Pastor’s honest reaction to Mormon (Latter-day Saints) TikToks – powered by Happy Scribe
I think I really shouldn’t be doing this without help. Hello, Saints. My name is Jeff. I am a Christian pastor exploring everything I can about the Church of Jesus Christ christ and Latterday Saints. And I’m on this journey because there are so many things that I believe they’re similar, but at the same time very different. And though I normally talk about a lot of doctrine and theology, there are a lot of things worth talking about when it comes to just lifestyle and culture. And I got sucked into a TikTok feed the other day by a group called Saints Unscripted, which is a bunch of LDS church members. And I was getting a kick out of it because there are so many things that seem very similar from a lifestyle standpoint between LDS culture and Bible Belt Midwestern Christianity culture, which is what I grew up in. So, like this video subscribe, check these out into the sake of it. Isaiah. Yes. When you’re reading the Bible, there’s certain books you get to where you just like, I call them skid mark books where you just slam on the brakes. I especially see that whenever people say, hey, I’m going to read through the Bible in a year, and they go through Genesis, which is pretty action packed, and Exodus, same thing.
There’s some law in there, whatever. But then you get to Leviticus, and it’s like people send them on the breaks. They’re like, yeah, I don’t know if I want to read through the Bible in a year. But the prophets are especially difficult. Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel. There’s some really interesting stuff in it that can be hard to get your mind around. I mean, imagine preaching through these passages. That’s always a challenge because you got to handle it right? Because it’s definitely the thick of it. Okay, so facial here, let’s talk about this for a second. I don’t know how much of these lifestyle things are tied to actual teachings in the Eldias Church or if it’s just the way the church culture is, but facial hair all growing up definitely had a stigma in the Midwest. If you had a beard, especially, or if you were unkept in some way, people would look down on you because they expect you to be sort of clean shaven and clean cut and always looking nice. So I can definitely relate to this frequently Asked question.
Mormon Dating Edition are you allowed to date? Yeah, I am. What age you allowed to start dating? Yeah, usually it’s around 16, but it just depends on what your parents or what your family says.
Do you have to date in a.
Group or can you date singlely? Usually people are advised to start in a group, but as people trust each other more and get more comfortable, you can single date.
And can you date a nonmember of the judge?
Yeah, you can date nonmembers. You can date just whoever you trust.
Are you guys allowed to kiss?
Yeah, you can kiss each other. You can hold hands. Just nothing too sexual before marriage. Cool.
Thanks for letting us know. If you guys have any other questions, let us know down in the comments. Alright? This is so similar to the rest of Christianity. The whole idea of how do you date? These are frequently asked questions that I grew up asking because though it wasn’t tied to, like, Latter day Saints, the whole idea of should you date, how old should you be when you date? There was a whole I kissed dating goodbye phase that took place in the early two thousand s. And people really got into courting where you had to ask a dad’s permission. And there was like a certain age where most people agreed on like mid teens that you can start dating, but you shouldn’t go on exclusive dates, you should go in groups. So I know that these guys are probably taking these questions really seriously, which is good. But that whole calculus of trying to figure out what’s appropriate, what’s not appropriate, and making sure everybody’s happy and okay with it and there’s not disapproval, I completely remember and understand that tight rope that I had to walk growing up. I think that’s pretty common in most religious circles.
I’m telling you, these people are Satanists as I sit here. They are Satanists. What we got to do is we got to go down to the religious supply store. We got to get ourselves a couple of gallons of holy water. My cousin Gary the priest can get us a deal. No. Then we got to go to the market. We got to get ourselves a couple of those big springs. Bring that garlic. A couple of big springs of garlic. We got to get ourselves some fresh lambs blood and then we got great. Do you want it to take your family kidnap and tear their Oliver out and make some kind of Satanic pat day?
Okay, I just had the performance here is on point. I mean, the syncing up of the lips with this sound bite is pretty impressive, I have to say that. But hold on. I’m not understanding trying to learn about Latterday Saints on the internet and that’s the Google thing. I mean, I feel like information has gotten a little bit better online. Like, whenever I was in high school, we weren’t supposed to use the internet for references. I think that’s changed now, but I’m trying to figure out where else do I get information to learn about Latterday Saints. Maybe I need to reach out to Saints unscripted and find out, because I’m sure it’s not all accurate, but I can get the gist right. Maybe not, I don’t know. Okay, so now I’m going to check out some TikToks that I think are a little bit more specific to the LDS Church. Let’s see if I even understand what’s going on here. Okay. Is this a polygamy. Okay. Okay. So I think I really shouldn’t be doing this without help. I think what this is conveying is that it’s hard enough to face, like, temptation and some of those things, but for crying out loud, when people automatically think, since you’re an LDS church member, that you have multiple moms because of the polygamous past, I could see that being annoying and frustrating.
No matter whitmer, we trick it.
In.
Always before.
Okay. Now, I just recently learned about this that members of the Eldias Church, at least up until recently, don’t drink coffee and tea. And I don’t know all the reasons as to why that’s the case. I’ve heard some people connect it to the caffeine. I’ve heard other people connect it to, like, the temperature of the drink. Coffee and tea are normally hot. But I can definitely relate to growing up and listening to secular music. And if I was ever around my parents, I would get very uncomfortable because that wasn’t consistent with what we believed. And so that whole idea of really getting into a song and then it’s talking about things that aren’t necessarily lining up with your faith, there’s definitely something I can relate to.
Welcome. Voice activation required.
Thor.
Access denied.
Thor, son of Odin.
Access denied.
God of thunder.
Access denied.
Strongest Avenger.
Access denied.
Strongest Avenger.
Access denied.
Damn you, stock. Point Break.
Welcome point break.
Yeah. I have to imagine that there’s a lot of anticipation tied to the whole mission call where I guess whether you’re missionary, like an elder or whitmer, you’re a sister missionary getting a call, you don’t know where you’re going. And I’m sure there’s a lot of hopes that you’ll end up in really awesome places, but maybe you just end up down the road. I can’t totally relate to that because we don’t have the same thing in the rest of Christianity as far as assigning people to go places. But I could definitely see how there’s a lot of anticipation and maybe sometimes disappointment in that. Okay. I mean, you can’t watch a TikTok without getting some dancing in there. And Lord helped that mom. Not to say that I would be any better. I’m a horrible dancer. But that actually does answer a question I have. Is it okay to dance in the LDS church? Because there’s a lot of non LDS Christian circles that put a black mark on dancing. You’re not supposed to dance. You shouldn’t dance. Growing up, there was, like, debates on whether you should go to prom or not go to prom because people dance there and all the things that are tied to that.
But I guess dancing is cool with the audience church. I mean, if you’re putting out there on TikTok, I just feel a little bit bad for this mom because she’s dancing like me. Oh, this answers the question right here. Ken mormon dance. Yes. Does that mean that everybody who is Mormon can dance? No, the whole dancing thing is really interesting. And I know it’s because the eldest church started in a time in American religious history where the temperance movement was taking place, which I think started with the Methodist Church. But this whole idea that you shouldn’t drink, smoke, dance, gamble, all these other things. And that’s interwoven into a lot of Christian culture. Not just the LDS culture, but the culture that I grew up in, had the same stigmas attached to those types of lifestyle things, and to this day can be really difficult to maneuver through, especially when you don’t want to focus so much on lifestyle do’s and don’ts. And you want to focus more on what do we believe, why do we believe it, and why should we practice what we believe? Yeah, I hear you, but this kind of strikes at what this channel is all about.
Right? Like, I get that the Eldias Church teaches about Jesus and makes references to Jesus, but the origin of Jesus and who he is and who he’s been and who he will be in the future is pretty different between the Eldias Church and the rest of Christianity. So I think there are pretty good reasons why the rest of Christianity the asks, have you ever had a dream that you do again, tied to, like, I guess, the missionary culture whenever you’re going out? And if they send you to a country where they speak another language, you have to learn that language. Which is pretty similar with missionaries in general in Christianity, though, I know that this is a specific age group for the missionaries that go out and I’ve never had to learn a language to do any sort of outreach or missions work. But I have learned Greek, which is what the majority of the New Testament is written in. And I remember those aspirations of being able to learn the language and read it fluently and understand it and speak it, and I would work really hard at it. And then when I actually tried to articulate it or write it, it was toddner language.
It’s hard to learn another language. Like, really hard. This is cool. Yeah. I have to think, like, if you’re a missionary and you’re called to, like, a unique part of the world, that’s, like, that’s a different context that I’m sure you just have so many, like, unforgettable experiences and you’re seeing things that you otherwise wouldn’t have seen. Even though in the rest of Christianity, we don’t necessarily go out the same way that the LDS Church sends out missionaries at that age. We did things whenever I was growing up called missions trips, and we would go places as a group for a week or two at a time to do missions work. A lot of times it was putting on, like, a VBS for kids or going door to door or helping build things where they’re trying to build churches. And I have so many unforgettable memorable experiences from going to all kinds of different parts of the country. I mean, Washington, D. C. And Toronto. And my wife, she did mission strips in, like, the Philippines and in the Caribbean Islands somewhere. In fact, whenever I was in youth group, we would always take mission strips up to the Native American reservations in South Dakota.
And I have the most unbelievable memories and had unbelievable experiences there of just seeing a part of the country I otherwise wouldn’t have seen and interacting with people I otherwise wouldn’t have interacted with. And it’s such, like, an enriching experience that I’m really grateful for. So, yeah, I think it’s really cool. I mean, whenever you go to do things to serve the church, you have the opportunity to see parts of the world you otherwise wouldn’t see, and that’s something that you take with you for the rest of your life. All right, so the moral of the story here is that I want to hang out with more LDS Church members because it seems like culturally, there’s a lot of similarities. And even though we may not agree on everything, belief wise, I think we kind of get each other. Maybe I should actually reach out to the Saints unscripted people and see if they want to hang out, because, really, they were one of the inspirations for me to start this channel. So I hope you enjoyed this video, like, and subscribe check me out on Patreon. I would love it if you would support me.
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J Washburn
