After a 3:00 AM start, long lines at Jet Blue Cuba in Ft Lauderdale, Florida and some very different immigration questioning entering the nation, a friend and I finally had feet on the ground in Cuba at 8:00 AM May 1st, 2019. About forty minutes later, our Cuban pastor contact came to pick us up in our rental car for the week.
Having just been in Haiti days earlier, I found Cuba to be very green, covered with trees and flowers all along the highways and very well maintained. There is a noticeable absence of traffic as the Cubans do not own cars. The highways have mostly trucks, taxi’s, touring buses, a few cars and a large number of motorcycles, the most interesting had added side cars. My personal favorite to capture on the roads and the small towns along the way were the 1940’s – 1950’s cars and trucks.
Santiago de Cuba is a city of half a million people. It is the second largest in the country, where the Castro revolution started, where the capital was at one time and where Fidel Castro is now buried. It is perceived to be the “warmest” city in Cuba because it’s in a valley. Luis, our Cuban pastor friend, is not from this city, but felt called to plant a church here after he had one convert from a personal visit many years earlier. The Lord had him move to the city which was not possible at the time because Castro would not allow the sale of your personal home in order to move to another location. But, as Luis repeated a lot, God provides.
It is very different being in a nation in which the government owns most everything: the water, most buildings which include the stores and hotels, the hospitals, the trucks on the highway, the electrical power generating plants, the farms and fields, etc. Almost every job is directed by or run by the government and the average worker makes $20.00 – $25.00 per month. A doctor could make as much as $60.00 per month. Luis shared with us that the Cuban government provides five pounds of rice, five pounds of sugar and oil to each family, nothing more in the way of food. He said for the average Cuban family this amount lasts for about two weeks.
Friday evening, we had a worship service at Luis’ building. (Luis’ home and church building are physically connected as are all of the “underground” churches.) The building would hold 125-150 somewhat comfortably, but we must have had well over 175 persons. The buildings in the city do not allow for air to flow through them and with the humidity and the number of bodies present, I’m guessing it was in the high 90’s. Our pants and our shirts were soaked through with sweat. But the worship was awesome and Luis allowed me to share the word that night.
Luis asked me to give an alter call and I am guessing around dozen plus people came forward to give their lives to Jesus. And then it was like someone threw a match on a pile of gasoline-soaked rags. The place exploded with dancing, prayer, deliverance and fiery worship. We came back to our room around midnight exhausted, but a bit dumbfounded at the revival and presence of God in this place.
The same thing happened the next night and the next. Cuba is experiencing revival like nothing I have ever experienced in my 48 years of being a Christian. Young and the old are coming to Jesus and it was thrilling to experience. Every church we visited has a building plan or a church planting plan because of the exponential growth taking place. I felt privileged to not only see it, but experience it first-hand.
Have you been on a mission trip lately? It will totally and radically change your life!
The glue that holds all this together? Prayer. Learn to pray together. There is no better way to communicate, resolve issues, gain wisdom or “cast your care” than to pray together. You will find the intimacy you have only dreamed of if you’ll pray together. You will discover answers to lifelong problems, to long-term financial disagreements, to present frustrations and to future visions and goals. Prayer is intimacy of the highest degree in marriage as together we reveal our hearts’ desires to God and to one another.
If you have been through a divorce, you know first-hand the devastation and loss that travels with the experience. There all always more damages than one can possibly be prepared for. Often, a divorce has been forced against someone’s own personal will, while the state laws favor the breakup of the marriage and leave them no choice or alternative but a divorce.
However, before this chapter ends, God tells Jeremiah on several occasions to go and share these words of affirmation, “Return, faithless Israel, declares the Lord, I will frown on you no longer for I am merciful…for I am your husband…for I will cure your backsliding.” He, in his faithfulness, takes an unfaithful people back. He just can’t stop showing His mercy, His kindness and His forgiveness. That is the heart of the God we serve. Even though He experiences unfaithfulness, He remained faithful to Israel.
Many years ago, after a particularly difficult trial I was put through at the hands of another leader who was lying and misrepresenting his position for personal gain, I left that particular meeting pretty downcast and confused. I knew he was not telling the truth, as did my wife, but there was really no defense to be made. It was one of those times in your life that you know you were just going to have to deal with the personal pain and loss. As well, we worked closely with this person and that fact did not help the matter.
Are you walking through a trial right now? Are you facing a hardship or a broken relationship? Have you been hurt or suffered loss in some way not provoked by your own behavior? It is this time of the year that we remember the New Testament guarantee of resurrection life. For after every death you die, there is a promised resurrection!
The Old Testament man of God called Nehemiah was a king’s cupbearer turned leader of Israel.
Nehemiah’s Initial response challenges me, “When I heard these things, I sat down and I wept. For some days I mourned and fasted and prayed before the God of heaven.” (Nehemiah 1:4). Am I hearing God’s commands for me in the midst of my day? Am I willing to step out and obey? Am I willing to do something that others see as radical?
I’m not sure if you recognized it, but my title for this blog is actually a verse in the Bible. It’s found in Song of Songs. I find this verse to be fascinating. I know scientifically that while I sleep, my mind is awake, but according to this verse my heart can be also.
He showed up one day at my high school. A couple of my friends and I began to pepper him with questions. “Where are you from? What’s your name? Why did your family move here?”
Snowy bowed his knee to Jesus and a brand-new relationship began between us. He allowed me to disciple him and then the request came to water baptize him. His pastor told me the tradition in their church was to baptize two times backward and one time forward and then he said, “Are you okay with that?” I told him if I had the honor to baptize my friend in his church’s baptismal pool, I would do it standing on my head.
Along with the Patriot Guard, I have had the privilege and honor of serving Snowy and his family by ministering at his full military memorial service. It was a final opportunity to bless this man who came from Alaska just to be my forever close friend. Thank you, Snowy, for the laughs, the rides to the beach in your amazingly fast Mustang, hanging out at your garage, the many spiritual discussions and our many, but not enough, breakfast meetings.
In a vision the Old Testament prophet, Isaiah, has (Isaiah 6:8), God asks who He should send as a prophet to His people. Isaiah immediately responds in two sentences and five total words, “Here am I. Send me!” Have you ever said, “Here am I, send me” to God or have you hesitated, knowing He just might take you up on it? When I was a parent of younger children and asked who was available for a job, my kids would tend to make themselves scarce quickly. That reaction to a voice of authority is not uncommon.
My wife cries. My eyes sweat. There is a difference!
Steve Prokopchak 