2024 Book of Mormon

Scot

One of the most exciting discoveries in reading the Book of Mormon is when we come upon quotations and extracts from the plates of brass! This is that ancient, sacred record that the sons of Lehi returned to Jerusalem and risked their lives to obtain. This is a record much larger than our Old Testament and it contains the prophecies, promises and covenants of the Lord from ancient times. And this week, we get to study one of the most significant prophecies given by Joseph of Egypt that we have record of.

Maurine

Welcome to Meridian Magazine’s Come Follow Me Podcast. We are Scot and Maurine Proctor and we are so delighted to be with you again this week. Now, in our family, birthdays are a big deal. We love to celebrate and to make sure we make something of that day. This week, on February 12, at 5:35 PM, we celebrate the 25th year birthday of Meridian Magazine! Yes, we’ve been doing this for a quarter of a century and it has been quite a ride. We feel so blessed. We thank all of you readers and listeners who have joined us and supported us over these past 25 years—and we especially thank all of our stellar writers who have made Meridian what it is!

Scot

That’s right! We have published more than 1,400 writers and more than 40,000 original pieces in these 25 years. I wish we could have a big celebration that just highlighted all these amazing writers who have blessed our lives and yours for these past 25 years. One of the ways we keep Meridian Magazine going——is through our Voluntary Subscription Campaign. Meridian publishes about 1,600 new, original articles a year, and thousands of news links to the most current news, at least 50 podcasts and much more. We begin our campaign today and will do it for about six weeks. Maurine For those who would be willing to lend their support to our continuing this effort of Meridian Magazine, kind of like a vote for us to continue, we thank you in advance with all our hearts and ask that you go to latterdaysaintmag.com/subscribe and help us celebrate these 25 years. An average voluntary subscription is $40. You can subscribe for much more or less—your participation and support are deeply appreciated. If you feel more comfortable sending a check, make it out to Meridian Magazine and send to PO Box 203, American Fork, Utah, 84003. That’s PO Box 203, American Fork, Utah, 84003. To subscribe online, please go to latterdaysaintmag.com/subscribe and help us celebrate today.

Scot

Just as Jacob’s blessing is particular to him, so is Joseph’s where Lehi quotes at length from Joseph of Egypt’s words on the plates of brass. “He truly prophesied concerning all his seed. And the prophecies which he wrote, there are not many greater” (2 Nephi 4:2).

Wouldn’t you love to have access to those plates of brass that are filled with words we do not have? The words of Zenock, Zenos and Neum, and the great words of Joseph, who was sold into Egypt, and then saved the House of Israel?”

“And great were the ccovenants of the Lord which he made unto Joseph” (2 Nephi 3:4).

Maurine

Joseph was told in a blessing from his father, Jacob, that he is “a fruitful bough by a well; His branches run over the wall” (Genesis 49:22)

We also learn from the Joseph Smith Translation, Genesis 50:25, that of his people, “a branch shall be broken off, and shall be carried into a far country, nevertheless they shall be remembered in the covenants of the Lord.”

This is fulfilled in large measure by Lehi and his family, who leave the boundaries of Jerusalem and the old world they had known to find their way to a promised land in the Americas.

One day pondering this, I was taught something by the Spirit. When Joseph had to leave the rest of the Children of Israel, his family, behind to go to Egypt, it was for a purpose. It was to feed them and save them when the world was in famine.

I realized that Lehi and his family had followed the same type. They, too had been sent away from their people, they were the branches that run over the wall for the same purpose. What they would create, the Book of Mormon, was also to feed the world in a time of famine. It echoes that the Lord says in Amos 8:11: “Behold, the days come, saith the Lord God, that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord.”

Scot

We also learn in this blessing that Joseph of Egypt, more than three thousand years before Joseph Smith’s birth spoke of him.

“For Joseph [of Egypt] truly saw our day [and was told]

“A choice seer will I raise up out of the fruit of thy loins; and he shall be esteemed highly among the fruit of thy loins. And unto him will I give commandment that he shall do a work…which shall be of great worth…even to the bringing of them to the knowledge of the covenants which I have made with thy fathers…

“And his name shall be called after me; and it shall be after the name of his father. And he shall be like unto me; for the thing, which the Lord shall bring forth by his hand, by the power of the Lord shall bring my people unto salvation” (2 Nephi 3:5-7)

Consider this. Before Moses led the Children of Israel out of Egypt, before the Red Sea was parted, before he received 10 Commandments on Mt. Sinai, long before when Joseph was serving in Pharoah’s court about 1500 BC, so far back in the mists of antiquity we cannot see much, Joseph of Egypt already knew of Joseph Smith, in fact, knew of him by name. This detail of God’s orchestration expands our puny minds.

Maurine

It is interesting that in early America, fathers often named their oldest son after themselves, and Joseph Smith’s father was indeed Joseph Smith. But that is not how it went in the Smith family. The oldest son did not get his father’s name. First, Lucy and Joseph had an infant son, who is not named. Then their family order goes like this: Alvin, Hyrum, Sophronia, Joseph. The Joseph, who is the prophet of the restoration, was the fifth child—and why did they finally get around to naming a son Joseph? They did not know they were fulfilling a prophecy that had been in place for at least three thousand years.

Joseph of Egypt also knew that his descendant named Joseph would bring forth the Lord’s word that would also convince the people of the word that had “already gone forth among them.” An important role of the Book of Mormon is to bear testimony of the truthfulness of the Bible.

Scot

In a 20 x 24-foot log cabin in a remote, nearly forgotten corner of Vermont, where winter comes hard and deep and would leave a family shivering in their cabin, a baby boy was born Monday, December 23, 1805. Since the winter solstice that year was December 22, this birth literally marked the day when the light began returning to the northern hemisphere where he lived, and would signal a new day on earth.

Nothing was particularly auspicious about the birth of Joseph Smith, nor would anyone have noted anything special about his family. His father, Joseph Smith Sr. had recently been cheated in a business deal when he crystallized ginseng and sent it to China and a dishonest Mr. Stevens had pocketed the proceeds in the journey. As a result, having lost their farm in Tunbridge, Vermont, the Smiths were now living on a farm rented from Lucy Mack Smith’s father and trying to eke crops out of New England’s rocky soil.

Maurine

The cabin itself was most distinguished by being divided right down the middle between South Royalton and Sharon townships, but we take it that Joseph was born on the Sharon side of the cabin because the family told us.

Still, as obscure, backwoods, and freezing as this birth was, the Lord sent in disguise there the mighty head of the dispensation of the fulness of times. When we take tour groups to this cabin site every year, we crowd around inside the outlined foundation and sing the reality: The morning breaks, the shadows flee; Lo, Zion’s standard is unfurled! The dawning of a brighter day, The dawning of a brighter day Majestic rises on the world. We are reminded again what F.W. Boreham said, “A century ago [in 1809] men were following, with bated breath, the march of Napoleon, and waiting with feverish impatience for the latest news of the wars. And all the while, in their own homes, babies were being born. But who could think about babies? Everybody was thinking about battles. Scot “In one year between Trafalgar and Waterloo, there stole into the world a host of heroes! Gladstone was born at Liverpool; Alfred Tennyson was born at the Somersby rectory…Oliver Wendell Holmes made his first appearance at Massachusetts…and Abraham Lincoln drew his first breath at Ole Kentucky. Music was enriched by the advent of Frederic Chopin at Warsaw, and of Felix Mendelssohn at Hamburg. “Which of the battles of 1809 mattered more than the babies of 1809? We fancy that God can only manage His world by big battalions when all the while He is doing it by beautiful babies. When a wrong wants righting, or a work wants doing, or a truth wants preaching, or a continent wants opening, God sends a baby into the world to do it.”[1]

Maurine

Though Joseph’s birth escaped notice of everyone, except his family, it had been much anticipated by the ancients, for, led by seeric vision, they knew who he was and what he would do. As we said earlier, Joseph of Egypt, more than three thousand years before Joseph Smith’s birth spoke of him. Joseph of Egypt also knew that his descendant named Joseph would bring forth the Lord’s word that would also convince the people of the word that had “already gone forth among them.” An important role of the Book of Mormon is to bear testimony of the truthfulness of the Bible. Of course, we do not hear from Nephi what he knew about Joseph Smith, but in his account, we are reminded that the Lord knows the end from the beginning, and that includes one important specific event of Joseph Smith’s life. As Nephi records his

history, the Lord asked Nephi to make two sets of plates. The larger plates were to cover the secular history of the people, but more specifically, the smaller plates were a record of sacred things. Scot Why make two sets of plates? Making plates is not an easy job, neither is recording two separate accounts. Nephi admits that he does not know the reason that the Lord has made this request of him: “Wherefore, the Lord hath commanded me to make these plates for a wise purpose in him, which purpose I know not. “But the Lord knoweth all things from the beginning” (1 Nephi 9:5,6). Indeed, the Lord does know all things from the beginning, even to the detail that Joseph and Martin Harris would translate 116 pages from those large plates, and then Martin, hoping to please the demands of an angry wife, would take the translation back to Palmyra where they were stolen. Those 116 pages were the Book of Lehi, and, thanks to the Lord’s absolute foreknowledge of the events of Joseph’s life, the small set of plates, which covered the same period, were there ready to be translated and take the place of those lost 116 pages in the final manuscript of the Book of Mormon.

Maurine The Lord knew this Joseph Smith whom He was sending into the world. God knew his devotion, his courage, his visionary capacities, his mighty unshakeable faith, his resilience in the face of every manner of persecution, and even the learning curve that would be required to fulfill his powerful role as the first prophet of this dispensation. God knew who he was calling from before the foundations of this earth and let this mighty and powerful head of the last dispensation come disguised as a farm boy. If Joseph Smith’s birth was to a rural family where the demands upon him would limit his education, this was according to the Lord’s plan. If their skirting the edges of poverty would mean he would grow up with resourcefulness and hard work as a legacy, this, too, was according to the Lord’s plan. Were there no erudite and great families to which to be born or a place where he could be privately tutored? Were there no fine houses, no Mount Vernon’s or Monticello’s instead of this 20 x 24 foot cabin in the back woods of Vermont? Of course, there were. Yet as Paul said, “God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty” (1 Cor. 1:27). Joseph’s tutor would be the great God and his angels, and he would come to the ideal family for him who would support him through his most difficult times.

Scot

Several scholars, who are not members of the Church, were interviewed for a documentary on Joseph Smith, and they grappled with how to explain the astonishing work he accomplished. The late Robert V. Remini of the University of Illinois at Chicago said, “Do I personally believe? No. I have no evidence for that. And as a historian I must base my conclusion on that. However, you can say, look what he did! Is one human being capable of doing this without Divine help and intervention?” Laurie F. Maffly-Kipp, professor and historian at the University of Washington said, “I find Joseph Smith a remarkable person. He had a charisma that is undeniable, I think, and had a vision for a community that was unlike anything else that’s ever been created. “So, as a historian, I’m interested in how that comes about. How is it that certain people can gain that kind of affection and respect from other people and also the kind of denunciations he received at the same time?” Maurine Richard T. Hughes, professor of American Religious History at Messiah University added, “If I believed, I obviously would become a Mormon. But having said that, if we want to understand a tradition, we’ve got to take seriously what the representatives of that tradition tell us. What do I think is the significance of all of these stories taken together? It’s the heart of the Latter-day Saint restoration. The concern to recover direct communion with God.” Astute historians do not know what to make of Joseph Smith. Latter-day Saints are amazed at this prophet, and simply grateful.

We do have to add one more quote, one of our favorites, from Brigham Young about the Prophet Joseph:

“It was decreed in the counsels of eternity, long before the foundations of the earth were laid, that he, Joseph Smith, should be the man, in the last dispensation of this world, to bring forth the word of God to the people, and receive the fulness of the keys and power of the Priesthood of the Son of God. The Lord had his eyes upon him, and upon his father, and upon his father’s father, and upon their progenitors clear back to Abraham, and from Abraham to the flood, from the flood to Enoch, and from Enoch to Adam. He has watched that family and that blood as it has circulated from its fountain to the birth of that man. He was fore-ordained in eternity to preside over this last dispensation.” (See Brigham Young and John A. Widstoe, Discourses of Brigham Young, Deseret Book Company, Salt Lake City, 1954, p. 108. See also Journal of Discourses 7:289.) Scot

And, Maurine, your quoting Brigham Young reminds me of a part of the Prophet Joseph’s patriarchal blessing, which said:

“I bless thee with the blessings of thy fathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob; and even the blessings of thy father Joseph, the son of Jacob,” spoke the patriarch Joseph Smith Sr. on a cold day in Kirtland, Ohio. “Behold, he [Joseph of Egypt] looked after his posterity in the last days, when they should be scattered and driven by the Gentiles, and wept before the Lord: he sought diligently to know from whence the son should come who should bring forth the word of the Lord, by which they might be enlightened, and brought back to the true fold, and his eyes beheld thee, my son: his heart rejoiced and his soul was satisfied…” (Blessing from Joseph Smith Sr., 9 December 1834, p. 3, The Joseph Smith Papers, https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/blessing-from-joseph-smith-sr-9-december-1834/1) Maurine Isn’t that so remarkable and inspiring! We are so blessed to live in this dispensation of the fulness of times when the Prophet Joseph was sent forth to head this great work. And I am so impressed by the confidence that the Lord entrusted in him, Joseph, when He said: 17 Wherefore, I the Lord, knowing the calamity which should come upon the inhabitants of the earth, called upon my servant Joseph Smith, Jun., and spake unto him from heaven, and gave him commandments;

18 And also gave commandments to others, that they should proclaim these things unto the world; and all this that it might be fulfilled, which was written by the prophets—

19 The weak things of the world shall come forth and break down the mighty and strong ones… (Doctrine and Covenants 1:17-19) How blessed we are to know that Joseph Smith is indeed a Prophet of God, as are all who have been his successors down to our day and time.

Scot

Nephi travels a miserable desert, endures starvation as he seeks to make a new bow, lives on raw meat, is threatened multiple times by his brothers, takes two extra trips back to Jerusalem, has to build a ship with only the worst of complaining workers, is tied up during a storm at sea and apparently never murmurs or sinks to despair.

Finally, the wrath and murderous intentions of his brothers, following the death of his father, Lehi, are too much, and even the invincible Nephi has his dark moment. On these plates where he is writing the things of his soul he cries out, “O wretched man that I am!” (2 Nephi 4:17).

He can acknowledge the “great goodness of the Lord”. He knows that he has experienced “great and marvelous works” showered upon him quite personally, but just for now, he can’t feel it. He is vulnerable and faltering.

He uses this word which is so vivid we can almost feel it, “I am encompassed about, because of the temptations and the sins which do so easily beset me.” Maurine

If you have ever felt that swirling darkness, confusion, and hopelessness that attends an attack from the adversary, you will know what this means.

He is apparently wretched not just for the anger and hatred that is heaped upon him, but also for his sense of his sin and weakness of the flesh—the pains and fallibilities of living in a fallen world.

It is valuable to us that Nephi is willing to share his moment of wretchedness and then what he does to emerge from that dark pit. If someone like the indomitable Nephi can sometimes be swathed in despair, then we understand that it is common to this mortal sphere and there is a way out.

What he does is profound—and a model for us all.

Scot

There is a point in Nephi’s lamentations where he makes a conscious choice. He stops short in his tracks as he is pursuing a line of thinking that is devastating. Right in the middle of describing how his “heart groaneth because of [his] sins”, he redirects his course. He has recognized that his mind is not working in a way that brings energy and light to his being, but that his very thought pattern and his narrative to describe life is dark and shadowed at this moment.

He is believing a lie, that he is “a wretched man”, and Satan who invented the sentence is having a hey-dey with it. Because the Spirit is light and truth, a lie drives the Spirit away and leaves us vulnerable and full of shadow.

The reality is that the Spirit is light and truth and we are energized and made happy and whole, in a very real way, by the light of God. We are taught “And the light which shineth, which giveth you light, is through him who enlighteneth your eyes” (D&C 88:11).

Maurine

We know that the Lord’s light is in us and through us, but like Nephi we can’t always feel it or access it. The world is too much with us and we know what it is to walk in shadows. More often than we’d like to admit, life bears down on us and the mists of darkness swirl around us and we, too, become heavy.

Think how easy it would have been to continue down the same course. Not only does his heart truly groan, but he could have begun listing a great number of other complaints at the same time. He could have become even more eloquent about the sources of his misery. He could have gone so far as to blame God for sending him rotten brothers or a difficult family situation.

Instead, he backs off and turns it around. He consciously chooses to believe and see the truth, and with this change in sight comes gratitude. “Nevertheless, I know in whom I have trusted.” With this remark, he is choosing to be an agent and not a victim. Now it would be easy to suggest that what he is doing here is merely choosing to have a good attitude, but there is something much deeper and more important happening.

Scot

Attitudes and emotions follow thoughts, not the reverse. We feel something because we thought it first. We are not, then, mere victims to our emotions, led along like a donkey on a rope. Our state of being begins in our head—in the thoughts we think at such a rapid rate every second of every minute of every hour.

Feelings follow so quickly after, that sometimes we think that they lead, but it is what we are thinking that carves out everything else and determines our emotions.

This would be fine and good if our thoughts were all based in truth and light, but we have learned certain patterns of thinking in this fallen world that are simply flawed. They are natural man patterns that don’t bless us. We would obviously abandon them if we realized that they were hurting us, but we usually hold on tight to them because we don’t see that they are false. They hold us hostage. It is our fallen world mentality, developed because we had no memory of our truer self or home. Maurine

When we entered this fallen sphere, we began afresh to determine what reality is—and none of us got it entirely right. So we developed patterns of thinking—some of which don’t bless us at all. We don’t stop to look at them because they become habitual.

Most of us believe that what we think is “the truth.” Our thoughts represent reality. After all, they feel like reality to us because we have rehearsed them so many times in our minds. They are reflexive. They belong to us. We even think our thinking, however flawed, is us.

How can you tell if your thinking patterns are flawed? The Lord has given us a sure way of understanding. Truth is light. The light that “proceedeth forth from the presence of God to fill the immensity of space” is “the same light that quickeneth your understandings” (D&C 88:11).

If we begin to feel that low energy dimness, a sense of discomfort and unease or if we simply live constantly with ideas that we are inadequate, unable, or hopeless, if we are anxious, resentful or blaming, we are holding on to false, natural-man ways of thinking. We have this perfect test to see if we are. Patterns of thinking about ourselves, our lives or others that bring us heaviness or darkness or unhappiness give themselves away. They are not God’s light that is quickening our understanding. Scot

They are half-truths, partial truths, even outright lies. Admittedly, Nephi was having a truly terrible time, but was he a “wretched man”? He appears to feel it wholeheartedly. At the moment he was carefully engraving it on plates, he believed it was reality—until he chose to embrace the truth, which is light. Then his wretchedness shows itself for what it really is—the product of his own natural man thinking.

“I know in whom I have trusted,” he announces, and then begins in his Psalm the most beautiful, light-filled description of his gratitude. Here is what is key. He is replacing the lies and partial truths of false thinking with the truth. He had the perfect test to tell if this new line of thought was true, because it was filled with light—very different than the darkness he had just been feeling.

Far from being a wretched man, he now acknowledges:

“My God hath been my support; he hath led me through mine afflictions in the wilderness; and he hath preserved me upon the waters of the deep.

“He hath filled me with his love, even unto the consuming of my flesh.

“He hath confounded mine enemies, unto the causing of them to quake before me” (2 Nephi 4:20-22) Maurine

Nephi has replaced flawed, natural man thinking with the truth—and what flows from that is gratitude and light. Someone else didn’t do that for him. In fact, no one else could. By his will, he stopped thinking the swampy thoughts that were dark and instead put the power of his beautiful mind upon the truth. His exultation of gratitude was the result.

Paul talks about the power of our thoughts when he says, “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus.” If we are to have the joy of the Lord, we must have the mind of the Lord. That is worth repeating. If we are to have the joy of the Lord, we must have the mind of the Lord–which is free, expansive, loving and full of light because He is full of truth. The Lord has given us a barometer to tell if our minds are full of thought patterns that are based in truth. We can feel the natural man, flawed thinking in our system when it’s there. It makes us droop. The truth, instead, lifts us.

If we feel a bit wretched or even worse, one way to help ourselves is to write down what we are thinking. Invite ourselves to some meditation on our thoughts. Step back and look at what you are thinking. We can be conscious of our consciousness. Scot

What are we believing now, and is it true? Or is it flawed? Be forthright with yourself as you write down what you think. Get to the very core of your own patterns. Let me give an example of what one woman did. This is what she wrote down, though it was more expansive and detailed than this.

I think I am always on the line. I think that I never measure up. I think that I am not good enough. I am afraid because I think I won’t be good enough. I think I am being judged.

Then she asked herself about each statement: what is flawed about this thinking? I know it must be flawed because it is bringing me down, and the truth is full of light. At the same time, she had to acknowledge that she really believed these statements to be true. In fact, she had gone through life unconsciously gathering evidence supporting these statements.

Maurine

She took those statements one by one, seeking to replace them with the truth—or at least a higher truth that she could write down in another column to the side.

For instance, she began to explore the statement, “I think that I never measure up.” She asked the question, “Measure up to what?” What was this invisible standard that she was supposed to measure up to? Did she think that somehow she had to be perfect to be acceptable to herself or to the Lord? And what was perfect anyway? What did it look like?

She began to see she was holding a very simplistic idea that needed to be explored through the help of the Lord and the Spirit. She studied God’s command to be perfect and realized that the word really means “whole”—the end of a process. And what was that process? Trusting that the Lord gave you weaknesses and mortality in order to take you on a journey to wholeness and bring you to Him. Trusting that his atonement was a gift to make you whole. She came to see that she had been denying the atonement all along and thinking she had to be sufficient unto herself. She understood that nobody measured up on her own or ever could.

So many things changed in her thinking as she studied, prayed and thought this through. She replaced her flawed thinking with higher, truer thinking—and her being began to be filled with greater light. Instead of thinking “I never measure up,” she determined that the Lord’s perfection was enough and He had given her the atonement

to teach her and lift her and, line upon line, bring her to Him. She knew in whom she had trusted and she stopped trusting in a false perception of herself.

Scot

When you are low, the way to help yourself at that moment is to go to the very core of your being and start saying true things—just like Nephi did. Truth, being light, drives out darkness. What is it that you absolutely know to be a core truth?

I have learned that when I am tempted by despair, which I know is fostered in part by flawed thinking, I start with the most basic truths. Sometimes that is hard, because in those dark moments we are absolutely convinced of our wretchedness and every difficult thing that got us there. We may even be convinced that things will not be better. “O wretched woman that I am.” “O wretched man that I am.”

In those times, I begin to say things I know are true. I say, “I know that God lives.” I can feel the light of that truth begin to stir in me.

What else am I sure of? “I have seen God working in my life.” More stirring of light. This is true. Then, I can begin to name some of those times. Truth begins to dawn inside of me.

I am gradually freed from the lurking shadows. Nephi consciously chose to lift himself from despair through the Lord’s light of truth, and we can learn from him.

Jesus told his disciples, “If ye continue in my word…ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free: (John 8:32,33)

Maurine

Oh, I truly love all of those last 21 verses of 2 Nephi 4. They are my go-to-scriptures when I just want to be lifted and inspired. Now, I have to say a quick last word on chapter 5 of 2 Nephi. There is no accident to the fact that Nephi goes through all the struggling within himself and then he, with the commandment of the Lord, makes the permanent break from his brothers. And please notice whom he takes with him:

His own family.
Zoram and his family.
Sam and his family.
Jacob and Joseph, his younger brothers.
His sisters (see all of this in 2 Nephi 5:6)
And all those who would go with them.

And he says,

And all those who would go with me were those who believed in the warnings and the revelations of God; wherefore, they did hearken unto my words.

Scot

That’s right. This was a self-selecting, righteous group of people, perhaps as few as 30-40 in numbers, and they make the split that will make them become the Nephite nation.

It’s fascinating, too, to see that they do two things to protect themselves: They make multiple swords similar to the sword of Laban AND they build a temple. And they built it after the manner of the temple of Solomon, the only temple they knew, using the sacred dimensions and design of that sacred edifice that had been in Jerusalem. We love you listeners. You are so dear to us. We think about you all the time we are preparing these podcasts. Thanks for so many of you who reach out to us. Tell a friend about these podcasts, with a new one every Friday. Thanks to Paul Cardall for the music. And a big thanks to Michaela Proctor Hutchins, our producer. We’ll see you next week when we will be talking about 2 Nephi chapters 6-10, “O How Great the Plan of our God.” Have a great week and see you next time.