Bringing Relief and Gospel Hope to Cuba

The Contreras, the Cambra, the Ruiz and the Vinetas gathering for a special Sunday dinner.

An update from Carlos Contreras, lead pastor of Sovereign Grace Church, Ciudad Juárez, Mexico and our key leader for Mexico...

For the past 5 years God has opened the door for us to serve 3 churches in the Habana province in Cuba. We first met these pastors as we were exploring the possibility of planting a church there. However, it quickly became evident that planting a church was not a viable plan, but God had instead been preparing the hearts of 3 local pastors who were eager to relate to Sovereign Grace Churches.

The three pastors of these churches are Eddy Cambra, pastor of Iglesia Biblica de la Gracia, Pablo Ruiz, pastor of Iglesia Biblica de Jesucristo (both in the area of Boyeros), and Juan Viñeta, pastor of Iglesia Biblica Emanuel in the area of Arroyo Naranjo. These churches share our values and are growing in understanding and applying them as well as our historical formative virtues. We are aware that because of so many limitations, it may take many years for these churches to “officially” join Sovereign Grace, but we are already joined in heart by our mutual love and respect for each other.

Preaching at Juan’s church.

After a couple of visits, I invited Joselo Mercado and Josué Rodriguez to join me for a time of teaching and fellowship in Cuba. The church they serve, Gracia Soberana de Gaithersburg has partnered with our church to help support and encourage these pastors, their families, and churches. Our joint plan is for us to visit Cuba twice each year to continue equipping and encouraging these pastors and their churches, as well as to bring them much needed relief in their incredibly difficult life conditions due to the severe depressed economy that the country is experiencing.

To help you understand their conditions let me illustrate it like this. What seems trivial to us like procuring supplies and food by going to the supermarket or the pharmacy and spending maybe 1 or 2 hours a week, is an ever-time-consuming effort of survival for them. Procuring a loaf of bread may take you 4 hours, markets might only have 2 or 3 farm items, and they only get a couple of pounds of chicken and rice a month from government stores. There is no milk, there are no basic medicines like analgesics or antibiotics or basic items like batteries for a glucose meter. So even if you have money, there isn’t much you can buy. And yet there is joy and gratitude in their hearts because of God’s grace in their lives.

Carlos and his wife, Kena in front of the house where the second floor apartment is rented for fellowship and teaching.

This past June I had the joy of being able to take my wife with me to encourage the wives of these men also. For the past 3 years we have been meeting together in a rented apartment that has a large living room area as well as a well-equipped kitchen. There we enjoy extended times of fellowship and teaching as well as wonderful times of sharing meals and laughs. Because the government of Cuba has greatly relaxed their customs limitations, we were able to pack our luggage with large amounts of books, medicine, scarce materials, and much needed supplies that they can use for their own families but also to distribute among the members of their churches as needed.

Mirelcy (Pablo’s wife), Mercedes (Eddy’s wife), Ana (Juan’s wife) and Kena (Carlos’ wife).

My wife was very happy to fulfill specific requests from the ladies that we had not been able to do in the past. A sad note on this last visit was that they shared that there had been a little more supply available, but it was because thousands of people have left the country in these last couple of months, seeking a better life somewhere else.

These visits are only possible because of the generous financial support of our family of churches. Thank you because this allows us to not just serve these men and their churches, but also to bring some relief and hope to them. I share some pictures so that you may connect some faces to this report and ask you to please pray for these men, their families and their churches.

A joint Sunday morning gathering of the three churches.