In conversation with Rob van Rossum
Rob en Mirjam
Faith, friendship, and an authentic life
Rob’s story
“Superficiality, as far as we’re concerned, is not a part of life,” Wim states at the start of our conversation. This declaration immediately sets the tone for a profound interview with Rob van Rossum, a 56-year-old man unafraid to be honest about his life, his faith, and the path he has walked.
The man behind the name
Rob van Rossum introduces himself as a father of three sons—Samuel, Jason, and Milan—husband to Mirjam, and “son of the Most High.” This last addition is no coincidence; it immediately indicates where his heart lies. He has been married to Mirjam for sixteen years but has known her for much longer. “I’ve known her since she was a little girl,” he shares, “of course, not in the way we relate to each other now, but still.”
It’s remarkable how open Rob is about his relationships. He has intentionally built friendships where he dares to share his heart. Besides Mirjam, he names Cor Dekkers as someone with whom he can discuss everything. “I wish every man had a male friend and every woman a good girlfriend. Someone you can talk to on that level.”
Lessons in friendship
This openness didn’t come naturally. Rob speaks honestly about his search for true friendship, including the mistakes he made along the way. After his conversion, he literally asked a few men, “Will you be my friend?” One of them responded with love, “Rob, that’s not how it works.”
It was a tough lesson. “Who teaches you how life works?” he asks. “Usually, it’s through your own experiences.” The friends from that early period are no longer in his life, but Rob looks back on it without regret. “I see it as a learning process. I’m not ashamed of it.”
The great turning point
The conversation inevitably turns to the major turning point in Rob’s life: his change of faith. He describes it as the highlight of his existence, where “spirit, soul, and body” all changed. What’s special about his story is that he wasn’t looking for God. “I was having a great time. Nothing missing,” he says. “I was my own god.”
The change came through a girl he met at a disco. She was a Christian and started talking about Jesus. Rob was interested in her, not her faith. “I always thought: if you’re at rock bottom with a needle in your arm, and you see no way out, then you’d cry out to God. But I was perfectly happy with myself.”
Yet it happened. Rob describes it as being “ambushed” by God. His entire mindset changed 180 degrees. “In the past, I enjoyed making a joke at your expense. Now I think: how can I help you? Before, it was: what can this mean for me? Now, I look at: what can I do for you?”
Faith in practice
This change in mindset also translates to his work. Rob works in the Dutch media industry and has contact with well-known Dutch celebrities. He often prays, “God, grant me that I may honor you without being able to talk about you.” The result? People see him as social and warm.
“I can’t pull a pious face,” he says honestly. “And sometimes, very inappropriate jokes are absolutely hilarious.” He’s not the type of Christian who immediately forces the gospel into every conversation. “If you evangelize bluntly, it doesn’t work. But ten conversations might be about nothing, and then comes that eleventh conversation where people notice something in you that gives them trust.”
Through the pain
Life has not spared Rob. He is divorced from his first wife, the girl from the disco. It was a painful period during which he consciously invited the Holy Spirit to guide him through the entire process. “That also means I hated my ex-wife at certain moments,” he says without reservation.
“Many people don’t understand that, but then you’ve never been hurt enough. Hate and love are very close to one another.” The key was not to get stuck in it, but to move past it in a healthy way. “It’s a wound, a scar. If you point to that scar now, I can tell you exactly what was in it. But there’s no more puss coming out.”
Inspiration and irritation
When asked what inspires him, Rob’s face lights up. “God inspires me. The lives of people I see changed by God. But also people who are good at something.” He can enjoy Max Verstappen, a good singer, excellence in general. “All excellence comes from Him.”
But Rob also has his irritations. He’s annoyed by hypocrisy, by people—like Extinction Rebellion—who glue themselves to private planes while traveling all over the world themselves. But also: “People who should know better, and yet willingly do other things. Who are essentially not functioning in their destiny.”
No regrets
It’s striking that Rob says he has no regrets about his choices. “You can only have regret if you know beforehand that something won’t work and you do it anyway. If I get into something and I do my best, then I assume I gave it one hundred percent.”
He illustrates this with his decision to leave Fokker—a job he loved in the aviation industry—to go to Spain as a DJ. Without any guarantees for what would come after. “I am here now because I took that step back then. I will only have regrets if I don’t do it.”
Future dreams
About future dreams, Rob is a bit more reserved, but he certainly has them. For his three sons, he especially hopes that they “have fun in this life and do what they love to do. We let them discover for themselves. ‘Go find your own way,’ of course, together with Jesus.”
The greatest gift
At the end of our conversation, Rob summarizes why his faith is so central. “Getting to know God is the greatest gift a person can receive. It’s not a religion; it’s a relationship. Religion pushes you from the outside and tells you what you should or shouldn’t do. A relationship, that’s something from within.”
He quotes his favorite Bible verse, Psalm 27, verse 4: “One thing I have asked of the Lord, and all that other stuff falls into place.” It’s that focus that gets him out of bed every day, that allows him to enjoy excellence wherever he finds it.
Rob van Rossum is a man who has lived life, with all its peaks and valleys. Above all, he is someone who tries to be authentic in a world that often revolves around superficiality. And that, as this conversation reveals, makes all the difference.
