“Let Me See That Book”

By Coke Newell

I was walking with my missionary companion down a shaded residential street near the University of Antioquia in Medellín, Colombia. Having had a fair share of challenges in that city, I braced for the worst when a young man stepped away from a group of college students and called out to us. We stood motionless as the man ran up to us.

“Let me see that book,” he demanded, pointing to the Book of Mormon in my hand.

I held it up, showing him the cover that featured a golden statue of the angel Moroni against a sky-blue background. “It’s yours if you want it,” I said nervously.

He took it. His next question unnerved us entirely: “I know you guys. Where’d you get this book?”

My companion had only been in the mission field three days, so I gathered courage and answered the man’s question as forthrightly as I could. When I finished he was in tears.

“I’ve seen this book before,” he said. “I’ve seen you guys before. But it was seven years ago, at night, in a dream.”

He began to tell us about his dream. “I saw a simple blue book, paperback, with a golden figure on the cover. The man was wearing a robe and blowing what appeared to be some sort of trumpet.”

But it was the feeling that he remembered best. He’d had an overpowering impression that the book was important, essential, and true. He’d never seen the book again until he saw it in my hands there on the street.

We taught Juan Guillermo Mejía the discussions by coal-oil lantern in a grain storage shed behind his uncle’s shack. To each and every principle, he responded that he “already knew that” and that we were just confirming what he’d learned long ago. He finished reading the Book of Mormon that week and was baptized on Saturday.

When I completed my mission months later, he was the elders quorum president in his branch. After seven years, he had at last found the book of his dreams.

• Coke Newell serves as a Primary teacher in the Canyon Rim Ward, Layton Utah Kayscreek Stake.