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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.

I

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.

X

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

I

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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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.

O

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.

C

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.