The Power of God's Presence — David Wilkerson

The Power of God's Presence

This message is one of the Times Square Church pulpit series. It was recorded in the sanctuary of Times Square Church in Manhattan, New York City. Other tapes are available by writing World Challenge, P .O. Box 260, Lindale, Texas, 75771, or calling 903 -963 -8626.

None of these messages are copyrighted, and you are welcome to make copies for free distribution to friends.

I do want to say hello to all of those, or greetings to the Annex. You know, some people say, well, it's just like watching television. No, it's not. It's not like watching television. I don't know what you're watching, but that's not like watching television.

That's strictly a vehicle. Just as sure as this is a book that you open it, you read it, and you look at it, it's just a vehicle. And it's nothing more than a video wall. And the presence of God is powerful there, powerful downstairs in the little rotunda, wherever it at.

We're just trying to handle the people. I want to talk to you this morning on the power of God's presence, the power of God's presence. Heavenly Father, I ask you to give me a special anointing this morning, to proclaim the wonderful word of the Lord.

Lord, we thank you that there's so many people gathered this morning that are hungry for the word and for the truth. And Father, we know it's truth alone that sets people free. Lord, whether we're here in the main auditorium, or in the little rotunda, or in the Annex, the same word, the same power.

God, move wherever this word is heard this morning. Let the power of the Lord Jesus be manifested. Oh, Holy Ghost, come now. Don't let anybody sit comfortably, Lord. Stir us, shake us, do whatever you have to do, Lord.

Moses and the Promise of God's Presence

And then bless us, because we receive your holy word. In Jesus' name I pray. Amen. I want to talk to you this morning about the almighty power of God's presence, and how to lay hold of that power. Remember Moses, when he spoke face to face with God, and he said, God, if your presence goes not with me, don't carry me up hence.

In other words, he said, God, if I can't have your presence, I'm not moving. I'm not making a move. I'm not going to take a step unless I have the assurance that your presence is emanating from me and that you are with me.

And the Lord, in turn, promised Moses, my presence shall go with you, and I'll give you rest. He had learned that you don't attempt anything, everything is out of order, everything is useless. There is nothing that's going to work unless you have the presence of God with you, unless you have his presence.

Because all the hills melt like wax at the presence of the Lord. It was the presence of the Lord in their midst that set Israel apart from every other nation. You see, Moses didn't care how they ran their affairs, all these other nations.

He didn't care about how they ran their government. He didn't care how they got their guidance. He didn't care how they operated in their armies. He cared not about all their new weapons, their swords and their gold shields.

He said, all I need is the presence of God. All we need, and that sets us apart because when we have the presence of God upon us, we're invincible. God said, my presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.

When you rest in the power of my presence, you don't have to worry about your enemies. You don't have to worry about guidance. You don't have to worry about your psyche. You don't have to worry about all of these things because my presence is the power.

The power of the presence of God. Moses could say, let all the people have their armies, let them have their chariots, their skilled soldiers. Give us, as Israel, the manifest presence of God in our midst, and we'll not worry what our enemies do.

They can't hurt us. Now, saints of God, I want you to hear for yourself this great promise of God. My presence shall go with thee, and I will give you rest. That promise is for you, and it's for me as well.

If you have the presence of the Lord in a church, for example, that church is going to be a church where there's rest, and you know it when you walk in. There's a quiet confidence. That doesn't mean that there can't be loud, exuberant praises.

We have that here. But where the presence of God rests on a ministry, for example, there will not be striving in the flesh. People will not be running around helter-skelter. You will see a divine order.

You'll see a calm and a peace on the staff, in the choir. You'll see a calm everywhere you look. You'll see it in the hearts of the people. If you have the presence of God with you, there'll be an order in your life.

God never intended that any family that knows Jesus be dysfunctional. He never intended that the family be out of order. Not at all. He says, you can have divine order in your home. You can have it in the church as long as you have my presence.

You have order. It is the presence, the manifest presence of our Father. There are churches today that are totally out of order. They have three songs, long announcements, a short sermon, and you're gone.

In and out. That's not divine order. That's not divine order whatsoever. I believe that when the Spirit of God rests upon a church, the presence of the Lord there is a comfortable, quiet rest. I thank God for the manifest presence of Jesus in this church.

We've had many, many walk in here and the building was empty and conviction fell upon them. Others came in and just began to pray. Others tell me they walked in here and began to weep because of the presence of the Lord.

Hallelujah. Now, I want you to follow very closely this morning because I have a lot to say. The Old Testament is filled with accounts of the wonderful blessings that have come upon those who had the abiding presence of the Lord in their life.

Old Testament Testimonies to God's Abiding Presence

God's presence was so evident in Abraham's life, even the heathen recognized it. Abimelech, for example, said to Abraham, God is with you, Abraham, in all that you do. What a testimony to the abiding presence of God on a man's life.

Abraham, there's something different about you. God preserves you. God protects you. God goes before you and he makes your way. He guides you. There's something different about you, Abraham. Abraham knew what it was.

God says, I'm with you, Abraham, as your shield. It was the abiding presence of God in his life. God promised Joshua that no man on the face of the earth could stand against him when God's presence was with him.

There shall not be any man be able to stand before you, Joshua, all the days of your life. For as I was with Moses, so I'll be with you. I'll not fail you nor forsake you. So be strong and be of good courage.

Beloved, when you have the abiding presence of Jesus Christ, which is the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Christ. When you have that abiding in your life, you can be strong and have good courage and no enemy, no weapon formed against you shall prosper, the Bible says.

God said, told Gideon, Gideon, the Lord is with you, you mighty man of valor. He was actually a coward, but the Lord was going to show him what could happen if the presence of God was with him. You mighty man of valor, go in this thy might and thou shall save Israel.

What is this thy might? It was the presence of God. God said, I'll be with you. If God be for us, who can be against us, the scripture says. God warned Jeremiah that the whole nation was going to rise up against him and reject all of his prophecies.

But God said to him, they shall fight against you, but they shall never prevail against you, for I am with you to save you and deliver you, saith the Lord. He said, it doesn't matter if the whole country turns against you.

If everybody turns against you, what's the matter? I'm with you. My presence is with you. In Isaiah 43, too, we have this great promise. I've loved you. When you pass through the waters, I'll be with you.

And through the rivers, they shall not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you shall not be burned. The flames shall not kindle upon you. Fear not, because I am with you. When God's with you, you go through floods, you go through fire, and you survive.

Now that you survive, you are blessed and favored by his presence. Beloved, the Old Testament Scriptures to me are not a dead letter. Now I thank God with all my heart for what I read that God did by his presence for Abraham.

I delight in what he did for Gideon, for Joshua, and for Jeremiah, for Isaiah. I thank God for the miracles they saw through the manifest power of God in their life. But folks, that's not just a dead letter to me because I've got my own testimony.

And you should have your own testimony. In fact, folks, I've seen God do such powerful things through the presence of God in my life at times that it reads—I really believe that I've seen some things that are just as great as anything in the Old Testament.

You say, what a boast. I believe this with all my heart. I boast in the Lord. And you should have the same testimony. Because he's not a dead Savior. He's still alive. God's still to work in the world.

God's no respecter of persons. I know what it's like—and you sit in this theater and you worship because I know what it was like to be on my face and I'm going to tell you how you get the presence of God.

Personal Testimony of God's Presence

And I was on my face, and I'll tell you, when I came to New York City, the presence of Jesus emanated all over my body. I remember walking into the theater owner's office here on Broadway, just a country preacher, walking into a Broadway producer's and the owner of this theater walking into the office trying to get an appointment and have a secretary sneer at me and all the underlings say it's impossible to get.

And who are you, anyhow? Why would he want to see a preacher? I know what it's like to just stand and say, Lord, this is your business. Your Spirit's upon me. And have him walk out into the lobby where I'm standing about to be kicked out and have him say, come on in, Reverend, come on into my office.

And I know what it's like to sit in a man's office and a man doesn't even know why he's given me an hour of his time when he's so busy. And I've been in that office again when I went back until finally the second and the third and fourth visit, yes, Reverend, walk right in, because the presence of the Lord was there.

I know what it is to sit there and watch him sign away his flagship theater for a church and to get up out of his chair and turn around and look, he said, I don't know why I'm doing this. He said, I'm giving away the best theater in Broadway.

And I know what it's like a year later to sit in the same office and have a whole group of lawyers try to buy this building back from us. And you'd have thought I was the king of the world. I know what it's like to talk to a man when we have this other place.

And for a while, nobody would let us would talk about us. And I've seen God open that seventy five thousand square feet. I saw the man become one of my best friends. I saw God move hearts. I've I've talked to businessmen who wouldn't even give me the time of day and just stand still and see the presence of God, melt hearts and move hearts.

Seeking God in Second Chronicles

That's the power of the presence of Jesus Christ. Now, there's a condition of getting and maintaining the presence of God in our lives. It's found in Second Chronicles 15. I want you to go to Second Chronicles 15, please.

How do you get the presence of God? It's so powerful. Folks, let me ask you a question. Wouldn't you like to go on the job? And on the subways and everywhere you go, enveloped in a cloud of the presence of God.

Let me tell you how that happens. Just leave your Bible open to Second Chronicles 15. But I'm going to set the stage for this. Please look this way, if you will. In the 14th chapter of Second Chronicles, King Asa had just led the armies of Judah into a great victory over a million man Ethiopian army.

The victory was given because Asa had sought the Lord for his presence. And I'm reading to you from Second Chronicles 14, 11 and 12. And Asa cried unto the Lord his God and said, Lord, it's nothing with thee to help, whether with many or with them that have no power.

Help us, O God, for we rest on thee, and in thy name or thy presence we go against this multitude. So the Lord smote the Ethiopians before Asa. All right, now look this way, please. Asa has just defeated a million man army because the presence of God, according to his own confession, the presence of God had scattered the enemy.

The manifest presence of God in their midst was the presence of God melting the hills. Asa now is coming back with the army loaded down with the spoils of the enemy. A great spoil, all kinds of wealth, all kinds of goodies are coming back.

And as this procession enters the gate, we pick it up in chapter 15,. Then the Spirit of God came upon Azariah, the son of Odim, and he went out to meet Asa and said unto him, Hear ye me, Asa, and all Judah and Benjamin.

Here it is, the secret of getting and maintaining the presence of God in your life. And the Lord is with you while you be with him. And if you seek him, he will be found of you. But if you forsake him, he will forsake you.

Now, look at it. No, he just did a point blank, the prophet Azariah, no holds barred. God is saying to Asa, now look at the next verse. Now for a long season Israel hath been without a true God, without a teaching priest, and without law.

But when they in their trouble did turn unto the Lord God of Israel and sought him, he was found of them. Now that word found is masal in Hebrew, which means God's presence coming forth to deliver. That's what it means in Hebrew, God's presence bursting forth and coming forth to deliver.

God said you seek me with all your heart and you're going to find God's presence bursting forth to deliver you. It's that simple. It is not a complicated theology. But the prophet is saying, Asa, you're not going to forget.

I'm not going to allow you, God says, to forget how you got the victory. Because before you came to power there was total disorder in the camp. Everybody was doing anything they chose. Every man was a law to himself.

It was all disorder. But you turn to the Lord with Judah. You begin to seek God with all of your heart. And God's presence came upon you. You defeated your enemies. And he's here to remind you, Asa, as long, the rest of your life, as long as you seek the Lord as you did now, as long as you stay hard with him, he will be with you and he will always be found of you.

In other words, you will always have God's presence bursting forth in your life to deliver you and guide you. If you will be a seeker after God, Asa. What a picture of many lives today, this third and fourth verse, without a teaching priest and without law.

How many homes supposedly Christian, whether it's either a believer as a wife or a husband. I tell you, there are so many homes without law and disorder and dysfunctional. And why is it? God said, look, Asa, before you begin to seek with all your heart and found my presence bursting forth and delivering you.

There was no law. There was no order. Everything was out of kilter. He said, don't you understand it? Don't you see where the order comes from? It doesn't come from any scribing in the flesh. I know one thing that if there is a praying wife or a praying husband, this laying hold of God becomes a seeker after God daily, pouring out their heart.

You are going to have the presence of God break out in your life and affect your family. It's going to affect everything around you. It's going to affect your job. It's going to affect everything because you're going to have the presence of Jesus Christ emanating from your body.

God's word is unchangeable. The Lord is with you while you are with him. If you seek the Lord, he will be found of you. In other words, you can have the abiding presence of the Lord. If you will seek for it with all of your heart, if you will go after it.

Now, according to the scripture, I believe that our chiefest concern in this life should be that we are sure, are assured of the presence of Jesus in our daily walk. Not just in the house of God, but in our daily walk, wherever we go.

Covenant Promises and Conditional Seeking

Now, there is a covenant of grace for all believers. This covenant of grace is based on the covenant promises of God in this book. For example, God says, Jesus, I'll never leave you. I'll never forsake you.

I'll go with you to the end of the world. The covenant promises say that he died for us and became a curse, that we not have to bear the curse. The Bible makes it very clear that he's taken on himself the iniquity of us all.

Now, these are covenant promises for every believer. Folks, let me tell you something, and listen very, very closely. There are special promises to those who set themselves to seek God with all their heart.

Because there's a law of God's presence in the book. There's a law. It's very, very clear. And if you abide by that law, you are going to have the presence of God in your life. There's a law of his presence, and it's purely conditional.

It's not one of the covenant promises for every believer. It is for every believer, but only a few believers enter into it. Only a few believers ever come to it, because most believers understand the works of God, but they don't understand the presence and the glory of God.

They go after his works, but they don't go after his presence or his glory. And that's where we're headed this morning. We're not speaking now of being saved or making heaven. Those are yours under the covenant promises of God.

But this is about being so given to God, so having your heart set on seeking him, that he becomes especially for you. He becomes your cloud of presence. His awesome presence is poured out on you, and it is known and seen by all.

Honoring God and the Loss of His Presence

Now, let me show you this law or rule of God's presence and the condition that goes with it. You can mark it down, but don't turn there yet. 1 Samuel 2 .30. Don't turn it, but let me just give you the history and the story.

God revealed the law of his presence to an unnamed prophet who came to Eli. Now, Eli was backslidden and lukewarm, and the Lord had been talking to him, and he was despising the word of the Lord. Remember, he was allowing sin.

He compromised with sin. And the prophet, this unknown prophet, in fact, when I get to heaven, one of the first after I meet Jesus, I want to meet this man. He's unnamed. This prophet who had such power and such discernment, he goes to Eli, the high priest, and he says, The Lord God of Israel saith, I had said indeed that thy house and the house of your father should walk before me forever.

But now the Lord says, Be it far from me, for them that honor me I will honor, and they that despise me shall be lightly esteemed. Now, that lightly esteemed has to do with God lifting his presence, just lifting his presence.

It doesn't mean that the man is damned, but the man is going to walk in the flesh. The man is going to do everything in striving and sweating. There's going to be disorder in his life because the presence of the Lord is not there.

The prophet said, Eli, God intended to bless your house to favor you, that you would walk forever with the blessing and the presence of God, but because you've scorned me, you've been easy on sinning your life and the life of your sons, and now I'm going to take my presence from you, and that's where Ichabod came from.

Now, God is not a liar. He changes not. His word is everlasting. But I want you to know that though his promises do not fail, they're conditional. His promises are conditional. Them that honor me I will honor.

The Lord is with you while you are with him. If you forsake me, I will forsake you. This idea that somebody can come to Jesus Christ with one burst of faith and come and say, I believe, and it's one burst of faith.

He's going to ride that burst of faith the rest of his life. He's going to live like the devil. He's going to cheat. He's going to commit adultery. He's going to do everything that his flesh pleases. But he said, I believed in God.

I am saved. That's a hoax. That's a lie. That's a delusion. The Bible says you neglect him. Days on end you forget to seek him. You won't pray. You don't seek his word. You live carelessly. You forsake him, the Bible says, and I'll forsake you.

Now, I'm not saying God's going to turn his back on you. He's never going to take his love from you. I am saying that his presence will not go with you. That's exactly what he told Moses. My presence is not going to go with you.

I'm going to send an angel to go with you, but my presence will not be in Israel. It will not be there anymore. Your life will not be an instrument of his powerful presence. You will be operating in the flesh, striving, floundering with no power and no guidance.

Prayer, Guidance, and the Cloud of Presence

Now, let me attempt to describe to you or tell you how the importance of seeking God's presence in your life, the importance of it, of seeking it. Now, folks, we've been having three weeks of prayer now.

Around the clock, 2 ,000 people signed up so far. Twenty-five hours a day praying, seeking God. Now, folks, that's just because God is trying to give you an instrument to remind you of it. But I'm going to ask the Holy Ghost to be that instrument now to remind you of the importance and why it is so important that you have a quality daily time of seeking God.

And not only an hour or two, but all day long, subway, wherever you ought to get, your mind always reverts to the Lord and always calling on his presence, worshipping. You're praying without ceasing, in other words, the Bible says.

And by the way, as you've heard me say many times here on the subway, on the job, in New York City, you can pray out loud, nobody going to look at you because everybody thinks everybody is crazy anyhow.

Now, listen to me, please. If you believe the scriptures I've just quoted to you, that if you seek him, you'll find him. And finding him, remember, it says that God's presence will burst forth in you to deliver you.

In his presence coming upon you, it is only when his presence is upon you and with you that you will ever behold the glory of God. The glory of God is always associated with his presence. This has to do with the pillar and the cloud.

And by the way, the pillar and the cloud were the one and the same thing. You'll find that in Exodus 14, 19, and 20. The pillar, it was a cloud by day, and that cloud became a fire. At night, it was the same cloud.

It was a pledge of the presence of God. Everybody knew that that represented the presence of God, and that covered the tabernacle. Now, the first benefit of that cloud of presence was absolute total guidance, absolute direction for every move.

They never made a move till that cloud moved. The cloud moved, they moved. The cloud stayed, they stayed. The Bible said he guided them with his eye and led them with his counsel. And they rested in confidence.

They didn't have to figure things out. They didn't have to have committee meetings. Just look at the presence. When the presence moved, I move. Oh, do you see it? Do you understand it? That there's a cloud of presence in a secret closet waiting for you to envelop you.

And when the presence of God is upon you, you seek him, the presence of God, you walk in that cloud. That protecting cloud, you don't have to figure things out. The Holy Ghost will speak to you. He'll guide you.

He'll say, there's a voice behind you, say, this is the way walk in. Folks, I know what I'm talking about. I live that way. You should be living that way. Pastor Carter lives that way. Most of those who have the presence of God walk that way.

You're not left to your own devices. God help us if we were left to our own devices. My life would have been a mess long ago. Presence, the cloud of his presence hovers over every secret closet. Now, that secret closet is hard to find in New York City when you're in a one room efficiency apartment.

Has to be maybe the bathroom. But you know that that secret closet can be on the subway? Well, you just shut everything out and close your eyes and say, Lord, this is my closet. This is my time with you.

I've got an hour till I get to my job. Holy Spirit, speak to my heart. Jesus, I love you. Begin to worship him and let the cloud envelop you. Hallelujah. It'll help shut out the noise and the cursing and everything else.

Now, it's a wonderful thing. Listen to me. It's a wonderful thing to be shut in with God and to develop a daily consistent prayer life because you're promised that you will soon behold a breaking forth of God's presence in your life.

But, folks, there is something even greater that happens as you become a seeker, as you become a praying saint. There's something even more glorious than just having the presence of God in your life. Now, you've got to follow me closely now.

God's Glory Revealed in Christ

His presence will lead you into a revelation of God's glory. There is a difference between his presence and his glory, though the glory never appears except where the presence of the Lord is. In Exodus 40, 34, we see the cloud of presence covering the tabernacle.

The Bible says, And the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. This is the end of side one. You may now turn the table. You've got to follow me closely, please, because I know that this is a divine revelation and it's been so blessing my heart.

I want it to bless your heart this morning. These Old Testament truths are patterns. They're examples. They're types. For things that we're to understand in our lives today, things that are for us in this time, our bodies, according to Scripture, are what?

The tabernacle. Paul made clear my body is a tabernacle. In fact, he said, Know you not that your body is the temple or tabernacle of the Holy Ghost which is in you? And I'm going to say to you, if you're a believer, when you become a seeker after God and you get the presence of the Lord and it's manifested in your life, one day, and it is in the here and now, you are going to see the glory of God.

You're going to understand it. It's going to come forth. The cloud of his presence will cover you just as sure as it covered the tabernacle in the Old Testament. Now, in a previous message, I told you of the revelation God gave Moses concerning his glory.

In Exodus 33, 16, Moses is seeking God, remember, for a manifestation of his presence. Listen to me closely now. He said that I might know you. This is verse 12 and 13. That I may know you, that your presence go with me.

And God said my presence is going to go with you. Now, you would say, Moses, that's enough. What more do you want? You have the presence of God. You have guidance now and God's Spirit is upon you now.

He's moving and affecting the hearts of your enemies. You've got the cloud of his presence to go before you. It's wonderful. What more could you want? But Moses was not satisfied with that. There was more.

You see, having the assurance of God's presence is not enough for Moses. God had just given him this promise. My presence shall go with you. I will give you rest. You say, well, if I've got rest in my soul and I've got assurance, what more can you have?

I've heard people say, well, by the way, let's go and look at this again at Exodus 34 about the explanation of God's glory. I want to remind you of it before going any further. You still with me? Exodus 34.

Start at verse 5, please. And the Lord descended in a what? Cloud. That's the cloud of his presence. And stood with him there and proclaimed the name of the Lord. The Lord passed by before him. Now, this is God revealing his glory to Moses.

The Lord God merciful, gracious, long suffering, abundant in mercy, abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin. Now, don't look at the rest.

I'll finish. I'll show you the rest at the close of the message. But you see, look at me, please. Here is a revelation of the glory of God. When God showed Moses his glory, there was no thunder. There was no shaking of the earth.

There were no supernal lights. There was nothing more than a simple revelation of the nature of God. Who God is. Who God is. That was the glory. And when Moses saw the glory of God, he saw a revelation of the goodness and mercy and love and compassion of the heavenly father.

This was the revelation. I've heard people say, you know, I've been to church and I've heard people say, boy, the glory of God came down on our church. I mean, people were shouting everywhere. People were falling under the power.

It was so wonderful. We didn't have any preaching. Now, that's the saddest thing you could ever say about a church. There was no preaching. Now, there have been times the glory of God came down. But we always stood and gave a word because God always makes of the Holy Ghost.

He makes a way for his word. But you see, that is not a manifestation of his glory because it has nothing to do with something that is emotional in itself. You say, well, what about the transfiguration when Peter, James, and John are on the mountain?

They see the bright light. They see this shining light. And they see Moses and Elijah. Listen, the glory of God was not on Elijah. It was not on Moses. It was not just in the great light because that light was in the face of Jesus Christ.

This is the wonderful thing. God embodied all his glory, the thing he revealed of himself to Abraham, his mercy, his grace, his long-suffering. He created in a virgin, in a womb, a body. And he put in that body, the scripture said, the fullness of God bodily.

He put in him mercy and grace. He said, here is a living picture of who I am. This is Christ, my son. This is my glory. This is my glory. You're looking for some shot. You're looking for somebody to knock you down.

It's looking in the face of Jesus and being changed from glory to glory. It's a revelation of the deeper knowledge of who God is in Christ. Nothing more, nothing less. I've heard people say, oh, if God could only give me a vision of the horror of hell, I'd never forsake God.

Oh, if God could make me just smell the flames and I could hear the cries of hell, I'd last forever for Jesus. And there have been men that have testified when they were near death, they had those horrible pictures.

And one man said, I lived for God for a whole year. The vision died, went back to his old ways. No, that will not keep you. That is not the glory of God. What keeps you, and I'm going to prove to you beyond any shadow of a doubt, that only a vision of who Jesus is, of the grace and mercy of Christ, that he is the glory, that is the only thing that will keep you from besetting sin and break the power of sin and mortification in your life.

No other thing. Hallelujah. Jesus Christ is merciful, gracious, long-suffering, abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression of sins. You dare not say, oh, that this is enough.

Jesus is with me, he preserves me, I'm at rest, he guides me. Oh, that's not enough. Do you know his glory? Have you yet tasted of his loving kindness? Have you had a picture, have you had your eyes opened yet to who he is?

The Cleansing Power of God's Glory

The richness of his glory in the inheritance of the saints? Now, why did Moses so desperately seek a vision of God's glory? Because of something God said to him, listen to me, about the cleansing power of his glory.

God had said something, and I'm going to give you one of the most amazing verses in the Bible. It has transformed my life. You say, brother, you always say that. Doesn't the Bible say we're transformed from glory to glory, becoming more and more like him?