though i feel alone

A great song to remind myself of important truths!

 

Blessings, Torben

a small god

Dear blog readers!

I wonder if there are still any of you out there after this very extended hiatus for my blog. Anyway, it’s not that I’ve been without thoughts, questions, insights, struggles, victories, sorrows and even some smiles these last months, and we’ll see what I end up choosing to write about these coming months.

It’s not often that I find myself reading something that’s truly hot and the thing lots of people talk about. I tend to have the perspective that I wait until the initial noise and fire is over, and then I’ll decide if it was something that was worth looking into. (And yes, I’m aware that some of you after reading that statement are tempted to write me off as a 74-year old who is out of touch with time, but in reality, I’m still only 34 )

But last week I did actually decide to pick up mega-church pastor Rob Bell’s latest and hotly debated book, Love Wins. I read it, and I’ve decided to share some of my thoughts on the book and some of the topics it talks about.

I studied at a very postmodern-focused university in Denmark, and I have studied postmodernism at length, and I’m well aware of that for a postmodern reader (which most younger, Western people are) the very fact that I choose to write my comments and choose to disagree with large portions of Rob Bell’s book means that I’m judging him. Let me make it clear from the get-go: I’m not Rob Bell’s judge. I have no intention or desire to judge this man that I’ve never met. And just because I disagree with some of the things he’s writing, does not mean that I judge him or think that everything I’m saying myself is perfect and beyond reproach. However, in order for us to be able to converse about what we believe, we also have to be honest when we disagree with what other people are saying when we find that it touches on something that’s precious to us.

Sometimes when I read or hear about somebody saying something about God or his kingdom that I don’t think is true, I think: “I think he is wrong. I hope he is right. What are the consequences if he is wrong?“. I don’t have the same thoughts after reading Love Wins. “I think he is wrong. I actually don’t hope that he is right. And I think there are very severe consequences for many people if he is wrong” are more along the lines of my thoughts after reading the book.

In a sense there is little point to writing my thoughts on this book by +100,000 Facebook fans pastor Rob Bell. Who cares what I think? If I disagree with him, I risk being ostracized as being ‘negative’, ‘judgmental’, ‘legalist’, ‘hateful’ or whatever the term might be. Couldn’t I just leave it to people to make up their own minds about his book and issues of salvation, Heaven and Hell? Sure, and I don’t have any illusions about my opinion being particularly relevant to other people, but I do believe that Rob Bell touches on some things that are dear to me, and where I do find it important enough to voice my concerns.

I don’t think that Rob Bell purposefully is trying to deceive people with his theology. I believe he believes what he believes. I am, however, troubled about some of his opinions and his ways of sharing it.

I enjoy books by authors such as W. Paul Young, who wrote the bestseller The Shack, and C. S. Lewis with his many books touching on issues of eternity including The Great Divorce, The Chronicles of Narnia and others. These are all works of fiction. And how I wished that Rob Bell would’ve written his book as fiction. Because, quite frankly, a lot of it is a lot more fiction than theology! C. S. Lewis writes in his preface to The Great Divorce: “I beg the readers to remember that this is a fantasy…the transmortal conditions are solely and imaginative supposal: they are not even a guess or a speculation at what may actually await us. The last thing I wish is to arouse factual curiosity about the details of the afterworld“.

Rob Bell, however, writes Love Wins as a book of theology. He is asking lots of questions, and he gives what he says are biblical answers to these questions. Some will read it and be relieved. Some will read the book and be happy. Some will just be utterly confused.

I read the book and came away with the thought: “that sounds like a very small God“.

Everyone of us stand in immediate danger of falling into the trap that the French philosopher, Jean-Jacques Rousseau described like this:

“God created man in his own image. And man, being a gentleman, returned the favor“

I felt I read 200 pages about a god created in Rob Bell’s image. I didn’t find that god very attractive.

I could write lots of examples of why I didn’t find the god or even the world presented to me very attractive. I just don’t think that serves a point. I do want to make a comment about the usage of the Bible in the book. I found it troubling that even though it’s in perfect line with a postmodern understanding of how we view literature and meta-narratives where we believe we can pick and choose and respect the context when it works for us, and ignore it when it doesn’t, it was sad to see how that’s how I saw the Bible being used in Love Wins.

Whenever the context of the primary hearers and readers was useful to stress a point it was used, and whenever the context would complicate matters or even disprove the point that Rob Bell was trying to make, the context was ignored or misunderstood. That I find troubling.

We already live in a day and age where most Christians know the Bible very poorly. I remember a couple of years ago where I asked long-term Discipleship Training School Leaders at various Youth With A Mission missionary training centers in Asia, Europe and North America the same question: “what is the biggest difference between Discipleship Training School students today and 10-15 years ago?” Every single one of these missionaries answered in a similar way: “the students know God and the Bible less and less, and we have to almost start from scratch and assume that they simply don’t know the God they claim to believe in, or the Biblical truths that they claim to follow“

We know the Bible less and less, and that’s where I find it troubling when pastors, leaders and authors exemplify pick-and-choose-Bible-reading. It is, after all, part of our calling as leaders to be responsible about not misleading people we have a position of authority over.

If you want to read a long review that talks about some of the many questionable points in Love Wins, you can read Kevin DeYoung’s blog here. I disagree with some of his points, and some of his tone is a bit too harsh, but especially some of the points are spot-on and very important aspects to consider (see point 2 – Historical Problems, point 3 – Exegetical Problems, and point 7 – A Different God).

I hope Love Wins will cause the readers of the book to chat with God about who he really is and what he really does have to say about salvation, Heaven and Hell. I have fears that people will be mislead. I have fears that there will be sad consequences for buying into some of the messages of this book. But at the end of this blog and at the end of each day, I choose to believe that God is still strong, and his Spirit is alive and well in all his children and will help them discern what is Truth which will set them free (John 14:6, John 8:32), and what is just wishful thinking-theology, which we are all in danger of buying into.

I want to know Christ deeper, and if the conversation about these questions lead people who don’t know Jesus at all as their Savior and Friend to get to know him and experience life in him here and in the afterlife, and if it leads people who know Jesus already, but don’t know him well to get to know him better, I rejoice. If that’s not the case. And I fear it’s not. It makes me sad.

Blessings, Torben – I’ll write another blog entry about why it’s problematic when we create a god in our own image, and why a God that makes perfect sense in my eyes, and is without any paradoxes, is a small god

Long months

It’s been two and a half months since I last wrote anything on this blog site. It’s been a very dark time. Lots of tears, confusion, questions, and very few answers. Learning about being okay without answers to all the very reasonable questions I have about life is a difficult journey.

Few people are okay without knowing. Few people dare to live in the mystery of unanswered questions. I believe that’s where real faith is fostered though. I want real faith. I want real life. I could do without this learning time, but I realize that it’s the only way to learn to live in the mystery of the moment where Christ is. If life always (or just often) made sense and could be explained, it – per definition – wouldn’t be real life. Real life with Christ can be measured out. It can’t be explained to other people. Often I can’t even explain it to myself. It doesn’t necessarily mean that life doesn’t make sense. Sometimes it does. But most often it doesn’t. Christ’s life is a life in the midst of unanswered paradoxes. Life is gained only through death is probably the biggest paradox. I know I’ll find life in the midst of this desert. That doesn’t make sense. There is no life in a real desert. But in the desert with Christ I learn to trust. Trust in him alone. Nobody else can be fully trusted. I can’t even trust myself.

I long for happy and fun days. We all do. But I know that today is all I’ve got. How will I meet God today? I pick up a book and I hope to meet with him. I listen to my heart, and in the midst of the white noise of accusations, hurts, misunderstandings, loneliness and frustrations, I recognize there is also a voice whispering: “there is hope. Spring is coming. New life is breaking free. It won’t always be like this”. I trust that voice despite not seeing any evidence of the truth of its statement.

I have nothing preachy to give to anyone these days. I have as many, if not more, questions than a lot of other people. But I KNOW that that is okay. I know that God is even doing stuff through me at this point. Even when I have no clue. Even when I just feel like running away and hiding. He is right there in me, with me, and speaking through me. God wants the unedited truth. Mine is messy. Mine is hurting. But that’s where real life is. God desires honesty from his children. And he gets it so very seldom.

I want to be honest. In fact I don’t know how to not be honest with God. It’s simply not possible for me to put on a happy, religious face and pretend that life makes sense, and if you just follow this and that principle everything will be great. I know life too well to buy into those lies. And I know that God doesn’t need me to be his PR-agent. He will be fine, and he is fine, even when I do more yelling or silent treatment in my worship of him than lifted hands and happy-clappy songs. He desires that from us. The honest cries of a breaking heart are truly better and more pleasing to him than a religious-duty-forced hallelujah.

God is good. God is love. God is in control. Those things remain true no matter what I feel and no matter what I see happening in me and around me. That’s faith. Faith in spite of circumstances. Faith when things don’t work out at all the way I want them to.

What’s going to happen with us and me in 2011? I don’t know. I can’t say I’m too optimistic, but my optimism or lack thereof doesn’t determine anything about what will happen. Will God remain good? Yes. Will I struggle with God trying to understand that his goodness is often different from what I think goodness should be? Absolutely. Will he bring laughter and happiness back in my everyday reality? Yes. I know he will. “Sorrow may last for a night (and may feel like hundreds of nights!), but joy IS coming in the morning”. That’s how it is. That’s how it’s going to be. The ball is in God’s court. I’m open for him to do the surgery deep within me that I think he wants to do. And he will heal, break down fortresses of lies, and set me free at his pace and in his way.

Torben

the minute maid gospel

Every morning I enjoy a cup of Minute Maid orange juice, and recently I noticed that on the juice you can find the following words:

“Put Good In. Get Good Out. You can taste and feel these words in every drop of Minute Maid. When it comes to life, we believe what you believe. The effort you put in is equal to the good you get out“

I read that and thought to myself that maybe it’s a modern day pastor who has a part-time job with Coca-Cola, the company that produces Minute Maid, who came up with that slogan…Unfortunately, there are many Christians who believe the Minute Maid Gospel. They believe that if I do all the right things, then life will turn out the way I want it. And even more so: when I have done my part, God needs to do his part. He has promised – people believe – that we will get exactly what we want, when we put in a good effort to please God and do the right things.

The law of linearity

In his excellent book “The Pressure’s Off“, the author Larry Crabb describes how lots of Christians believe in the law of linearity where there is an A that leads to the B you want. Now you just have to figure out what A is, do it consistently and disciplined, and you’ll have the life that you desire. It’s the Minute Maid Gospel that Crabb describes here.

But the problem is, that God hasn’t promised that everything will be great and fun, just because you do your best. Just because you raise your kids and tell them about Christ, there are no guarantees they’ll turn out the way you wanted. Just because you pray diligently to find the spouse you so desperately want, there isn’t any promise provided that you’ll find him. Even if you pray, study, tell other people about Christ, and give to God’s kingdom, you might still end up sick or lose your job.

The law of linearity, or the Minute Maid Gospel, doesn’t preach the truth. But so many of us believe it. I meet people all the time in my counseling office who have come to a place of broken marriages, depression and a general sense of hopelessness, because they believed in the false Gospel, and now they’re disillusioned and mad at God! And unfortunately, there are even more people who simply give up on God, because he didn’t provide what they thought he had promised. It’s essential, in counseling, and in the rest of our lives, that we figure out what God has actually promised. That’s the journey I take my counselees on. God’s promises in the New Covenant are absolutely wonderful, but it’s not from a law of linearity. The Minute Maid Gospel appeals to us, because we enjoy eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil that Adam and Eve ate from a while ago. We enjoy the power. The power to be God. The power to be in control. We think we can control our circumstances and other peoples’ choices. And we actually believe that God promised us that our lives would make sense. But these are some of the words that Jesus said regarding living in this world:

“In this world you will have trouble” (John 16:33). Plain and simple. You’ll have trouble. Things won’t turn out the way you want them to. People won’t respond the way you desire. Accidents will happen that you didn’t plan for.

But Jesus also said: “Peace I leave with you. My peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives.” (John 14:27). This is part of the real Gospel – the really great news! Jesus can and will give you peace. Not the kind of peace the world, other religions or people who claim they don’t believe in anything at all give. That kind of peace is based on circumstances. When there is no conflict, you have peace. But Jesus’ peace is a peace that you and I can experience in the midst of marriages falling apart, rebellious kids, lack of a spouse or meaningful friendships, loneliness, unemployment, depressive thoughts, or whatever other situation you may be in the midst of. It’s his peace. The peace of knowing who I am in him. The peace of knowing I am safe. Of knowing I am loved, accepted, and secure. Of knowing that nothing or nobody can ever change that fact. It’s the peace – that Paul talks about in Philippians 4:7 – that goes beyond understanding! It’s a peace you can experience that you can’t explain. Other people around you are losing hope and falling apart, but strangely enough you feel at peace. I have experienced this peace. Sometimes. Not all the time. I long to experience it more. I rejoice when I experience it. And I am excited to share about that peace with other people. We all need peace. Especially when we have run sour trying to pursue the counterfeit-truths of the Minute Maid Gospel. There is no peace when we drink that tonic. We can never rest. We can never just be. It’s a demand to strive and try and go further and push harder. Jesus invites us to rest. He invites to be. It’s the New Way, as Larry Crabb calls it in The Pressure’s Off.

Drink from Jesus’ cup. It gives real life that doesn’t disappoint and doesn’t run out.

Blessings, Torben

He knows best

I was just hit by a sense of laughing at myself for the silly project that I’ve allowed myself to be engaged in for a while. The project is called ‘questioning God and whining at him for not understanding me and what I need and what I need to do’. It’s a project that certainly doesn’t bring any life to me or to the people around me who end up as collateral damage when I go down the well-worn path of self-pity, doubt and thinking I know better than God.

God, as always, is patient with me, and I believe he just used a couple of conversations yesterday to remind me that he knows very well what he is doing. I was talking to a Portuguese friend of mine on Facebook about the missions conference in Holland at the very end of 2001 where we met each other. This was also the conference where God called me into missions and completely changed the direction of my life. I wasn’t planning on attending this missions conference. I thought I had plans with my girlfriend, but when she decided to end our relationship in November 2001, I thought I might as well go to the missions conference….! There were no deeper spiritual reasons for going than the very human emotion that at least I would be with a lot of people around new year’s instead of puttering around by myself. And God saw that somehow my heart was open, and he called me into missions and changed my life!

I was also talking to my wife Jeannette and we were talking about the fact that we both really wanted to lead a Youth With A Mission Discipleship Training School (YWAM DTS) outreach team to Kenya in Africa in 2004 when we were both on staff helping leading a DTS in England. Unfortunately the base leaders wouldn’t allow the Kenya idea to happen, and instead we ended up leading a team to Ukraine. A year later God called us back to Ukraine and used our two and a half years in Ukraine to break us of much pride and set us on the path we’re still on of learning daily more about what it means to have Christ be our life and rest in everything he is and does instead of trying to produce life ourselves. Would we have gone (back) to Ukraine if we hadn’t been there before with the outreach team? God only knows.

The message from God in reminding me of these two instances is that God knows what he is doing, even when I can’t see the big picture at this point.

I know parts of what God has called me to do, and I’m impatient for more things to happen quicker. I often eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, as Adam and Eve did in the Garden of Eden, and I think that I know what’s best for myself. I want things my way at my pace, but I know that at the essence of who I really am, in my spirit, I want what God wants for me. I want life his way. I want the plans he has for me and the ministry that he wants to do through me to happen in his order and in his way. I know that’s the truth, but I need to be reminded of it, when I’ve fallen under the control of my emotions and believe that nothing is happening…

Blessings, Torben – who just saw this picture of myself from my toddler days and know that God has been leading me all my life even through the experiences I still don’t understand

Was Mother Teresa right?

Mother Teresa of Calcutta, the little Albanian-born missionary to the least of these in India was a remarkable woman. No doubt about that. She gave her life out to suffering people in a self-sacrificing way that I know God was honored by and pleased with!

One quote, however, that she said has become almost known as a piece of Gospel truth in Christian circles. I saw it last week on Facebook. I heard it from friends the other day. I bet you have heard it too sometime these past weeks. If you do a Google search on it you’ll find out that people even claim that it’s in the Bible, even though that’s not the case. The quote from Mother Teresa goes like this:

“I know God will not give me anything I can’t handle. I just wish he didn’t trust me so much“

And the short version is of course: “God will never give you more than you can handle!” While that may sound good, and it’s considered true by many Christians, it actually isn’t true if you go to the Bible and start looking at the truths displayed there, or even if you look at your own or somebody else you knows life. There are many times where God wants us to be in situations where we are in way over our head. He longs to bring us into situations where we don’t know what to do, and we don’t have the strength to carry on. David calls that place “the valley of the shadow of death” in Psalm 23. It’s a lonely place where you come to the end of yourself. It would be the most terrible place in the world, if it wasn’t for the fact that Jesus promises to go with us there – “I fear no evil, for You are with me. Your rod, and your staff they comfort me“. We come to the end of our own rope when we are burdened beyond what we can handle or what other people can handle for us. We hang at the end of the rope, and we have to let go and we are in a free fall. If God doesn’t show up we are in big trouble. We are out of alternatives. But he does show up in those times.

Paul experienced that God gave him a lot more than he can handle too, and he describes it like this in 2. Corinthians 1:8-9:

“For we do not want you to be unaware, brethren, which came to us in the province of Asia, that we were burdened excessively, beyond our strength, so that we despaired even of life; indeed, we had the sentence of death within ourselves so that we would not trust in ourselves, but in God who raises the dead“

‘burdened excessively, beyond our strength‘ Paul writes. I have been to that place. Many people have. Some have gone the road of bitterness when faced with sufferings, others have gone the path of brokenness and have encountered Christ there. But aren’t there Bible verses contradicting what I’m saying? No. There are verses talking about that we will not face temptations that are more than we can handle in the sense that we always, as God’s children, have a choice when faced with temptation (and remember temptation is not from God! He doesn’t tempt us!). There is a way out. We can choose to walk in the Spirit (Romans 8), say no to the temptation and walk away from it. Or we can choose to give into the temptation, and we get to experience death in our lives. The verse about God always providing a way out of temptation can be found in 1. Corinthians 10:13, and the fact that God doesn’t tempt anyone can be studied in James 1:13. But again, these verses don’t negate the fact that God’s plan for all of us is to bring us to a place of brokenness and surrender where we admit that we don’t have what it takes to live the life we want to live. Where we accept that we can’t do it without Christ doing it through us. It’s never about us getting strength from God to do our life. God wants to bring us to a place of death where we surrender to him and let him live his life through us. We are his unique expressions to the world, but it’s him who does it all. All I do is surrender and submit to him doing his will through my life.

So while Mother Teresa was a wise woman, she wasn’t right that God never gave her more than she could handle. And from so many of her other writings, I know that she often came to the end of herself and cried out to God to intervene. And he did. And he does. And he will for you and me today. God’s timing is always perfect. I often disagree with his timing, but that’s me wanting to be God and assuming that I know best. God knows best. God knows how to bring me into places, situations, relationships, circumstances where I’m in way over my head and where I come to the place of finally surrendering to him and throwing myself in his arms fully. He longs for that. And the truth is that I, as a child of God, also long for that. I’m just so often confused by the noise and distractions of my soul and body life that I don’t hear the Spirit’s voice in my spirit whispering: “give up, surrender to my love and you will experience the life you always wanted”. Thank God for the truth in this quote by C. S. Lewis:

“God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains. It is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world“

I don’t like the megaphone anymore than anybody else does. But I’m thankful for the life that God has given me because he has given me much more than I can handle.

Blessings, Torben – who is very excited about his trip to Bulgaria and Ukraine these next few weeks!

“Happy birthday, dear bloooog…happy birthday to you!”

Today is a special day in the life of this blog site. It’s www.abrokencup.wordpress.com’s first birthday! 

103 blog posts after this site was launched on January 6, 2008 while sitting in Kiev, Ukraine it’s time to look back at the first year and reveal some of the statistics regarding this blog.

6870 views in a year gives an average of just about 20 views each day. The busiest day was September 24 where 87 views were recorded. 

The most popular blog entry is somewhat of surprise to me, since the single topic that most people were wanting to know something about was the old hymn It Is Well With My Soul written by Horatio Spafford. 

Other very popular topics include two blog entries about my beautiful home country of Denmark titled The Happiest Country In The World and 16 Things You Should Know About Denmark

Many people ask the question: why is Christianity so boring, and hopefully they see in this very popular entry that it’s simply a lie that Christianity should be boring! Others look for info about one of my heroes, Watchman Nee, and others again are starting on a journey with Christ and would like to learn more about listening to your life. A large group of people struggle with doubt and would like to learn more about how to trust, while others again want info about LEGO!

Also a large number of people are dying to know why I don’t eat cheese and when spring actually starts…! 

And finally a good number of people are searching for questions relating to Christian faith: how to share the Gospel with others?, how can I be a blessing to others?, how does God view indifference?, can the Bible really be true?, and is there any rest to be found in my life?

Two blog entries suffer the disappointment of only having been read once (even though they include some excellent songs!): Three New Year’s Songs and I Hope You Dance – they will be hoping for better times the coming year

This concludes the first year of blog entries. I am looking forward to another year of writing thoughts, insights, funny stories, and all kinds of other stuff here on this site!

Blessings from a proud father of the birthday boy

Torben

Fireproof

We went to the local dollar theater tonight to watch the movie Fireproof. 

I came away from the movie with tears still waiting to dry out completely on my face. The movie is absolutely wonderful, and really a must-see if you are married and have any interest in keeping your marriage alive and beautiful, also if you don’t have big problems right now. And if you’re even dreaming about getting married some day, I would definitely also recommend this movie to the best of my ability! It’ll be out on DVD January 27, and we have already pre-ordered our copy right here. You can also get it at amazon.com

In a day and age where more than half of all marriages, also within the Church, fall apart…In a time where Hollywood send out movie after movie portraying the wonderful and God-ordained institution of marriage as either the death of romance and fun, something that is dull and that can only be spiced up by an affair with someone, or just as a place where the man is controlling his wife or more often these days the other way around where a hysterical and demanding wife controls her semi-brain dead doormat of a husband…In these days where I know many people making poor choices in the area of relationship…And in a time where it’s easy to lose hope and just accept that “that’s just the way it is“….this movie was like a breath of very fresh air!

Cynics will watch the movie and focus on the B-movie level acting, but if you decide to leave your heart open when you watch the movie, I’m confident that you will be touched by the beautiful and life giving message of hope that runs through the story in the movie. 

I thoroughly enjoyed watching a movie filled with real hope. And hope based on the only one we can ever trust fully: Jesus Christ! He is the hope for the hopeless. He is the hope for marriages that are falling apart right and left. He is the one who can fix any marriage, if the two spouses chose to surrender their own pride and allow Christ to teach them what humility and love really is!

How I rejoice when I meet couples, and I do know several of them, where they can tell me their story of how when they were on the brink of divorce, like in Fireproof, can tell of how God saved their marriages and their families. So often Christian movies have only focused on the salvation aspect of what Christ did for us. And that is certainly super important that he saved all believers from Hell and is offering salvation and Heaven at the end of our lives here. But there is more to it. That’s only the first half of the Gospel. The rest of the Gospel is about Christ giving us life and hope and changing us from within. And this movie portrays this fact beautifully. Human effort is not enough to have a marriage, or any other relationship, that is truly alive and life giving. Only when we find our strength and life in Christ do we have anything to offer to our spouse or our friend.

I hope you’ll rent/buy this DVD and watch it and allow God to speak words of hope into your life. He did to Jeannette and me tonight, and we thank God that he is the one who has kept our marriage alive and growing the first 3,5 years, and we’re delighted that we know he’ll continue to do that as we surrender ourselves and our will to him and his will.

Fireproof definitely gets six stars out of six!

Blessings, Torben

Here is a video from Fireproof with a beautiful worship song to God:

The rest of the Gospel

If I had to pick one book that has really challenged and changed me within the last year, it would have to be Dan Stone’s The Rest of the Gospel. It’s a small book from a small publishing house by an unknown author, but it is a masterpiece. Nothing more. Nothing less. I have just given away my only copy of it to a friend of mine who wants to know more about who he is in Christ, but I intend to buy a bunch of them and have them to give to people who truly want to know the truth about how life in Christ looks like.

Here are just a few quotes from the book. May they challenge you, maybe make you buy the book and read more (?), and may the Holy Spirit show you more of who you are in Christ if you’re already a believer. If you’re not a believer, I would still encourage you to read the book and get a taste of the life and freedom that Jesus Christ has bought for his children.

“You are not waiting to become holy and blameless and beyond reproach (Colossians 1:22). God sees you as holy and blameless and beyond reproach before him right now. When he looks at you, he sees the nature of his son. He sees you as love. He sees you as joy. He sees you as peace. He sees you as righteous. He sees you as redeemed. He sees you as justified. He sees you as perfect. He sees you complete” (page 103)

“It is an affront to God to keep talking about how unworthy we are. It’s a statement of unbelief. “I really don’t believe what God says about me; I believe what I think about me”. We’re never going to anywhere that way. It isn’t being humble. It’s a false humility. It’s the teaching of tradition and the flesh, because it appears humble. What’s truly humble is agreeing with what God says about you. Nothing more. Nothing less. We are the righteousness of God (2. Corinthians 5:21). We don’t look it all the time. We don’t feel it all the time. We don’t think it all the time. But we are” (page 104)

“Any activity that’s giving you your identity is an idol and is only contributing to the false self. Our false self thinks it needs external things or activities to give it life. It wants the stroking, the external affirmation, the place of authority, or the the public place to make pronouncements. We are dangerous living out of our flesh, because we’re using others to validate us. But when we no longer need those externals – when we are in Christ and who he is has become foundational truth in our life – then we can handle externals, because we don’t need them for our identity. God will take us through situations again and again to bring us to the place where he is our total life, where we are living out of our true identity. Once we are, he can give us back the external things” (page 107)

“Even if we’re messing up, we’re not a liability, because he’s (God) going to use it somehow in our life or in somebody else’s life, or both” (page 111)

“This is why we have to fail (in our attempts to please God through with our religious activities). God couldn’t be God and let us succeed in the flesh, or we would never know Spirit life. We have the Spirit – we do contain the living God – but if we don’t live out of him in our daily experience it’s like we don’t have him in us at all. Our failures at living the Christian life press us into knowing him as our life” (page 123)

Amen, brother!

Torben

FAQ about why I don’t eat cheese

I was looking through some of my old blog posts on my old blog www.torbenriisjensen.blogspot.com and I came across my old masterpiece about cheese. And since – for some reason – I’ve gotten a lot of the good, old questions about why I don’t eat cheese these past weeks, I thought I would reprint this FAQ for a new generation of blog readers! It was written two years ago, but nothing has changed! Enjoy

Q: Why don’t you just make a FAQ where you answer all the questions regarding why you hate cheese and never eat it?
A: Here it is!

Q: How can you not like cheese?
A: It’s really not that difficult. It’s not wrong to not like cheese. Cheese is just one food product type. It’s really not any stranger than not liking green beans or mustard. It is in fact a fairly low percentage of the world where cheese is something that “everybody” eats. Look at China, India and the rest of East Asia. No cheese. Look at all of Africa and much of South America: very little cheese. And that may be something like 70-80% of the world’s population that is not obsessed with cheese! And I’m okay being a minority in my part of the world.

Q: Did something happen when you were little that made you hate cheese?
A: Hmm…..boring answer: no. More interesting answer: there was in fact one incident where my brother, Carsten (you can confirm the story with him (!)), took a piece of bread with butter and cheese and a bread knife and tried to force me to eat the cheese…! He was so tired of my sister and I constantly talking about hating cheese, and I guess that drove him to desperate means of communication. Today Carsten is a more peaceful cheese-lover who has to live with the pain that his sons, Christian and Jakob, don’t eat cheese either. Like uncle, like nephews!!
Q: Have you always hated cheese?
A: Yes, Always. I can’t remember a time when I didn’t hate cheese. It’s been going on for a bit more than 32 years now. My parents used to say that it would change when I grew up. They gave up quite a few years ago.

Q: What is it you hate about cheese?
A: Everything. The texture. The smell. The look of it. The fact that it is a product that has come to be through a process of putrefaction/decay/rotting which my dictionary suggest as proper translations of the beautiful Danish word forrådnelse. I feel physically bad when I see people eat cheese, especially when they seem to enjoy it. It makes me sick to my stomach. And Jeannette and I have a clear-cut rule that says that she has to eat a piece of chewing gum after she has tasted the forbidden fruit. For some reason she loves cheese:-(

Q: What about cheese on pizza or lasagna?
A: I’m completely orthodox, and I don’t eat cheese on pizza or lasagna either. And trust me: a pizza or lasagna without cheese is wonderful. In fact I dare you, dear reader, to try it and see for yourself. All of a sudden all the other yummy ingredients will taste of so much more when they’re not overwhelmed by the stinking and foul-tasting cheese. Trust me!

Q: Do you eat any kind of cheese?
A: Nope. None. Not even cream cheese or the like.
Q: Have you ever tried cheese?
A: There have been clever people who have tried to trick me into eating cheese. I recall a Norwegian mother who thought she was pretty brilliant when she put cheese in some rolls that I apparently liked. But other than these crimes towards humanity I haven’t eaten cheese with my knowledge.

Q: But how can you not like cheese when you’re from Denmark where they make such good cheese?
A: I’m happy that so many people spend their money on Danish cheese and support my home country that way, but I’m more than happy not to eat cheese products. I enjoy a whole range of other Danish products, especially red hot dogs, so I don’t feel like a national traitor either.

Q: What do you do if you’re in somebody’s house and they serve food with cheese?
A: I do my best to avoid eating it. Obviously I can end up in some social contexts where it’s only appropriate to try to eat whatever is served, but in most homes it’s okay to say that you don’t eat cheese. These days we have people who don’t eat or are allergic to numerous things, so it’s normally not a big deal.

Q: Is your whole family cheese-haters?
A: My parents and my brother love cheese, but my sister is on my team. She doesn’t eat cheese either, and we enjoy being part of our little exclusive club

Q: If you had to choose between killing your wife Jeannette and eating cheese what would you choose?
A: What an insane question!! Obviously I would never hurt my wonderful wife, but still….eating cheese…….I’m not sure I could do it. I’m not sure I could swallow it…….Please….if you read this and are into torture and have plans of catching me….please consider another means of torture….:-(

Q: Will you ever start eating cheese?
A: No. I will not.

Torben