also known as
God's Plan of Happiness in Ten Simple Symbols
Have you ever wondered: "Why are we here?" Do you ever contemplate why God made the earth or,
given the pain many people have, if there really is a God or if he really cares about us? These
deep questions have bothered people since the very beginning of everything!
God has provided us answers to our questions and help to understand why our world is the
way it is. He wants us to learn many things and grow up to become like him. God created a
plan to accomplish this. This plan is called "God's Plan of Happiness."
You have likely come to this web page because you were intrigued by this string of
characters: 03IXI8E0OC. I call this "the Mariner's Log." The log is a graphical
representation of God's Plan of Happiness, to help you remember the Plan and what God
wants to do for you. What I am about to tell you is not fiction; it is my understanding
of God's purposes for the earth and our mortal lives.
Though what I say here has deep roots in a particular religious belief, the things I write here
come from my own personal understanding of God and his Plan. These writings do not represent the
official position of any group or anyone besides Jason Nemrow.
I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
(LDS) and there may be many similarities between what is written here and official LDS doctrine.
If you are interested in learning more about LDS beliefs regarding God's Plan of Happiness,
you can visit http://www.mormon.org or talk with a
Latter-day Saint about it.
I repeat: the things explained in this web page are NOT official statements of LDS doctrine,
nor are these writings endorsed by the LDS Church.
Here is some background into the creation and early history of the Mariner's Log.
A Short Explanation of the Log
Please understand that this short explanation is totally incomplete and the symbols
associated with each part of God's Plan might not seem to have anything to do with what is
written in this section. This short explanation is merely a "teaser" to the larger explanation
that follows. If you like, it is a reluctant and unsatisfactory answer for impatient people
who want a one-minute response to the question of "What is this Mariner's Log?"
0 - God created a plan for us to grow up with an opportunity to become like him.
3 - Two-thirds of us chose to accept God's plan and Jesus was our leader.
I - As part of the plan, we had to come to earth by being born.
X - We are here on earth to prove to God that we will follow his plan and that we will
take the help of Jesus.
I - We will all die and our chance to prove ourselves to God will come to an end.
8 - God will give us a last time to learn about and follow his plan after death.
E - Jesus will judge how we followed the plan and give us our ultimate reward.
0 - If we reject the plan or break a big law of God, we will be given a poor reward.
O - If we follow parts of God's plan, we will be given a better reward.
C - If we follow God's plan completely, we can grow to become like him: the best reward of all.
As you read the more detailed explanations of each part of God's Plan of Happiness, everything
will make much more sense and you will understand how the symbols relate to each part.
On the Log Symbols
Each symbol of the Log is a number or a letter, but you must understand that each symbol is more
accurately a graphical representation of a part of God's Plan of Happiness. The Log was designed
to be comprehensible to anyone, no matter their language or culture, as an aid in understanding
the Plan. The fact that all of the symbols are commonly used numbers and letters simply allows
the Log to be transmitted easily by email, web page, typewriter, handwriting, or other means of
communication.
The Explanation of The Mariner's Log or God's Plan of Happiness
I have only given a passing attempt at explaining God's Plan of Happiness here. Learning the
nature of God and what he wants us to do is a unending process and I am sure even those people
who are very knowledgeable about the Plan still have much to learn from God about it. I don't
think anyone on earth fully comprehends the entire Plan, least of all me.
In this explanation, I have intentionally left out some aspects of the Plan, such as the importance
of physical bodies and the Resurrection. I do this to keep the explanation brief and to encourage you
to seek out a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day
Saints that you respect to get a more complete explanation of the Plan.
The Mariner's Log (or God's Plan of Happiness)
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Before you were born, you lived with God. We all lived with God because we are his children.
Like any good father, God loves us and wants what is best for us. God wants us to have the things
that he has. Like any normal child, we loved God our father and wanted to grow up to be like him.
As children, we were in a safe place, living with God our father. In order to grow up, we would
have to leave this safe place and strike out on our own. If we didn’t leave this home, we could
never really grow up and become like God. Growing up requires making our own choices and not
always being under the eye of our parents. Growing up means that we must be willing to be in places
that might not be particularly safe.
God wanted to give us guidance as we left our safe home with him. He created God's Plan of
Happiness to help us along the way while we were far away from him, to help us grow up with
the least amount of danger. God presented his Plan to all his children.
The number '0' symbolizes our safe home as children with God. It represents a circle without
an opening because, before God created the Plan, we were not able to leave this home and grow up.
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When God presented his Plan to us, he also gave us our first choice: to accept the Plan or reject it.
God's oldest son, a man we would call Jesus Christ, supported the Plan. He also offered to help
all of God's children to fulfill the Plan. Many children followed the leadership of Jesus and also
accepted the Plan.
Another of God's sons, someone we would call Satan or the Devil, did not support the Plan. He
convinced many children that the Plan was too dangerous and that many children would choose not
to follow the Plan and never get to be like God. Satan told the children that he would force them
to do what the Plan required so that everyone would become like God. Some children liked this
idea and followed Satan, rejecting the Plan.
God knew that his children would never really grow up if they were forced to do what they should
and that they would never be able to be like their father, no matter what Satan said. God put Jesus
in charge of making the Plan work. Two-thirds of the children of God followed Jesus and supported
the Plan.
Satan and those who followed him vowed to destroy the Plan and every child of God that tried
to follow Jesus. One-third of the children of God followed Satan in trying to destroy the Plan.
God sent Satan and his followers away from his home.
The number '3' symbolizes the two-thirds of God's children that followed Jesus Christ and
supported the Plan. It represents two circles connected together with an opening on one side,
allowing the followers of Jesus to progress in the Plan.
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God's Plan required that we leave our safe home with him. Jesus created the earth for us to
live on while we were away. We leave our home with God when we are born. As part of the Plan,
we are born to mortal parents, who are children of God that have lived on earth for a time and
who are meant to help us grow up the way God wants us to.
When we come to earth, we cannot remember our lives before birth. God does this because he
doesn't want our memories of accepting the Plan to influence us into blindly following the Plan
while on earth. It is very important that we make our own choices while we are here.
The first letter 'I' symbolizes our birth, the portal between our lives as children with
God and our lives of growing up on earth. It also represents a barrier to our memories of
childhood with God.
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X
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Without the memory of our time with God, our life on earth becomes a great test to see if
we will seek out, learn, and follow God's Plan. Though we don’t have our memories, God has provided
a way for us to learn about the Plan and what we must do to follow it. What we have to do is seek
out that learning.
God has taught men called prophets about the Plan and what God wants us to do. These prophets
are told to tell other people and to write down these things in books. The Bible is a collection
of books written by prophets and we can learn about the Plan by reading it.
As part of the Plan, God sends the Holy Ghost to help people feel when things are true. When we
listen to a true prophet of God or read his words, the Holy Ghost lets us feel that the things we
hear or read are true and come from God. This way we can know truth. This is how we learn about
the Plan and what God wants us to do, even though we cannot remember learning about it when we
lived with God. God will answer our questions through the Holy Ghost when we sincerely ask him
through prayer.
If we are to grow up, we must learn to make good choices. The earth provides several possibilities
to choose from and to learn from. The Plan, as taught by prophets of God, is one possible choice among
many on how to live your life. We learn very quickly that the choices we make can affect us for the rest
of our lives and beyond.
Before you were born on earth, you rejected the ideas of Satan and his followers. You are now the
enemy of the Devil who wants to destroy the Plan by persuading you not to follow it. He may entice
you to do things that God doesn't want you to do. He may convince you that the Plan is foolish or too
hard to follow, or that there is no God and no Plan. He can trick you into ignoring or rejecting one
or two parts of the Plan so you can never become like God. Satan can confuse us by offering many,
many different and appealing paths to follow besides the Plan. If Satan can get us to deviate from
the Plan, even just a little, we can lose our opportunity to be like God. God doesn't want this
to happen.
Many people on Earth are influenced by philosophies called atheism and agnosticism, which deny
God typically because there is obvious suffering and unfairness on earth and that a proper God would
do something about this. Such people miss the entire point of mortal life, which is to test how people
will react to such situations. Obviously, people who put much stock in these philosophies are testing
poorly and should not expect to become like God.
Before we were born, Jesus Christ promised that he would help us follow the Plan. He was born and
lived on earth just as we do, and he followed God's Plan perfectly, giving us the ultimate example.
Knowing that we would make mistakes and might be tricked into doing the wrong things by Satan, Jesus
paid the punishment for the things that we will do wrong and provides us the opportunity to repent of our
mistakes and sins against God's Plan. When we repent in the way Jesus taught us, it is as if we never
sinned and we can be right back to following the Plan. Jesus truly does fulfill his promise to help
us follow God's Plan.
Experiences we have on earth can prepare us for living a life like God's. Parenting children,
avoiding bad things and embracing good things, serving others, and gaining control over our bodies
and appetites help us to be more like God and help us better fulfill his Plan for us.
Once we learn about the Plan and are following it, we need to help others do the same. We can do
this by teaching our children these things and sharing with them our understanding of the Plan. We
are commanded to do these things for everyone around us.
Our first purpose in life on earth should be to recognize God's Plan, learn of it, and follow
it by following the example of Jesus Christ. Our second purpose should be to help others recognize,
learn, and follow the Plan as well.
The letter 'X' symbolizes the fact that "we are here" on earth. It also represents the many
decisions we must make and the many directions we may choose to go in. One of those choices
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Very similar to birth, the other portal through which all of us must pass is death. It marks
the end of our mortal opportunity to make many decisions for ourselves. Our greatest chance to
prove ourselves in following the Plan will be behind us.
In death, we leave behind all the physical things that we accumulated during life: money,
possessions, physical addictions, and the like. The Plan was meant to lift our vision past mere
physical pleasures and focus more on our ultimate reward. As the common saying goes: "You can't
take it with you."
The memories of our lives before birth will be restored to us in preparation for the time that
Jesus will judge how well we followed the Plan.
The second letter 'I' symbolizes our death, the portal between our mortal lives and the
life beyond. It also represents a barrier that the physical things of mortality do not follow you
beyond death.
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Between death and our judgment, there is a time of waiting until one is judges. We will wait
in one of two places, which God often calls Paradise and Prison.
Paradise is the place where those who accepted and tried to follow the Plan will go after they die.
It has also been called a place of rest from the cares of mortal life. Many people in Paradise will be
given the task of teaching God's Plan to those in Prison.
Prison is a place of punishment for those who did not repent of all their sins during mortal life.
Most people will spend some time in Prison, where they are dealt the commiserate punishments for
their un-repented sins.
Prison is also the place for those who either did not choose to follow the Plan, or didn't have a
good chance to learn about the Plan during their mortal life.
Those in Prison will be taught God's Plan and will have the
opportunity to accept it. God has promised that everyone will understand the Plan and choose to
accept or reject it before their lives are judged. Those in Prison who accept the Plan and have
finished being punished for all their sins will be able to enter Paradise and finish their waiting
time there.
The number '8' symbolizes the two places of waiting called Paradise and Prison. It also
symbolizes that the two places are connected and people can move between them under certain
conditions. It further symbolizes two connected albeit closed circles because further progress is
only possible after judgment.
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E
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Each person that has ever lived on earth will be judged in their appointed time. Jesus Christ,
the one who taught us about the Plan and gave us the perfect example of following it, will be our
final judge. His judgment will be based on how diligently we followed his example and did the things he
taught us to do. When you did something wrong but then repented for it, Jesus will not consider
those mistakes in his judgement.
After we are judged, we will be given our reward. Basically, there are three rewards that we
receive, based on how we accepted and followed the Plan. [There is also a fourth judgement that involves
a circumstance called "outer darkness", but very few people merit this.]
The letter 'E' symbolizes the judgment that each of us must eventually pass through. The
three arms of the symbol represent the three basic rewards we can receive based on our efforts in
following the Plan.
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The least reward that we can receive is called the "Telestial Kingdom" by God. It has been
compared in glory to the light produced by the stars.
People who did not accept the Plan or who committed serious sins on Earth without repenting
for them will ultimately receive the Telestial Kingdom as their reward. The Telestial Kingdom has
conditions like those on the earth as it is now, albeit without decay.
Those who receive this reward will not be permitted to progress any further. They will not be
allowed to become like God.
The number '0' symbolizes the Telestial Kingdom, or lowest reward. It represents a closed
circle as those who receive this reward will not be permitted to progress beyond it.
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The better reward that we can receive is called the "Terrestrial Kingdom" by God. It has been
compared in glory to the light reflected by the moon.
People who accept the Plan but do not follow it sufficiently will receive the Terrestrial
Kingdom as their reward. The Terrestrial Kingdom has idyllic conditions perhaps similar to those
in the Garden of Eden before Adam and Eve fell.
Those who receive this reward will not be permitted to progress any further. They will not be
allowed to become like God.
The letter 'O' symbolizes the Terrestrial Kingdom, or better reward. It represents a
closed circle as those who receive this reward will not be permitted to progress beyond it.
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C
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The best reward we can receive is called the "Celestial Kingdom" by God. It has been compared
in glory to the light produced by the sun.
People who accept the Plan and follow it well, repenting of the things they do wrong in life,
will receive the Celestial Kingdom as their reward. These will live with God and.
They will also have the further opportunity to progress onward and become like God.
This is the reward that Jesus Christ receives because he followed the Plan perfectly.
This is the reward that God wants all his children to strive to receive. The Plan is designed
to help God’s children desire and work to receive the Celestial Kingdom and become like God.
The letter 'C' symbolizes the Celestial Kingdom, or best reward. It represents an open
circle as many who receive this reward can progress on and can become like God.
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The Most Treasured Things I Take Away from the Plan
Each person has an individual reaction to God's Plan of Happiness. For myself, I am struck
by the love of God for us. He is willing to share all he has and all he is with us. Like any
good father, he wants us to have the joy and happiness that he has. I can imagine him working
every day of my life to help me along as I strive to follow the example of Jesus Christ toward
the best reward the Plan offers. The world ceases to be a confusing and frightening place and
becomes an opportunity to grow and learn and understand what is truly important and also an
opportunity to share my perspective with others.
This was the reason that I created the Salvation Code: to share God's Plan of Happiness with
as many people as possible. I am, by nature, a person who is reluctant to do things that I think
might upset or offend others, just like a lot of people. Jesus Christ has said that teaching
others about the Plan is very important and this is my way of honoring all his efforts and
showing my desire to obey and follow him.
I hope that the Code and this inadequate and incomplete explanation of God's Plan of Happiness
will touch
your soul and that you will get a desire to learn more about what God has in store for you.
I hope you will contact a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and discover
that there is more to know about God and Jesus Christ and what they want you to do. You can
learn that all these things are true through the warm feelings that come from the Holy Ghost,
just as I have learned them.
I have felt God's love and I know that if you haven't had that feeling, you can. I know God
lives and I know he loves you and wants you to become like him. I know that Jesus Christ makes
it possible for us to repent of the things we do wrong and that he will lead us back to God, if
we will follow him. God awaits me and God awaits you. May these things bring you closer to that
highest reward that God wants you to have!