UPDATE 64 DAYS IN JAIL – TORBEN SONDERGAARD
Greetings to you all in the name of God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ.  What a privilege it is to be able to walk with God, and by the Holy Spirit take part in the salvation, suffering and life of our Lord Jesus Christ!  May the Bible NEVER become a History book, to be READ only.  No!  The Bible SHOULD be a Book which should be LIVED OUT, because Jesus is the SAME, yesterday, today and forever!  

God is FAITHFUL, and we have seen that the last twenty-five years serving Him.  We have gone through many trials and hard times, but God has ALWAYS been faithful and has saved us out of them ALL!  I have now been locked up for sixty-four days, and still don’t know exactly why I’m here or what will happen.  I know that I have a clean conscience and I have done nothing that should keep me here.  I pray and believe that the TRUTH will be revealed soon, and that I won’t need to stay locked up until my asylum case goes before a judge. 

 
I truly miss my family and the life out there, but until then I find it an honor that I can walk in the footsteps of Paul, Peter, and thousands of others all over the world who have been innocent locked up, just as Jesus said in Matthew 5:11, “Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you and tell all kinds of vicious lies about you because you follow Me!”  Yes, I am truly blessed and know a great reward is kept up for me in heaven, as He goes on to say in Matthew 5:12, “Rejoice, be glad, because your reward in heaven is great – they persecuted the prophets before you in the same way.”
But God has also been with us these last sixty-four days.  Even though it has been hard, we have experienced again and again how He has been giving us “manna” (a word from heaven) here “in the desert,” and “water flowing from the Rock,” as He did for forty years with the Israelites.  Yes, in the hardest moments, when we really need it, He has sent manna from heaven to us!  Both Lene and I can testify how God has come EVERY time, by someone sending a word from God, or we got a phone call, or like one time when I got a very powerful dream….

One day some weeks ago when I was really down, it was very hard and I cried out to God, and He answered.  Someone got a dream about me, and a word from God, and WHOA, it was so powerful!  When I read it, the Holy Spirit came over me.  I was crying and crying.  I had a moment like I’ve never had before.  I could only read one line at the time, and then I needed to stop to pray and cry some more, before I could go on reading.  It was like God was speaking DIRECTLY to me through EVERY word, like it was HIM who had written it all down for me!  I never in my life experienced a moment like that. 

It was truly a HOLY moment, and tears are coming to my eyes now, just thinking of it.  GOD CAME!  GOD SPOKE, and everything changed!  

The dream was about me and the situation I am in right now, but also about the future and what will come out of it.  I am truly excited about what God is going to do for us in the future!  Yes, this really spoke to me about many things – things I will share another time. 

But there was also something revealed in the dream I needed to repent from.  I needed to repent from feeling sorry for myself.  The few days before the dream had been really hard, and somehow I began to feel how unfair it all was, and I started to feel sorry for myself.  But through the dream, I saw very clearly that I needed to REPENT, and I needed to stop feeling sorry for myself and STAND UP – KNOWING that this is ALL part of GOD’S plan and purpose for my life. 

Suffering for Christ is what God has called us to.  “When you do well and suffer for it, take it patiently.  This is acceptable with God.  For this you are called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow His steps.”  (I Peter 2:20b-21)  

It is so easy for us to start feeling sorry for ourselves when we go through hard times, and then start to murmur and complain, like God doesn’t know what He’s doing, or like He is not in control.  To murmur and complain is really a DANGEROUS place for us to be.  Remember the Israelites – how they did this time after time, and how in the end they were REJECTED, and did not enter into the Promised Land as God had for them.  Yes, that generation did NOT enter, and it was first Joshua and the next generation who entered in, because they were a STUBBORN people who MURMURED again and again.  Yes, they only needed to go THREE DAYS into the desert after they had walked through the Red Sea by the hands of God before they started MURMURING and COMPLAINING, as if the God who had saved them out of Egypt, the God who had just brought them through the Red Sea had just left them there to die.  This is NOT how God is.  He WILL finish what He has started, and He is FAITHFUL!

Let this NOT be us!  God is FAITHFUL, and we have SEEN that AGAIN and AGAIN, and we WILL ALSO SEE IT THIS TIME!  As the dream really spoke to me, I repented, and many things started to happen.  I got many new opportunities to share Jesus.  I saw people get healed.  And NOW I got told that I’m going to lead some of the church service here in the jail!  We normally have church every second or third Sunday when some people come from outside, but God has given me favor and opened a door, so NOW we are going to have church EVERY Sunday, and I will have the service those times when the other people aren’t coming from outside.  The first time will be this Sunday, and I am very excited for that, so thank You God for opening this door and giving me favor in this place!  

Remember that GOD IS FAITHFUL! NEVER take your eyes away from HIM!  He KNOWS what He’s doing, and He’s USING these hard times to HUMBLE us and to FORM us after the image of His Son Jesus Christ!  Yes, we pray that God will help us and save me out of this place, but we also pray that GOD’S WILL will be done, and that He will use this for HIS KINGDOM!  We pray that the truth may come out, and that all the lies will be revealed, and that I soon will be free again.  But when we pray, let us be ALERT, that we DO NOT COMPLAIN, but pray KNOWING that God KNOWS BEST and that He HAS A PLAN with it. 

So we pray with THANKSGIVING in our heart, giving everything over to HIM.  “Be persistent in your prayers, and keep alert as you pray, giving thanks to God.  At the same time pray also for us, so that God will give us a good opportunity to preach His message about the secret of Christ.  For this is why I am now in prison.  Pray, then, that I may speak, as I should, in such a way as to make it clear.”  (Colossians 4:2-4)

We are thankful to God and to all of you, our friends out there, who are thinking of us.  Please keep us in your prayers, that God, He will have HIS WAY with us, and that it will happen soon that the truth will come out and I will be released from this place, and that God will use it for HIS NAME’S SAKE.  Pray for the church, that they may come into the life God has for all of us.  STAY BOLD and MAKE DISCIPLES, as we are all called to!  KEEP RUNNING THE RACE so you one day can stand as a FAITHFUL SERVANT to our Lord Jesus Christ and receive the crown of RIGHTEOUSNESS!  

Love and many blessings to all of you, from your brother and friend,
Torben Sondergaard