The Meeting Cassette From Drøbak

In August 1989, an amazing thing happened. A young brother from Drøbak sought me out privately. He was an im­migrant from Tunisia of Islamic origin. He had lived in Oslo for some years, but he had now moved back to Drøbak and was attending the meetings there. He felt that Ole Kristiansen’s preaching was not the same as what he had ex­perienced from Sigurd Bratlie in Oslo. He had a cassette with him containing one of Ole Kristiansen’s messages.

Before that, I had had dinner with Ole Kristiansen and his wife at a summer conference in Holland. Suddenly, as if on impulse, I said to him: “You’ll have something to answer for on the Day of Judgment, Ole.” These words required some further explanation, and when he asked for it, I gave him this exhortation: “You friends from Drøbak never come to Bratlie’s Bible studies in Oslo. Sigurd Bratlie is one of the greatest apostles of our time, and his instruction has tremen­dous significance for each individual. It is quite a responsibil­ity to stay away from these gatherings. Not only should you yourself come, but you should encourage those you are a shepherd over to do likewise.”

A short time after I had listened to Kristiansen’s message on the cassette, I decided to attend a meeting in Drøbak in­stead of going in to Oslo that day. It was actually slightly quicker to go to Drøbak from my home in Kråkstad than to go to Ryenstubben in Oslo. After our conversation in Holland, Ole Kristiansen had encouraged me to come to a meeting in Drøbak. I arrived after the meeting had started. I listened as Ole Kristiansen stood up and spoke about how there was too little joy among us. When he saw that I was present, he asked me to continue after he had finished. I spoke about the fight of faith that we must stand in. When some of his daughters heard this, they stood up and left the hall, saying in half-whispers, “We can’t stand to listen to such talk.”

Over the years, Ole Kristiansen had departed from the preaching of the fight of faith. He said that we were supposed to rejoice over salvation, but the conditions for this rejoicing were quietly omitted. With the able assistance of some of his children, his message more and more lacked command­ments, and he eagerly labored to bring the assembly to an emotional high.