When I posted the letter from the church in Smyrna I was almost 100% sure it was accurate. I did not receive it from a blog post but rather in email form from a friend with direct ties to Turkey. I was disturbed when I began to hear rumors that the letter was inaccurate. Turns out the letter was not entirely inaccurate rather it was over-blown. I want to thank Tonia who sent me this information via Tulip Girl. Here is the update:

A preface from Turkish World Outreach:

We received a few emails saying some elements in “A letter to the Global Church from the Protestant Church of Smyrna” were exaggerated. However, since none of the messages stated what was thought to be exaggerated, we did not send a retraction. Instead, we contacted the pastor and his wife who prepared the message and shared the negative email messages we had received. The spouses of the men who were slain reportedly say they want people around the world to know what took place, and the real objections appear to be from foreign workers who understandably feel threatened by unwanted exposure to their mission
work. In addition, some people felt the graphic details of the torture the men experienced (though apparently factual) should be omitted. The following corrections were sent by Pastor Bocek and his wife, and we have made these corrections in the attached text. Thank you for your prayers.

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Dear Friends,

We are amazed at how quickly the Global Church communicated the message of our friends’ deaths. Thank you for your continued prayers for Semsa, Susanne and the Church in Turkey.

We need to make a couple of corrections on the letter we sent out.

First, if you forward the letter again, due to sensitivity issues please take all the details of the torture off, replacing it with “They were brutally tortured for 3 hours” and ask your friends who you have forwarded the previous email to do the same. Also, later in the article where it says their throats were slit “from ear to ear, practically decapitated” we are not sure of the actual size of the cuts, so please delete those words from the letter as well. We won’t know actual details until autopsy reports are made public; news reports and articles we were basing our information on were possibly exaggerated.

Second, my faulty estimating mistake put the word “thousands” when in fact there were only about 800 people at Necati’s funeral.

Third, I made mistakes in names. Susanne Geske (not Susanne Tilman),
and Tilmann not Tilman.

If you can make those changes, and pass on the information I’d appreciate it.

As a wonderful follow-up, we know for a fact that three people in the last week have committed their hearts to Christ in response to the sufferings our friends went through: John 12: 24-25 I tell you the
truth, unless a kernal of wheat falls to the ground and dies it remains only a single seed. But if it dies it produces many seeds. The man who loves His life will lose it, while the man who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life.

Blessings,
Darlene Bocek

for The Protestant Church of Smyrna

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