MikeJentes.com

Since blogging is so cool…and I started and never kept it up…I thought I’d renew it. So I’ll at least begin to post my ramblings from the email I write each week to keep thequest family connected. You can always check out the latest at www.thequestcolumbus.com/email.html

I’m kinda into the “old,” rather than the “new” right now. I mentioned a quote from Bonhoeffer last week (because I have been reading stuff older than 2 or 3 decades lately). This quote was passed on to me a week or so ago and I thought it was worth sharing.

Benjamin Franklin was impressed by the Dunkers (early name for Brethren) because of their continual search for a better understanding of the Scriptures. He wrote, “This modesty in a sect is perhaps a singular instance in the history of mankind, every other sect supposing itself in possession of all truth . . .” (The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin)

I think that does typify our community more than 2 centuries later. We are on a search. A quest. We are trying to understand the Bible better. We are working hard to have a humble and simple approach. We are following Jesus and the Bible. We certainly don’t think we have possession of ALL truth.

Since we believe what Jesus says, we do believe we know the TRUTH. Truth is a person. At least that’s Jesus’ assertion:

Jesus told him, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. No one can come to the Father except through me.”

John 14:6 NLT

We must continue to have “such modesty” as Ben Franklin described. We don’t have the corner on all truth…but what a great thing to know The Truth. Since we know Him, we don’t have to know it all…only He does!

One last thing as we talk about searching the Scriptures, we had a good time in the Institute this past Sunday. We are learning to look, look, look at the Bible. We are studying a little letter written by Paul to Philemon…the forgiveness exhibited in this letter is astounding. I’m sure you’ll hear more about it in upcoming emails and discussions.

Press on,

Mike

Totzke Prayer Communique

Friday, August 29, 2003 11:30 AM

Dear Praying Friends,

We want to thank you for praying for us this summer while we

were in the Czech Republic. Answers to prayer were very

evident and came in all forms – Sylvia’s sister

Linda’s slow but steady recovery from the perforated

colon, safety for the teams coming from the US to do the

English camps, safety while traveling by metro, bus, and

trains to distribute Jesus film brochures, a good working

relationship with the Swains, and joy in our ministry were

all answers to your prayers.

Here are some of the highlights of what was accomplished

this summer:

· Helped to distribute over 7,500 Jesus film flyers in 10

towns surrounding Prague.

· 63 response cards have already been returned by people

requesting the Jesus film. In addition to the Jesus film,

they receive the book More Than a Carpenter, a Gospel of

John and a survey to complete after they view the film.

· Hosted three teams with a total of 30 people who came

from Wooster OH, Ashland OH, and Martinsburg PA Grace

Brethren Churches to teach the English camps.

· About 75 Czechs came to the English camps. We helped

teach the English camp with the Wooster team.

· Saw God answer prayer for Petr Masny whose wife divorced

him and didn’t permit him to see his two young sons for 15

months. The judge gave him visitation rights every other

weekend. He is grateful for your prayers. He is also

attending services at Swains.

· Sylvia was able to communicate in German and has a

desire to become more proficient in her second language.

· Our total expenses were $500 less than what we budgeted,

so we donated that $500 to the literature fund so that the

Swains can buy more Jesus film brochures, Jesus films, Four

Spiritual Laws booklets, and have the postage required to

send them.

To see more of the ministry in pictures, please view our

photo album on line at

http://groups.msn.com/TeamTotzke/pictures.

You may be wondering what’s in store for us now. As we

continued to pray and wait on God for His answers, we came

home energized to the ministry God has given us in urban

Columbus. Being involved in ministry here in the Short North

is very similar to ministry in the Czech Republic. All

people need to hear the gospel and to learn about Jesus. We

plan to continue making contacts, building relationships,

and sharing the good news that we have a Savior. The summer

confirmed that our ministry and life in Columbus is right

where God wants us to be now. To be involved in church

planting in the Czech Republic would require language skills

that would take us a minimum of four years to acquire. We

couldn’t possibly share Christ through an interpreter in a

meaningful way, but we can right here in our own culture.

Teammates are desperately needed for the Swains so that the

people who are connected to them through the Jesus film will

have more follow up and discipleship. Our role in their

ministry is to help them find potential teammates to reach

the Czech people for Christ.

Thank you for being a part of the ministry we had this

summer. You are all very important to us.

Love you all,

Larry and Sylvia

Totzke Prayer Communique

Sent: Friday, August 15, 2003 6:55 PM

Subject: We’re Home!

Dear Praying Friends,

Thanks for praying for us. The trip home was uneventful —

we and our luggage got home safely. Several members of our

church were waiting for us at the airport. It’s good to be

home. We’ll write more soon wrapping up our ministry time in

Prague. Thank you for being part of our support/prayer team.

We love you all.

God bless you,

Larry and Sylvia

Totzke Prayer Communique

From: syltotzke@wideopenwest.com

Sent: Tuesday, July 22, 2003 7:32 AM

Dear Praying Friends,

We’ve been in Prague for almost seven weeks now. It’s

hard to believe that the time has gone so fast. The teams

have kept us busy and we’ve had little time to catch our

breath between teams. The second team arrived at the place

where we are staying on Saturday, July 12 before the first

team left for the airport.

Besides doing the hosting activities, our role with each

team is different. On the first team we led the literature

distribution team of seven people delivering the Jesus film

brochure to mailboxes in communities surrounding Prague.

We’d board the bus at the metro station and travel 20-30

minutes to our destination. We distributed brochures for two

days in Pruhonice and four days in Ricany. We distributed

about 3700 brochures with the first team. When the

recipients opened their mailboxes and saw the brochures,

they had the opportunity to order the Jesus film for free.

Their responses go to the Campus Crusade for Christ office

in Prague and then are forwarded to George and Cindy Swain,

our hosts and the full time missionaries here. Last week we

were encouraged that already four people from Pruhonice and

18 from Ricany have requested the film. More people will

respond – maybe even months later, so we are still praying

for the people of these communities.

The second team is seven members and we are helping them

teach in the English camp – Larry in the beginners class

and Sylvia in the intermediate class. The ages of the

students in each class range from very young to retirees. We

had very little contact with the Czech students in the first

English camp, so we are enjoying this opportunity to

interact with them. Some of the intermediate and advanced

students attended the first camp as well, so they knew who

we were and now we can talk to them more. We had a very

good talk today after church with Petr, a student from the

first camp. He is going through a difficult divorce and had

not been permitted to see his two children for over 15

months. Today he told us that he will get to see them next

weekend, and he credited our prayers for that. Petr is

moving closer to God, and we are encouraged that he may

become more involved in the house church that meets at the

Swain’s.

Thanks for praying for Sylvia’s sister Linda. The update

is that she is feeling better. She still has fluid in her

stomach, and the doctors can’t figure out why it’s

there. The pain has lessened and she is driving her Miata

again. She too credits the prayers of many people in the

States and here in Prague for helping her through this

difficult time of recovery from emergency surgery.

After this second team leaves next Saturday, July 26, we

will have one week “off” before the third team arrives.

They will only be here one week, and, since there are only

eight of them, we will also help them with teaching English.

This has been an excellent experience for us in many ways,

and we are grateful for your prayers and financial support

that have helped make it possible. We continue to pray for

you. Please join us in continuing to pray for the growth of

the Church throughout the Czech Republic.

In His love,

Larry and Sylvia

Totzke Prayer Communique

From: syltotzke@wideopenwest.com

Sent: Tuesday, June 17, 2003 12:46 PM

Dear Praying Friends,

Ahoj! That’s the informal Czech greeting for hello and

goodbye. Just think of the Beatles song, “You say hello

and I say goodbye.” It’s all ahoj to the Czechs.

Sylvia got here last Wednesday trouble free. It took a bus

ride and two metro changes to get to our pension where we

stay that is owned and operated by a Czech widow named

Yarka. She is very helpful and speaks English. The pension

has a beautiful garden with many varieties of shrubs and

flowers. That’s where we eat breakfast and just relax

after the day is over. All of the team members will stay in

this pension when they arrive beginning in a few weeks. It

will be very convenient for us to be involved with them

because of this arrangement.

We are settled into a routine that we will have until the

teams arrive. After breakfast at the pension we walk the

mile to George and Cindy Swain’s home for a morning

meeting. At that time we do some administrative stuff, pray,

learn some Czech words and phrases, and plan the ministry

activity of the day. Last Friday we went with George to

Beroun, a village that is a 30 minute train ride southwest

of Prague where we distributed 700 Jesus film flyers. George

states that within the first two weeks of a flyer

distribution, they get a 2.5% return which is higher than

the normal return for a similar distributions. George has

10,000 flyers to distribute, so we’ll be busy seeing the

countryside surrounding Prague distributing these flyers all

the while praying for the recipients’ response. The

Ashland team will be helping with this project when they

come, too. Yesterday, Monday, we went to a village a short

bus ride away and visited people who responded to the flyer

awhile ago, got the Jesus film and viewed it. One woman was

a young mother who was interested in Bible studies; another

older couple was very hospitable and invited us back for

another visit but didn’t have any interest in spiritual

things. They do know some of the Czech people in the work

here, so that it an opening.

We’ve been learning our way around Prague. On Saturday we

were on our own and found our way to the castle, old town

and many other attractions. It’s an easy city to navigate

since it’s quite compact and visitor friendly. You can

hear many languages spoken wherever you go. We still have

lots more downtown time in the future so that we can become

comfortable knowing where the important things are located

– bank, post office, restaurants, major sightseeing

venues. We do walk a lot and when we go to bed at night,

we’re tired.

Thanks for your partnership with us and thanks for praying

for Sylvia’s sister Lin. She went home from the hospital

on Thursday and is feeling stronger each day. After having

only an IV drip for almost 10 days, she’s being careful as

to what she decides to eat. She has four cats and has found

that bending over to feed them and then to change their

litter pans is something that she won’t be able to do for

a awhile. She wants to thank all of you for praying for her

while she was in the hospital. Please continue to pray for

her full recovery.

Larry and Sylvia

Totzkes In Prague

Date: 6/12/2003 2:03:48 PM Eastern Daylight Time

From: syltotzke@wideopenwest.com

Mike,

Lin got home from the hospital last night and wants to thank

everyone for praying for her. Every day she feels a bit

better. Thanks for praying!

Syl

Sylvia from Airport in Germany

I got this email from Syl and wanted to post it here…

Date: 6/11/2003 3:29:38 AM Eastern Daylight Time

From: TotzkesinPrague

Mike and Mindi,

I called your house yesterday to give you a phone number. I was happy and hopeful when I found out that Stratton was doing child care while you were at the hospital. I hope that there is a new little Jentes for us to thank God for. If not, we’ll still keep praying that there will be an early release from the womb.

I’m in the Frankfurt airport waiting for my flight to Prague. I’m checking my email and it’s interesting navigating the German version of AOL. The screens look similar, but it sure was hard getting to the email screen. Oh well, time I have.

I talked to my sister yesterday and she’s improving. They took the intravenous thing out of her so now she can experiment with what to eat. It’s been 10 days since she had anything but an IV drip to sustain her. She’s hungry! That’s a good thing. They still aren’t talking about discharging her, but I hope that I’ll be able to talk with her today when I get to Prague and hear more good news of her recovery.

I pray that all is well with you. God bless you both and all the little Jenteses whether they be three or four in number.

Love ya,

Syl

Totzke Prayer Communique

From: TotzkesinPrague@aol.com [mailto:TotzkesinPrague@aol.com]

Sent: Monday, June 09, 2003 12:05 PM

Dear Friends,

As of today, we’re not sure what email address will work when we’re in Prague. Larry has tried to use wideopenwest and also this aol address that we got when we got our laptop (you know, 6 free months of aol but you can’t use the current account you have). Neither one of them has been successful yet but he’s still working on it from his end. He does have email access through the Swain account and a Czech cell phone Randall Wood from Dublin Baptist Church lent us. We’ll keep you posted on the email access.

I’m in Seattle and will leave tomorrow. My sister Lin is still in the hospital. Her intestines have started to wake up but not to the extent that she can come home. Our mom is here now and will take over for me. Today they hope to put her on liquids. She hadn’t had even a drink of water until yesterday. It’s been a good time for us to be together although I wish it weren’t under these circumstances, although God is teaching us a great deal about the many facets that love is. For that I’m eternally thankful. Thank you for praying for me about how good a caregiver I will be to my sister. She’s says I’m a good caregiver, but that won’t make me rush off to nursing school.

To read more about Larry’s trip to Prague, you can go to the quest blog at http://www.thequestcolumbus.com/blog.html. It was an adventure!

I wanted to send this out today to make sure that I have all of your addresses correct before I take off tomorrow. God bless you all.

Sylvia and Larry