Florida Baptist mission teams share the Light in darkness of Eastern Cuba

Florida Baptist mission teams share the Light in darkness of Eastern Cuba
Oct 7, 2014
By MARGARET DEMPSEY-COLSON
Florida Baptist Convention

SANTIAGO, Cuba (FLBaptist)—It was mid-afternoon in mid-July when the
lights went out in Eastern Cuba and stayed out for about five hours,
even as the sun set.

With skies growing darker, the Cubans were undaunted by the power
outage. They had been waiting so long for this week when Florida
Baptists would come their way. They walked to church for the evening
evangelistic service.

Gathering in the church, Floridian Dana Hardee used a cell-phone
flashlight to read the Scripture and preach to the nearly 80 Cubans present.

Then the "Light of the World" illuminated the Eastern Cuba darkness.

"There were decisions made that night by flashlight as the Holy Spirit
worked in all of our lives," said team leader Hardee from Idlewild
Baptist Church in Lutz.

Idlewild's team of nine, including seven men and two women, was the
first to minister and witness in Eastern Cuba on behalf of Florida Baptists.

With a partnership between Florida Baptists and the Western Cuba Baptist
Convention firmly established since 1997, a new partnership between
Florida Baptists and the Eastern Cuba Baptist Convention was launched in
2013, with the first teams going in this year.

"The fact that we can now send in mission teams to Eastern Cuba to
assist our brothers and sisters is an answer to prayer—both their
prayers and our prayers," said Craig Culbreth, Florida Baptists' lead
strategist for missional support.

The team was based in Santiago, Cuba's second-largest city and home base
for the Eastern Cuba Baptist Convention, and traveled each day to the
town of El Cristo, about 20 miles one-way. There, team members helped
with church construction projects, vacation Bible school, neighborhood
houses of prayer and evening evangelistic services.

The 14-hour days were long but rewarding for the volunteers, who had to
be prepared to keep going in sometimes unpredictable circumstances,
including the power outage.

While there, Florida Baptists discovered a youngster in the community
who had been injured in a car accident and could not attend Bible
school. Because she was unable to go to the meeting, they took Bible
school to her, going into her home to teach her biblical truths.

"On my first trip to Cuba in 2011, I fell in love with the people," said
Hardee, who has been on mission to Cuba 12 times since 2001 and "is
working hard" to improve his Spanish.

"The people of Cuba have great hearts for Christ all over the island.
Their love for biblical truth is contagious. The Holy Spirit is at work
all over the world, but Cuba is seeing revival in many areas," he said.

Three days after the Idlewild group touched down in Eastern Cuba, 11
individuals from Fruit Cove Baptist Church in suburban Jacksonville,
landed in Guantanamo, the first Florida Baptist team to minister in that
province of Eastern Cuba.

Dividing into five teams, the Florida Baptist missions volunteers
invested their time and energy in eight Baptist churches, including six
home churches.

In each church, team members were able "to give our testimonies, talk
about God's will and give them encouragement to keep fighting for
Christ," according to team leader Gary Wilder. He described the Cuban
Christians as "a loving people with a heart for God."

One church in particular, he said, "had been praying for 10 years that
someone from the United States would come and help them. We were the
first team to come in. We have given them some hope where they had
little to none," he said.

While there, the team of 11 also assisted with church construction.

"By working with them to prepare a building where the people can come to
hear God's Word and by going and witnessing in the other local churches,
we can start reaching more people for Christ," said Wilder.

These two mission teams are just the beginning of Florida Baptists'
relationship with the Eastern Cuba Baptist Convention, according to John
Holloway, Florida Baptists' partnership missions strategist.

Four teams will go to Eastern Cuba in 2014; six teams are slated for
2015, he said.

"We go in obedience to the Great Commission of Jesus. God is at work in
Cuba," Holloway explained. "Cuba gives us proximity, purpose and
priority just 90 miles from our shore."

"It is a blessing to see, feel and experience this movement of God up
close and personal," he said.

With his feet back firmly on Florida soil now, Wilder looks forward to
his next trip to Cuba, saying, "Our intent, of course, was to go in and
spread God's Word, help the people and try to be a blessing to them.

"But, as it happens so very often, we end up with a bigger blessing."

Source: Florida Baptist mission teams share the Light in darkness of
Eastern Cuba - Florida Baptist Witness -
http://www.gofbw.com/news.asp?ID=16359