Promises for Eternity
Learning that families can be eternal has blessed my family forever. It can bless your family too.
Elder Soares’s parents, Apparecido and Mercedes Soares
As a young man, my father, Apparecido, was not interested in religion. His parents were good people but not religious. Nevertheless, as he grew into adulthood, he read the Bible, attended Bible classes, and studied the life of Jesus Christ. This caused him to have great interest in the Savior’s gospel and in family. He wanted to marry someone with the same interest.
My mother, Mercedes, came from a deeply religious family. They attended church and practiced their religion. Growing up in that environment, my mother never missed church.
After my parents married and my three brothers and I came along, they did their best to raise us based on the Savior’s teachings. One day my aunt said to my father, “If you really want to raise your four boys centered in Christ and have God in your family, you need to learn more about my church.”
She was a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
The Gospel Blesses My Family
My father was not very interested in finding out more about my aunt’s church, and nothing happened until the missionaries knocked on our door. As they taught us, one thing that interested my parents in the restored gospel of Jesus Christ was the importance of family and how the gospel blesses families.
For months, my parents attended church and engaged with members, but they were not baptized right away. As they met with the missionaries and continued studying the gospel, they learned the importance of teaching their children light and truth and that families can be eternal. Eventually, they were baptized.
The idea of having eternal families touched my parents’ hearts so much that it became the key point of their conversion. They also invited neighbors to listen to the missionary lessons frequently.
Building Forever Families
After my parents’ baptism, they regularly held family home evening and scripture study, faithfully attended church, and began family history work. With those efforts, they hoped to create a family centered on the gospel of Jesus Christ and desired to be sealed as a forever family.
The year my parents were baptized, there was no temple in Brazil. The closest temple to where we lived in São Paulo was the Mesa Arizona Temple, almost 6,000 miles (9,650 km) away! Travel was too expensive, so my parents waited for years for the dedication of the São Paulo Brazil Temple, the first temple built and dedicated in all of South America, before they could receive their temple ordinances and be sealed. By that time, I was serving a mission in Rio de Janeiro.
About two months before I concluded my mission, my mission president allowed my companion and me to travel overnight with stake members from Rio de Janeiro to the São Paulo Brazil Temple so I could be sealed to my parents and receive my own temple ordinances. My experience in the temple had a tremendous impact on the rest of my mission. I loved testifying of the temple and the importance of God’s plan for families. The temple also changed my vision of the future.
Elder Soares as a young missionary, with his brother and parents
When I returned from my mission, I wanted to find an eternal companion and be sealed in the temple. I first met my wife, Rosana, while we served in the same mission. Several months following our missions, we crossed paths at a multistake dance. We started dating, and two years later, we were married and sealed in the temple with the goal of raising our own eternal family.
Elder Soares and his wife, Rosana
Rosana and I worked together to create a family focused on the Savior, His teachings, and the teachings of His prophets and apostles. In time, I had the blessing of sealing my three children to their spouses. Seeing them kneel at the altar in the temple was an unforgettable and beautiful experience. Today, our children are raising their children in the gospel—just as my parents had done for my brothers and me and as Rosana and I have tried to do for them. I can see the blessings of the gospel continue eternally for our family!
Elder Soares with his wife, his children, and their spouses
The Savior Makes It Possible
Everywhere I go on a Church assignment, I try to find a little Nativity to purchase and bring home. Rosana and I feel that these Nativities help connect us to the Savior. Today we have quite a collection! One year before Christmas, we placed all our Nativities on two big shelves in our home. After Christmas, we decided to leave them up. Every day those Nativities remind us of what is most important to us—the Savior, His gospel, and our family.
Elder Soares lets his collection of Nativities remind him of the Savior all year.
For us, family is everything because “the family is central to the Creator’s plan for the eternal destiny of His children.” But without Jesus Christ, that plan is not possible. His Atonement and His gospel make possible the promise of eternal families.
President Russell M. Nelson has taught, “Only through the saving ordinances of the gospel of Jesus Christ can families be exalted. The ultimate end for which we strive is that we become happy as a family—endowed, sealed, and prepared for eternal life in the presence of God.”
In our day, prophets and apostles have taught that “happiness in family life is most likely to be achieved when founded upon the teachings of the Lord Jesus Christ.” No matter your family situation, as you do your best to follow the Lord, He will bless you with strength to find ways to uplift the family you have now and the family you will have someday. He will help you progress toward the glorious possibility of one day living joyfully with loved ones and with Him and our Heavenly Father forever.