where was the lesson? Yes, there was a reference to Christ and the many Mormon prophets, but there was never once a reading of scripture or an overall lesson. To me, there was no sense of organization other than the two hymns at the beginning and the closing