My daily Book of Mormon reading has brought me up to a reppetitive part of the Nephite storyline: high frequency pride cycle.
They had just believed the words of Samuel the Lamanite, but many began to do wicked things. Of the righteous, they reasoned that they were trying to keep them in ignorance:
“...therefore they can keep us in ignorance, for we cannot witness with our own eyes that they are true” (Helaman 16:20)
...speaking of the prophecies that habe been fulfilled, and will yet be fulfilled.
Satan had successfully convinced them that good is evil, and evil is good! And what a great way for them to rationalize their evil doings. (Not!)
I recall from the movie Inception a scene where Eames and Cobb discuss the approach of incepting an idea in a CEO's mind. Eames points out that to approach the topic of corporate dynamics would become convoluted due to all the aspects involved. But if they can pinpoint a simple aspect of the CEO's life, they can based their inception on it.
They choose to influence the CEO's relationship with his father: the desire to please his father. This CEO had recently inherited the company from his him.
Looking at the movie in a strange and different perspective, I make the following comment: had the CEO been guided by more righteous motives, he would not have been deceived.
Satan likewise exploits the desires of our hearts that are unrighteous. We will always have some part of us that isn't perfectly aligned with God, and Satan tries to use that as leverage.
Our Heavenly Father's counter to this is simple: keep the commandments. A set of laws, founded by doctrines of love and salvation that we can measure ourselves by.
Satan has been known in the scriptures to perform anonymous inceptions of thoughts – if he can convince us that the planted idea is our own, not his – or better yet, God's idea – he can get away with a lot!
Was there evil inception in Saul's choice to save the best of the lands he was commanded to utterly kill? Was there possible inception in Judas thinking he was doing Jesus good? (Read Talmage's Jesus the Christ) Was there obvious inception of Satan convincing Cain to offer an unworthy sacrifice to God? Yes.
My Institute teachers have recently reiterated that the tandard works are so called because they are the standard against which we can measure all other beliefs. Scripture study is thus a magnificent defence against the anonymous inception Satan seeks to employ.
I pray we not be deceived.
Elder Lawrence in the April 2017 genereal conference said,
"The devil is brazen when it comes to putting wicked ideas into our minds. The Book of Mormon teaches that Satan whispers unclean and unkind thoughts and sows thoughts of doubt. He nags us to act on addictive urges and to entertain selfishness and greed. He doesn’t want us to recognize where these ideas are coming from, so he whispers, 'I am no devil, for there is none' (2 Nephi 28:22)."
God has declared, “And whoso treasureth up my word, shall not be deceived” (JS–Matthew 1:37). Let us do so.
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