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From: 	 heb_roots_chr@mail.geocities.com
Sent: 	 Tuesday, July 29, 1997 1:49 AM
To: 	 Hebraic Heritage Newsgroup
Subject: The Rabbi Arriveth


From:          "Hay Did Center For Learning - haydid" <haydid@haydid.org>
Reply-to:      shalom@haydid.org
To:            heb_roots_chr@geocities.com
Subject:       The Rabbi Arriveth

Shalom, Rooters,

Well, Rabbi Yehoshua Othniel has arrived with his family in 
Independence, KS! We wanted to tell you that your prayers and good
wishes were answered with their safe arrival late Friday evening after
many adventures along the way. The local crew had to go to the rescue of
the Rabbi in Joplin, MO (about 90 minutes from us) though. Seems as if
in their exhaustion, the rabbi locked the keys to the truck inside! So
David and Mary Fritzemeier had returned early from vacation for a
reason---and now we knew why! David is a man of many talents, and locks
is one of them! The four of us headed over to Joplin to find a very
wilted Rabbi, wife  and three children standing in the shade of the
Ryder truck in 115 degree heat  index weather. 

After several tries at unlocking the door (Ryder said that they would
come for $400, and the police don't do that kind of thing over there),
Tom decided to try out his collection of Ford keys. Since the Holeman's
only drive Fords (something about having a godfather who is a dealer,
and your father being a service manager just sort of created Ford fans
here), Tom whipped out the key to "Lurch". Now Lurch is a unique truck.
Lurch has about 275,000 miles on it, and is a l975 version of brown
junker but with a great a/c and heater! This was to be the new vehicle
for the Rabbi's family once they arrived here anyway, so Tom tried the
key...it worked! Who would have thought! 

When we arrived in Independence, the gang was all lined up to offload
the small truck of its precious cargo. Rabbi's children had asked many
questions on the drive home about the possibilities of life in rural
Kansas, and were ready to explore, but since it was after 11 pm after
many days of driving they were fed pizza, and loaded into the cars once
more to go over to their temporary home.

Earlier this week, a wonderful blessing came our way. Randy and Betsy
Felton had arrived with a missions trip group of teenagers from the
church in OKC that they attend. Often times the Feltons have lead trips
to Mexico or to Indian reservations, but this time they came to help
remodel the rabbi's house. What a blessing these 11 teenagers were! They
knew that Randy and Betsy taught in the adult Sunday school something
different than norm, but had never knew what. After the first lunch
discussion about who we were and what we were doing,  they started
asking questions, and exploring the books and materials that we had in
our house. Our home was the breakfast and lunch feeding  area, so they
knew that this was not an average home with the phone ringing and
mezuzahs on the doors! "What's this" and "Why do you do that?" and "What
do you mean we don't bless food?" were just some of the many questions
that were asked!
As we worked with the teenagers, the discussion continued each day. When
they ripped off the leaking roof on the porch they discovered our worst
nightmare! Carpenter ants and termites! To complicate the situation, one
of the teenagers decided to "step out" on the roof, only to find himself
on the floor of the porch underneath! He had fallen through! We held our
breath, but he only had one scratch on his arm! Baruch HaSHEM!!!!!

Since we are a teaching ministry, on the second night we had decided to
teach about the sabbath. I got up at 4 am and baked  4 loaves of challah
bread before the heat set in. The work broke for naps in the afternooon
(there was no a/c where they were working), and they worked hard until
about 7:30 pm. Then back to their two homes-away-from-home that had been
provided for showers. At 8:30 pm they arrived ready for a spaggeti
dinner, and not realizing that their lives would be changed! As we lit
the candles, and proceded through the service we explained each element
and how Yeshua was everywhere! You could have heard a pin drop when we
had finished...they knew that they had experienced HIM! They were
listening to each of us explain and explain and explain for hours into
the night. Fertile ground was receiving seed.....
On Wednesday we were all focusing on finishing as much of the remodeling
job as we could by 4 pm. The heat was sweltering, but they had begun the
day watching SHALOM JERUSALEM video, and you could hear "Hine MaTov"
being sung as they worked. By 4 pm the hardest part of the remodeling
had been finished. This was an amazing feat! Many of these teenagers had
never held a hammer, or even been on a missions trip! But they had done
it! To HIM be the glory!
At 4 pm we took them over to a neighbor's private pool for a good swim
party full of laughter and fun. Our little children and grandchildren
had never experienced, "teenagers" so they were thrilled this week, and
when they got to join the teenagers in the pool, the kids were thrilled!

At 7 pm we  loaded them up for dinner out. All through the week, our
local volunteers and friends had shown up with food donations and hours
of cooking and cleaning to keep the teenagers well fed. The OKC group
had not expected this kindness, and were thrilled with the homecooking!
My grandson, Thommy age 7, was thrilled with all the soda/ice tea cans
that he accumulated during the week from the workcrew, too! He had been
saving his allowance and anything  else that he could, so he could go
with us to the Little Rock conference to hear "Dr. Ron do some good
teaching!" He'd fallen in love with Dr. Ron Moseley when he was here in
April. What he doesn't know, is that we have already paid his
reservation and he will be in tow at the  Little Rock Conference August
6-9! 
Much to our children's delight, the teenagers tucked them in the church
van and took them on our final evening meal trip out of town to our
favorite restaurant. Each of the 4 children (under 9) had latched on to
their particular teenager, and wasn't letting go anyway! 
When we arrived at the restaurant we had warned the group that this
place believes in homecooking and LOTS of it! The steak hangs over the
edge of the plate, another plate is your REAL mashed potatoes and gravy,
or homecut french fries, and still another plate is your one homemade
bread roll! At the end of the meal, the waitress shows up with styrofoam
meal boxes so you can take your left overs home to feed on for the next
2 days! When the plates began to roll out, Clayton--the youth
assistant--let out a whopeee! and ran for the video  camera. He
proceeded to video tape the  entire  table, and interview each of the 25
of us about our plate in front of us while he climbed on top of the
benches around us to scan it from over our heads! If that wasn't enough,
he then proceeded to interview the other patrons of the restaurant and
finally wanted to know where he could get a franchise!
After much feasting and fellowship, we loaded them up and went back to
our evening home for fellowship. We all gathered in the dining room
where we shared havdalah. There wasn't a dry eye in the place as we
listened to "UNTIL I SEE YOU, LORD" sung on the tape deck, and lit our
individual candles from the main candle. We talked of HIM  and of the
work that HE was doing in each one of them until early morning, and even
as they were leaving Thursday morning they were still asking questions,
and writing down titles of books! One of the boys said, "I feel so
cheated not to have known about all this! I have so much to learn!" I
replied, "Yes, you do. But we left a paper trail where you can follow.
That's more than we had when we started out many years ago!" 

Now the rabbi is here, and our local group has had its first sabbath
together. Much work is left on the house, and we still ask for your
prayers. We need an Orkin man or someone who knows one, to come and help
us treat the house, and the two hollow trees in the yard that are there
feeding them. We also need someone with a boom truck to come and cut
down those trees that hang dangerously over the house that was donated.
And we need a job for the rabbi locally. That HE provided all the funds
for the move, the funds for the remodeling so far, and the workers,
surely HE will be faithful to provide the rest. Will you pray?

Father, right now, we ask each member of this newsgroup to join together
in the unity of prayer. We ask them to reach out to their prayer
partners and friends in agreement, to give YOU the praise and the glory
for the work that YOU are doing. Without YOU in this work, nothing is
possible! You ARE providing for our needs, and we thank you! We give you
all the praise and the glory for this  work within us, and that we may
all experience this work in our own lives each day. Speak to our hearts,
Lord, what you would have each of us do for YOUR  KINGDOM. Let us bring
our hearts faithfully each day to your knee, and listen to what each of
us is to do. Thank you, Lord, for the workers and volunteers that have
come to assist us both here, and around the world. Please bless those
that have made financial contributions, as well as those that made
prayer contributions. Each was given in obedience to YOU, and we give
you the praise. It is a good work, and worthy are the servants!
And everyone spoke Hebrew and said, "AMEN"!
There is much sheet rock to hang, and finish. There will be much
fellowshiping, and bonding with  our families, and with our rabbi's
family. Thank you for your part in this work.

Shalom, 

Cheryle Holeman
HaY'Did (The Friend) Learning Center
PO Box 804
Independence, KS 67301
http://www.haydid.org

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