I don’t want to talk politics…. I am in fear of putting people in danger so many times there are pictures I cannot show or there will be blurred faces. But the Cuban people feel like the world has forgotten them… let me share with you their stories so you can see that God knows right where they are and He is seeking them out!
We were at a small church one Sunday in Cuba. The amazing, fast-moving, jubilant Cuban music started and an older lady at the front started dancing. She never stopped dancing, clapping for as long as the music continued in the sweltering church. For over 2 hours, there was joy in her face and she moved and danced all over the church in her special, private kind of worship.
After the church service ended I went up to her- I couldn’t wait to hug her! I looked into her twinkling eyes and I asked her name… She told me and we grinned at each other. I said, “I love your dancing! I love your joy!”
“Yo bailé hasta los pies de Cristo,” She said in that clipped, speedy way the Cubans have of speaking Spanish. ("I danced all the way to the feet of Jesus!")
“Cuénteme!” I smiled, “Tell me!”
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| Here she is with a young man she has brought with her to Jesus |
“It was 1998,” She told me, “I was on my way to a dance. In Cuba we celebrate the Fiesta de Santa Bárbara on Dec 3rd. I knew there would be music and dancing and lots and lots of rum. My husband had left me several years before. I had supported my children on my own. I had no man and no joy and no life. My elderly mother liked to see me happy and pretty and I was all dressed up and I knew I looked goooood!” her blue eyes twinkled. “I went by my mother’s so she could see me and I smiled big and danced her through the living room so she would see how happy I was. The only times she ever saw me smile was when I was on my way to a dance- excited about meeting the men, drinking the rum and dancing the night away. I tucked a blanket around her legs and said goodnight and I left. I remember hearing the music from the street party and dancing toward it. I got to this small intersection up here and I clearly remember turning right, towards the dance. But the next thing I knew I was sitting on the front bench of this very church. I don’t know how I got here but the people told me later I danced all the way down the aisle as they were singing hymns! Bet they didn’t know what to do with me! “ She winked.
“A man stood up at the front and began to talk about a someone called Jesus. I couldn’t sit still! I jumped up and said “ Who needs a man? They all leave!”
The man at the front answered, “He says He will never leave you nor forsake you!’
“Yeah, but he’s probably a liar!” I yelled.
The man answered “He is not a man that he should lie!"
“What can he give me?’ I asked,
“Hope," The man, answered, "Abundant life, and best of all- eternal life with Him."
"If you can get me some hope, a real life, I want some of that!" I yelled out.The man (the pastor of the church, I later learned) laughed and said "Get on up here!"
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| Counseling at one of the campaigns |
I ran to the front and knelt down and prayed to accept Jesus. I have been walking with Him, singing with Him and dancing for Him since that very moment. My life is full of joy, and hope. That very night my mother accepted Him also when I went home and told her- she died soon after that. Jesus let me dance all the way to this place and to His feet and I will never stop thanking Him!”
I wish I could convey the joy in her step, the twinkle in her eye and the hope in her heart. “Hope is not something my people have a lot of," She said, “But Jesus knows no borders- when no one else could or would come, He took me by the hand and danced me all the way to Him.”
And they dance together still.
