Further responses from one of my buddies:

As baptized and endowed members we gave away our agency and promised to keep the commandments/covenants. The agency was in play as to whether to be baptized and receive our endowments, having done so we turned in our "agency" ticket to the Lord. I wonder if that concept can be taken all the way back to the council in Heaven...essentially everyone on earth already made their choice, which was to follow the Savior. We have no right to chose otherwise at a later moment. Anyway, not sure how that relates to the article, I just think it's an interesting point.

His thought reminded of a portion of a talk by Pres. Kimball:

“One of the basic tasks for each individual is the making of decisions. A dozen times a day we come to a fork in the road and must decide which way we will go. Some alternatives are long and hard, but they take us in the right direction toward our ultimate goal; others are short, wide, and pleasant, but they go off in the wrong direction. It is important to get our ultimate objectives clearly in mind so that we do not become distracted at each fork in the road by the irrelevant questions: Which is the easier or more pleasant way? or, Which way are others going?
Right decisions are easiest to make when we make them well in advance, having ultimate objectives in mind; this saves a lot of anguish at the fork, when we’re tired and sorely tempted.
When I was young, I made up my mind unalterably that I would never taste tea, coffee, tobacco, or liquor. I found that this rigid determination saved me many times throughout my varied experiences. There were many occasions when I could have sipped or touched or sampled, but the unalterable determination firmly established gave me good reason and good strength to resist.
… The time to decide that we will settle for nothing less than an opportunity to live eternally with our Father is now, so that every choice we make will be affected by our determination to let nothing interfere with attaining that ultimate goal.
Develop discipline of self so that, more and more, you do not have to decide and redecide what you will do when you are confronted with the same temptation time and time again. You only need to decide some things once!
How great a blessing it is to be free of agonizing over and over again regarding a temptation. To do such is time-consuming and very risky.
We can push some things away from us once and have done with them! We can make a single decision about certain things that we will incorporate in our lives and then make them ours—without having to brood and redecide a hundred times what it is we will do and what we will not do.
Indecision and discouragement are climates in which the Adversary lives to function, for he can inflict so many casualties among mankind in those settings. … If you have not done so yet, decide to decide!
How wonderful it would be if we could just get every Latter-day Saint boy and girl to make up his mind or her mind during childhood to say, “I will never yield to Satan or to anybody who would want me to destroy myself.”
The time to quit evil ways is before they start. The secret of the good life is in protection and prevention. Those who yield to evil are usually those who have placed themselves in a vulnerable position.”
“Chapter 10: Fortifying Ourselves against Evil Influences,” Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Spencer W. Kimball, (2006),102–13