Tonight for family scriptures I broke out the parable of the sower from Matthew 13 for my little children. It was slightly over their heads (I got questions like ?what is God?s special word?? ? as in singular) but as I read the parable and succeeding explanation out loud it dawned on me that this parable was further support for my theory on the Devil?s GPA!

The Devil?s GPA is the code name I use for what I think is the fundamental content of Satan?s playbook as explained in the scriptures. I introduced the concept in an earlier post, but here is the list temptations we?ll face in mortality from greatest to least:

G: Greed and Getting Gain (Plus the power wealth brings)
P: Popularity, Prominence, Praise of Men, Pride, Power (at least the influence part)
A: Appetites and Addictions

I have loved this idea since I read somewhere that President Mckay taught similar things. I hadn?t seen it in this parable until tonight. Here goes:

The seeds by the wayside = Appetites and Addictions

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As demonstrated by today’s Sunday School lesson (D&C Lesson 7) exaltation can be attained through 5 simple steps on our part — all the rest of the work is taken care of by the atonement of Jesus Christ. You know the steps already:
1.) Exercise faith in the Lord Jesus Christ
2.) Repent
3.) Be baptized
4.) Receive the Gift of the Holy Ghost
5.) Endure to the end.
(See references here, here, here, and here)

But the problem with this list is that we have a huge amount of scriptural detail on steps 1-4 and nearly no scriptural detail on step 5. To make things worse, one can accomplish steps 1-4 by the age of 8. We have been instructed that Step 5 generally includes keeping baptismal covenants and making and keeping of temple covenants, but why is there so little other specific instruction from God and the prophets on the step that will take the next 92 year of life to accomplish? Read on gentle friend, I think I’ve discovered the answer… (more…)

I was thrilled yesterday when Clark’s only real remaining critique of my post on God’s non-foreknowledge was “if you can reconcile that to your understanding of the gospel that’s fine. I suspect many people can not.” WhooHoo! I’m not mainstream! I can call on Heisenberg again to explain why that is such a good thing. (more…)

The devil is extremely interested in your GPA… No not your grade point average, your quotient of the Babylonian or Devil’s GPA – (more…)

After hearing my assertion that God isn’t much concerned with mortal life and death, a blogger called danithew brought Jacob’s discourse in 2 Nep. 9 to my attention. The discourse by Jacob is very relevant to an examination of the proper view of human life and death. (more…)