“Of Dreams and Promises,” Liahona, May 1996, 8
Of Dreams and Promises
We all wept as we thought of the marvelous events we had witnessed that day and of the beautiful promises the children had made.
It was five o’clock in the morning when my husband and I, with two of our four children, left home in our small car. A fierce downpour pummeled the windshield, making it hard to see the road. But despite the weather, we were in a state of high excitement, for this was September 1983, and we were traveling to the dedication of the temple in Santiago, Chile.
My husband, a counselor in the bishopric, had received two tickets to attend dedicatory sessions in one of the large rooms inside the temple. Our older children, Igor and Perlita, ages 10 and 9, would see the services on closed-circuit television from a meetinghouse near the temple.
Brother Basualto, the other counselor in the bishopric, and his wife were traveling with us. They would sit with our children in the meetinghouse.
As we drove, Sister Basualto recounted a dream she had had the night before. “My husband and I were in the meetinghouse with your children, waiting for the session to start,” she told us. “Suddenly, one of the ushers came up and said, ‘Follow me. There are four extra seats in the temple.’ He took us into the temple and seated us right in front. It felt so real! When it was over, the General Authorities shook hands with the people. One of them spoke to your children.” As we listened to her, a peaceful feeling came over us. The rain continued to pour down.
We arrived at the temple, which stood stately and majestic in the storm. Shielding ourselves under a huge umbrella, we left our children and the Basualtos at the meetinghouse and hurried to our seats in the temple. The dedication was an extraordinary experience, with the Spirit gloriously in attendance. Even thinking about it today, I have a sweet and peaceful feeling. After the session was over, the members of the choir continued to sing with all their hearts in hymns of praise to the Lord.
My husband and I left the temple and went to the meetinghouse to join our children and friends. They were nowhere to be found. Quite concerned, we inquired if anyone had seen them. We were told, “Just before the session began, someone took them into the temple.” We looked back toward the temple and saw the four of them walking in the gardens.
Soon we were greeting one another excitedly. “Everything was just like my dream!” exclaimed Sister Basualto with tears in her eyes. How thrilled they had been to be seated inside the house of the Lord! Then they tenderly described how, at the conclusion, President Gordon B. Hinckley, then Second Counselor in the First Presidency, came up to our son Igor and spoke to him through an interpreter.
“How old are you, son?” President Hinckley asked.
“Ten,” said Igor.
“Will you promise me, here in the house of the Lord, that when the time comes you will serve a full-time mission, no matter what the obstacles?”
“Yes,” Igor replied in a quiet voice. “I promise.”
President Hinckley then turned to our daughter Perlita. “And you, my precious child, will you promise me that you will keep yourself clean and pure so that you can be married in the house of the Lord?”
She, too, shyly responded, “Yes.” We all wept as we thought of the marvelous events we had witnessed that day and of the beautiful promises the children had made.
Now, more than 10 years have passed. During that time, President Hinckley has become President of the Church, and my husband and I have watched both our children withstand the darts of the adversary. We have watched them stand firm and keep their childhood promises. Igor served as a missionary in the Chile Viña del Mar Mission. And his sister Perlita married a returned missionary in the beautiful Santiago Chile Temple—the same temple in which she and her brother had made special promises to a servant of the Lord and had witnessed a dream fulfilled.
Illustrated by Dilleen Marsh