The Testimony of Jason Lomheim

Jason Lomheim was baptized on May 11th, 2024 in the Cordata Park Ward in the Huntington Beach Stake.

I’ve never borne my testimony before but I figured it’s worth catching people up on how some random 39 year old, married father of two decided to join The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. In retrospect, my faith journey has often felt like staring at a ror-schach test. After years of contemplating something took a form I couldn’t have predicted and eventually could not ignore. I’m still in real time trying to understand all the events in my life that have transpired to bring me to this point. I am still struggling to find the words to articulate it all, so please forgive me if I sound vague. The only other experience in life I can compare is finding my spouse, Kat. In both instances events transpired such that I felt like I was at a nexus of neutrality, where I stopped forcing the need to be right and let go of my fear of being wrong. The paradox is that in trading my need for clarity and certitude I found some peace in the trust that comes with being whole. 

That being said my story is long and, unfortunately, as many of you already know and Kat can attest, I am long winded, but this is my baptism, so get comfortable. 

I came back to faith in April of last year after ~12 years as an agnostic. I actually grew up in a loving Christian home. My parents, Terry and Bernice, who are here today, happen to be co  

Ppl nfirmed Episcopalians and attend St. Paul’s in Tustin. Needless to say, my parents were understandably excited that I had come back to faith but not exactly surprised, especially my mother, who has reminded me on more than one occasion that she always knew it was inevitable. 

My mother has a Bachelor’s degree in human development and, now in retrospect, it’s no surprise that she encouraged me to start my renewed faith journey by diving into faith development, more specifically the constructs put forth in James Fowler’s Stages of Faith. The developmental framework helped me find language to describe my whole faith experience. I realized, in a way that I hadn’t before, that my journey was frankly not all that uncommon. I soon began looking into discussions on the subject to learn more of other such faith journey’s in the podcast universe. This subsequently led me to find the Latter Day Saint podcast, Faith Matters. What started as curiosity soon became a place of surprising spiritual resonance. Through the podcast I found a plethora of holistically minded Latter Day Saint thinkers including, but not limited to, Richard Bushman, Terryl and Fiona Givens, Thomas Worthlin McConkie, Patrick Mason to name a few. This was a wonderful, refreshing shock coming from my old Protestant lens. In a way, I felt like I was some impostor who stumbled in through a backdoor into the coolest Christ centered party out there. There was no missionary knocking at my door but in hindsight I know something was definitely trying to get my attention. 

As I went through the episodes, and related authors works, I kept having these feelings of deja vu like I was watching parts of myself 12yrs prior, examining the hard questions that come with being a seeker. For me Faith Matters served as a mirror for some much needed self awareness, healing and peace and a sense of hope that I am eternally grateful for. 

It is also worth noting that around this time I had only one contact in the Latter Day Saint tradition, my friend and work colleague Kimber Nelson who I’ve known for nearly 8 years. She lives in Provo with her husband Chad, who is a tenured professor at BYU, and together they have four wonderful children. Kimber travels to Southern California to work blocks of shifts at Long Beach Memorial Emergency Department, on a monthly basis, where we are both employed as PAs or Physician Assistants. We also both happen to love running, and all things outdoors, and ended up training for several races and outings together with our work colleagues who share similar interests. All this being said, her and Chad ended up being invaluable contacts as I explored the Latter Day Saint Tradition over the last year. I knew Kimber had a friend in the Fountain Valley area who was a member (enter Kim Lund) and I finally found the courage to tell her I needed to pay a visit. That was last October and, as you all know, I never left.  I remember leaving the parking lot that first Sunday and knowing I had found my spiritual home. There’s much more to say about the whole experience but that’s the quick story of how I wound up here. Since October I’ve met with the Sister missionaries in many of your homes. Through our discussions and my own further reading, prayer and contemplation I’ve come to develop a testimony I would like to share with you all. These are the truths that have grounded me in this tradition and the reason why I am a Latter Day Saint. 

The first truth I bear witness to is the knowledge that Heavenly Father lives and loves his children. This construct of the eternal family runs deep in the DNA of the tradition but I believe it starts in something even more elemental, involving the nature of God. 

In the King Follet Discourse Joseph Smith articulated the eternal nature of intelligences stating that “The mind of man is as immortal as God itself” that “Intelligence exists upon a self-existent principle; it is a spirit from age to age, and there is no creation about it.”  I noticed this first and foremost in my son Reese and my daughter Etta Jude, long before I joined the church. Their personhood had an echo, an expression of something that I intuitively knew was eternal and divine. The apostle Orson Pratt captured this sentiment stating “Persons are only tabernacles or temples, and truth is the God that dwells in them. If the fullness of truth dwells in numberless millions of persons, then the same one indivisible God dwells in them all. When we worship the Father, we do not merely worship His person, but we worship the truth which dwells in His person. Wherever you find a fullness of wisdom, knowledge, truth, goodness, love, and like qualities, there you find God in all His glory, power, and majesty. Therefore, if you worship these adorable perfections you worship God.” I can’t help but see these “adorable perfections” everyday in my children. Their need to create. Their endless inspiration. Their ability to, quite literally, will joy into existence. They are already co-creators with God. It’s just who they are, and I now know it’s who they have always been. I know this, at its essence, is the same relationship between God and us. We give Him joy beyond comprehension and he reciprocates in love without end. 

The second truth I bear spiritual witness to is that Jesus Christ lives, that He is the Son of God, and that He carried out the infinite Atonement. As D&C 88:33 states “For what doth it profit a man if a gift is bestowed upon him, and he receiveth not the gift.” The atonement for me is a transcendent gift, existing as a universal constant not just an event. 

It’s meant to incur conversion again and again in our daily lives through at-one-ment with our savior, bringing us to the full recognition of our inherent divinity. As Eugene England stated better than I ever could “the atonement has a quality of mercy which allows us to be at one with ourselves, and thus gain the strength to be the new person that our sense of justice in the first place demanded that we be. God atones for our sins, and begins the process of forgiveness by extending unconditional love to us, in order that we might repent and thus bring to conclusion the process of forgiveness.” The atonement has me re-imagine eternity. It’s not just something that I will find on the other side of the veil but instead begins right here, right now. It allows for a state of wholeness in the present and not just something to be obtained in the distant future. 

The third truth I bear witness to is that this church is the truest expression of a faith community I have ever taken part in. I say this with some knowledge, having been a part of many a congregation and having spent years as a hired musician at churches all across Southern California. I encountered so many wonderful, loving people in those places but something about the Latter Day Saint community stands apart, evidenced in the fruits I have come to see, and over time received the spiritual confirmation as to why. In 2nd Nephi 2 we are taught that “there need be opposition in all things” and Joseph Smith articulated in The History of the Church “that in proving contraries truth is made manifest.” Furthermore Eugene England captured this lived reality in “The Church Is As True As The Gospel” stating “The church is as true, and as effective, as the gospel because it involves us directly in proving contraries, working constructively with the oppositions within ourselves, and especially between people, struggling at an experiential level with paradoxes and polarities that can help to redeem us. The church is true because it is concrete, not theoretical. And despite, even because of its contradictions and problems, it’s as productive of good as is the gospel.” I know that this church is true because in the receiving of priesthood keys it was given a divine, inspired construct. By design it’s meant to humble us to our core, in our service and relationships with one another, so that in doing so, we stand together as the light of the world, so that they may see our good works, and glorify our Father which is in heaven.

The fourth and final truth I bear spiritual witness to is that Joseph Smith is the prophet of God who was called to restore the gospel. Furthermore, I bear witness that the church is led by a living prophet today. Of note, I obviously did not grow up in primary school learning about Brother Joseph. My introduction to him was through historian Richard Bushman’s definitive biography “Rough Stone Rolling.” I quickly began to see him like prophets of old, fully human, deeply complex, filled with all the gifts and shortcomings that seem to come with such an inspired mantle. I personally remember being astounded when I came to fully understand the process of translation of The Book of Mormon. Even pre-eminent non-LDS scholars could never provide me a satisfactory explanation to its depth and complexity, let alone explain how it was verbally dictated, from a 23 year old farm boy, with an estimated 3rd grade education, in around 60 days. It is truly inspired and revelatory.

Lastly, the current prophet, Russel M. Nelson, captured my attention in the April 2023 conference talk “Peacemakers Needed.” I have never heard a message that addressed, with such conviction, what we need to be to the world today. Now, when I listen back to it, I am reminded of how much being a peacemaker starts in our own homes, within our families. It’s worth stating that the Lomheim and extended family is a mixed faith family. We are made up of non-believers, Episcopalians, Evangelicals, non-denominational Christians, Muslims and now a Latter Day Saint. I believe we are image bearers and I start there. We aim to speak of each other with the other's best interest in mind, where charity is the focus. And that’s what I want to leave everybody with today, spoken in revelation, from president Nelson himself:

“Charity is the antidote to contention. Charity is the spiritual gift that helps us cast off the natural man, who is selfish, defensive, prideful, and jealous. Charity is the principal characteristic of a true follower of Jesus Christ. Charity defines a peacemaker.”

I invite all of you to continue to strengthen your own testimonies, by seeking after Christ, by strengthening your knowledge of the savior in charity to others. I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ, our Savior. Amen.

Artwork by Jenna Conlin.