December 26, 2025 Show with Jatniel Pérez on “Bringing the Gospel of God’s Sovereign Grace to Cuba”
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Live from historic downtown Carlisle, Pennsylvania, home of founding father James Wilson, 19th century hymn writer
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It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next two hours, and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions.
And now, here's your host, Chris Arnzen. Good afternoon,
Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, and the rest of humanity living on the planet Earth who are listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com.
This is Chris Arnzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Friday on this 26th day of December 2025.
I hope that you all had a wonderful and refreshing and joyful and safe and meaningful and Christ -centered
Christmas, and I want to give a special word of thanks to Katie and Corey Mowry, the daughter and son -in -law of my longtime friend
Susan, who led me to Christ in the 1980s. I want to thank them for inviting me over to spend
Christmas with them, and it was a pleasure to be in their company.
And today, I am thrilled to have a first -time guest that I've been wanting to interview for quite some time, and I'm sure that we will all be fascinated by his story and his in Cuba.
I'm speaking of Jotny L. Perez, who is director of William Carey Seminary in Cuba.
He is also the national coordinator of the Association of Reformed Baptist Churches of Cuba, also known as Berean Mission, and a church planter with over 19 years of experience in pastoral ministry and a missionary sent out by Trinity Reformed Baptist Church of Kirkland, Washington.
Today, we're going to be addressing bringing the gospel of God's sovereign grace to Cuba, victories, and challenges, and it's my honor and privilege to welcome you for the very first time ever to Iron Trip and Zion Radio, Jotny L.
Perez. Thank you a lot. It's a big privilege for me to be with you, and thank you for the invitation.
Well, first of all, tell us about William Carey Seminary in Cuba. Well, for many years, my dad tried to start a seminary since 1997 when he first met
Davis Traub and Jim Allen. He tried to start the seminary since that time, 1997.
So then after that, the government closed it, and in 2006, we started again to recover the seminary, and we just started with that, made some connections with William Carey in Argentina, some masters, and then with Carey in Canada, Bob Penhero, Tim Beavis, and then from there, we just started.
And we started contacting pastors, and people were trying to come to study with us because of the
Reformed theology, and up to today, we have around, I don't know, like 300 students all over the island.
Wow. That's something. I was not expecting that amazing description in detail about how many students you have.
And also, please tell us about the Association of Reformed Baptist Churches of Cuba.
The same in 1997. My dad, he was, you know, he had to leave
Los Pinos Nuevos Convention where he was a pastor since 1980s, and then he just started planting the
Reformed Baptist Association. He met in Jamaica, Davis Traub, and then he met
Jim Allen, and they just, you know, started training my dad and helping him to start that in Cuba.
So in 1997, he got in a region as soon as he started just planting churches, and some pastors came to join him in that effort, and he just started all of that.
And since that period, you know, the Cuba government has been trying to stop the association in 1999 with the effort of many of the
American churches. My dad had like 15 churches with 15 different pastors, and the government confiscated 14 houses, and the government put all the pastors outside of the buildings of the church.
And then, you know, it was reduced to just only three churches.
And then from there, we started all over again planting churches, and God has been opening more doors.
And up to today, we are 12 churches and like three planting church plants that we're just working on.
So that's just God's grace. Amen. And by the way, is the
Jim Adams that you're referring to, is he the same James Adams who wrote a really phenomenal tract, a booklet called
Decisional Regeneration? Do you know if it's the same? Yes. Yes.
Yes, James Adams from Arizona, Mesa, Arizona. And I have met him at at least one conference, and I also had the privilege of meeting and hearing the late
David Straub preach, and he had a fascinating story to tell.
I don't know if you heard about this yourself, but when he was bringing thousands of dollars, really smuggling it to Romania, he was warned that the corrupt police would stop buses and other vehicles at checkpoints, and they would get onto the bus and question people that looked suspicious to them, and if they had money, they would steal it.
And so David was very nervous about being questioned and searched with all this money he had under his coat.
And a man that was sitting next to him started to erupt in an uncontrollable coughing fit, and it distracted the police on the bus, and they just ignored
David. And David said that he always wondered if that was actually an angel sent from God.
He obviously didn't know that for a fact, but it was quite a fascinating story.
And what a wonderful brother in Christ he was. Such a gentle, humble man, and very bold in his proclamation of the gospel, albeit his humble and gracious nature.
But, well, I am really looking forward to this discussion today.
I also want to thank the brethren at Trinity Reformed Baptist Church of Kirkland, Washington, for being the primary church that has sent you out as a missionary.
And, by the way, folks, if anybody wants to find out how you can financially support the mission work of my guest, you can go to the website of Trinity Reformed Baptist Church of Kirkland, Washington, which is trbcwa .org.
Well, we have a tradition here, Jotniel. By the way, is that the first name of yours?
Because you are the very first person I've ever heard of with that name. Is that a common
Spanish name, Cuban name, or is it rare? Because I've never heard of it before.
Well, in many of the countries, like in Latin America, South America, Spain, those countries, they always try to name the people after, or the
Roman Catholic, you know, like the year, day by day, they have saints in every day.
And then for the Christians, they try to find the name on the Bible. So my name is,
I think it's 1 Chronicles 26. It's one of the Psalms there, so my name comes from the
Bible. Oh, great. Praise God. Well, as I was saying, we have a tradition here.
Whenever we have a first -time guest, we have that guest give a summary of their salvation testimony, including the kind of religious atmosphere, if any, in which they were raised.
And you already hinted that your father was a friend of David Straub, so I'm assuming you were raised in a
Reformed Baptist home. Maybe you could even tell us about his own upbringing and how he came to Christ.
But please tell us a summary of your story. Well, I grew up in a
Christian family. When I was born, my dad was a little bit like a broad evangelical fundamentalist denomination.
So I grew up a little bit there, where all the kids of all the pastors, you know, they are saved and they are like small angels.
You mean in their mind, they viewed them as all saved. So they just, you know,
I grew up like thinking that I was a believer because I was born in a Christian family. So then later, when
I started to grow up, when first I met David Straub and James Taubin, they started to put something in my head, like, are you really, are you a
Christian just because of being born in a Christian family? So those words, like, came into my heart really, really strong.
And I started to think about that. And, you know, then I started to realize that, you know, to be safe is not just because of being born in a
Christian family, but because of believing in Christ. One night, James Taubin was preaching and he was talking about that.
And then that came to my head, you know, that start questioning a lot.
But after that, I got into a corner with him and he was starting to explain it to me, like everything about salvation, all of that.
And I cannot tell you on a specific date, but if that could be the time, it was through the preaching of James Taubin that I started to get to know the purpose of my life and to believe in Christ.
It was more than just being born in a Christian family. So that was really good. And since then, then
I started to find comfort and rest in Christ for salvation. But that's my story.
And were you born in Cuba? Yes, I was born in Cuba, 1985,
May 29th. And tell us how your father, because you already said that you were raised in a broadly evangelical, fundamentalist
Baptist home. How did your father discover the
Reformed faith? Was it through James Adams or some of the sources that he initially discovered and embraced
Reformed theology? So my dad studied at Los Pinos Seminary, and in 1988, he went to Jamaica to study a master's degree.
So when he was in Jamaica, some of the teachers that came down there to teach, they were referring to books that they were
Calvinistic and Reformed. So whenever my dad had to start studying them and reading them, he started to see that the theology that he knew was not the same that he started to learn now in Jamaica.
So then, you know, he started to write letters to the publishers of those books, and one of them, it was
Banner of Truth. And the one who received the letters, it was from Carl Ioffe.
Eshelman was the one who started receiving all the letters. And that was amazing. Yes. So it was through Eshelman.
Eshelman passed the letters of my dad to David Straub, and then they started to meet by letters.
And then after that, they put in connection my dad and closer in Jamaica, who was a missionary in Jamaica.
So that has been the way how my dad came to the Reformed theology. And then that was a big, big change for my dad.
And when he returned back to Cuba, he started to preach all of that, and he couldn't just close the mouth and don't speak it.
And that brought many problems for him. And then that's why he had in 1997 to leave the denomination and just go to plant a
Reformed Baptist church and association. But that has been the story.
By the way, folks, since I mentioned this earlier, I thought I'd let you know if you'd like to get an excellent tract by the aforementioned
Jim Adams, also known as James E. Adams, you can go to the website of Chapel Library, and that is chapellibrary .org,
chapellibrary .org. If you type in the search engine, decisional regeneration, that will come up.
And also, the church where Jim Adams is serving as an elder, you can go to seastonemesa .org,
seastonemesa .org, and that is Cornerstone Church of Mesa, Arizona.
So I hope you will be blessed by exploring both of those websites.
Well, it is somewhat surprising, knowing the brutal anti -Christian communist past of Cuba, more correctly pronounced
Cuba, I guess. And of course, it is still a communist country.
How is it that you are able to have such an open and public ministry there, including being director of an established seminary,
William Carey Seminary in Cuba, without being shut down, without being persecuted?
It's actually quite amazing. Well, that's a funny story.
Well, yes, it's persecuted, and we face all the time a lot of police questioning, and we receive a lot of those.
So the big thing about Cuba is that, yes, we continue under all of that oppression.
People are suffering. The government just go and close places, and they come and try to stop us.
Why we continue doing all of that? Well, it's because, and I will be really careful how to say this without sounding really bad, but I learned from my dad.
He's still in Cuba. So my dad and my mom, they're in Cuba. I'm here in the States. I had to flee Cuba because they were going to try to get our kids out of us.
So we had to get out of Cuba, and I'm just going back and forth. But it's really, you know, they're threatening me a lot, but I just continue doing everything that we can, because I always say this to my friends.
If somebody needs to die, well, I will be open to do it for Christ. So I'm just open to continue doing all of this until God let me do it.
And I just want to continue doing this. I think that God placed me in Cuba to do it, and I have been following the example of my grandfather who died just doing the same thing.
My dad is there in Cuba. He's a pastor there. He continues preaching the gospel, and I will just continue to do the same.
So, yes, it's a communist country. It continues being like that. It goes against the churches and tries to stop the gospel in Cuba, but we just need to continue being brave and just preaching the gospel until God let us do it.
Just out of curiosity, why is it that you were bold enough to come on my show using your real name?
I've interviewed missionaries in dangerous countries, and they typically have insisted that I use an alias or a fake name, but you have made no such request.
Just out of curiosity, why? Well, my name is known by the
Cuban government, and they know everything that I do and everywhere that I speak. My dad and I have been in many places, in human rights organizations, and everywhere.
I have been interviewed when I was in Cuba by many organizations here in the
States and all of that, so I'm not going to hide. If they just want to stop me, they know where I am and everything that we do.
And again, if I need to go to jail or whatever, I'm open to do it. Now, other than the grace and good providence of our sovereign
God, why is it that it seems that they are threatening your father and you, but they haven't done anything more than threats to this point?
I don't know. It's just God's grace, but because of the big influence in other countries.
So, like, in July the 11th, 2021, we had two pastors from our association that they were in jail, and I don't know, so God just opened the door, and, like, 19 countries wrote letters to the
Cuban embassies in those countries, and they started to see that, you know, those letters will say, free the pastors and don't touch
Javier Perez. So, that has been something really good. So, I'm just using my name and that's all, and if they don't let me come in,
God will open more doors and the gospel will never be stopped. Hallelujah.
Now, how frequently do you go back and forth to and from the
United States and to Cuba and back? Well, the same stories that you were saying about David Straub and, you know, bringing the money with him and all of that, in Cuba it's the same.
The only way to bring money in is hand -delivered, so you need to bring everything with you.
So, I need to come every month. I need to bring the support for the pastors. We need to bring all the money for the seminary.
We need to bring everything down to Cuba hand -delivered. There is no other way how to do it. So, I'm coming every month down to Cuba to continue the work.
Wow, every month. Wow. And you mentioned,
I believe, and listen, my poor memory is not working correctly, but you mentioned 300 students at the seminary.
How are they hearing about this seminary? Well, what we do is we bring the pastors into Havana, so we don't have, you know, because of all the pressure and all that, we can only have a certain amount of students.
So, we have like pastors who come to our seminary in Havana from like 40 pastors.
So, then they come to Havana, they get the courses, and then we bring those courses, and they bring with them all the materials to the local churches, and then at their local churches, then they have the other students.
So, we train men, and then they go and they train others. So, in that way, we can have this platform where we train some, and then they continue the training to others.
Tell us something about Cuba itself. Is it less oppressive or equally as oppressive as it was under the leadership of the late
Fidel Castro? And I know that his brother rose to power for a while.
I don't know if he still is the dictator of Cuba. Perhaps you could give us updates on that.
But how, if at all, has the climate of religious freedom changed over there?
Well, I always use a joke with this. I always say the problem is that what they try to do is, you know, to try to bring people into Cuba so they can see how beautiful Cuba is and how good communism is, and then they can bring that good communism here into the
States. So, I always tell everybody, whenever you come to Cuba and you see everything that we're doing and all of that, always know that behind all of that, there's persecution, there's suffering, there's everything.
Don't try to come down to the States and bring how beautiful Cuba is. Yeah, and I'm assuming that you are perhaps bewildered.
I don't know if you are as frustrated as other Americans are who have witnessed the rise in popularity of socialism, even communism here, perhaps especially with young people.
It is mystifying how ignorant these people must be about the track record of socialism and communism in other parts of the world.
It has never succeeded wherever it has existed and thrived.
And the people there have never, in any of these socialistic or communistic countries, have never flourished nearly as much as people in free societies like the
United States. Tell us about that. When you witness things in American television and other media of this rise of appreciation, admiration of socialism and communism, so much so that New York City recently elected an openly socialist mayor.
Well, the way that I can describe that is that the
American people, they like to try things. Try it, you'll like it.
So, you know, they have the iPhone 16 Pro Max, really good.
They had paid for the phone, but then the 17 comes up and then they just want to switch to the new phone just to try, just to see the new thing.
And what happened is that with political things, I will say it's not good to try something else.
So it's better just to learn from others and to see how it has been going for others.
So that's why I always encourage people just go travel, check before you just make a decision.
But that's how I think all of that is just coming into here because the problem is that people just like to try things and they just want to see,
OK, now we have this person, he's pretty bad and I don't like it, let's try somebody else. Well, then what you get is that the other person ends up like what you have now in New York and all of that.
So that's my perception on why some people just make those kind of decisions.
Now, how did you learn how to speak English so well? Well, if I would be a
Pentecostal, I will say I have a gift of speaking Pentecostal. I don't know, it just came from God.
I went with my father to Jamaica and then I learned there for a couple of years that I was there.
And now look at my kids, how fast they have been learning English here. I can tell you that things can be in your head.
You can never use it later, but it will be inside of your head. And then whenever you start using that again, it will come up.
So that's what I think. I don't know. It's just God's grace. Amen. And so going back to how oppressed are those that live in Cuba still, how openly do people preach whatever they believe the
Bible compels them to preach? Are there puppet churches, as it were, as there have been, going back even to the rise of communism, there have been churches in different areas of the world.
And back in the days of the Soviet Union, there were puppet churches where some
Americans, perhaps especially famous ones like Billy Graham, were taken on tours of puppet churches that were really just under the thumb of the
Soviet Union. And Billy Graham really angered people who had been persecuted in the
Soviet Union and had been imprisoned in the gulags and so forth. When he came back to the
United States after a trip to the Soviet Union and declared that there was no religious persecution there.
And they were like, is he out of his mind or something? So tell us about that.
Well, in Cuba, it's like the same. Yes, the church is open to speak and to preach, and they let people to go to the streets and give away crack and all of that.
But everything is restricted. They use that in a way that whenever you don't get into political sense, then they let you do it.
For example, in my case and everything that we do,
I never try to be silent against things that is going really bad.
I will always protest and do whatever, just if they just go too close to church or something.
But the problem is that they will never do things to me they will do the things to the pastors.
So then the pastors are the ones who will call me and say, hey, please don't speak anymore.
Try just to focus on this and this and this, because they call me and they try to make me stop everything that I'm doing.
Would this be reformed with Baptist pastors? Oh yes, this is normal to everybody. Wow. Yes, so they will come to the people.
They will try to make the people to stop. We have many pastors that just because of preaching reformed theology in churches, the government just called the nominations and they get them.
And then they come to us, hey, you know, I just want to plant a church. I just want to study at your seminary.
Just for coming to study in our seminary, we have pastors that they have been ejected or, you know, like take it out of their churches just because of coming to study with us.
Because in Cuba, reformed theology, reformed theology, you know, 1689, is like a little bit prohibited because of all the stories between Spurgeon and Marx and Engels.
Well, we're going to go to our first commercial break. If anybody has a question for Jotny L. Perez about the gospel of sovereign grace in Cuba and how it is progressing and victories that have occurred there as well as challenges that continue to exist and anything else that comes to your mind, please send us an email to chrisarnson at gmail .com.
chrisarnson at gmail .com. As always, give us your first name at least, your city and state of residence, and your country of residence.
If you live outside the USA, you may feel free to remain anonymous if your subject involves a personal and private matter.
Don't go away. We'll be right back with Jotny L. Perez after these messages from our sponsors.
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The Lord bless you in the knowledge of himself. Welcome back. If you just tuned us in, my guest today is pastor, church planter, seminary director, and missionary to Cuba, Jotny L.
Perez. He is a Reformed Baptist, and we are discussing the gospel of sovereign grace in Cuba and the victories and the challenges in spreading that precious gospel in that communist country.
If you have questions, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com. Give us your first name at least, city and state, and country of residence, and we do have
Thaddeus in Carmel, or Carmel, however they pronounce it there in Indiana, Carmel, Indiana, and he says, has anyone close to your family ever been murdered by the communist government of Cuba?
No, we have not have anybody yet murdered, but what we have is because of the oppression, my niece,
Noemi, she had, I don't know how to say it, but mental issues, she couldn't continue.
She had big fears, so she started to think that always the government was persecuting her and all of that, so she had a lot of periods in her life that she didn't want to get out of the house because she thought that they were going to kill her because of all the oppression to all the family.
So the same to my uncle, David Perez, and I'm really grateful for all the, everything that my dad has been just facing, but never had been getting sick because of that.
So, but no murder, but a lot of oppression, and my niece, Noemi Perez, she had been really affected by that.
And why don't you tell us about the day -to -day life of your average resident in Cuba as far as the ability to eat what they want to eat, purchase food and clothing in any way that they choose to, just the average, ordinary, run -of -the -mill things that people in free societies take for granted.
And I just came back before doing this program to Kohl's department store.
It was easy to find everything that I wanted to buy and that kind of a thing.
How different, if at all, is life in Cuba in that regard? Well, number one, the first thing is that everybody in Cuba spend, the day has 24 hours.
So they spend 25 hours a day just finding what they need to eat.
So that means like they spend the whole day in line just to try to find what they need for the house.
Then the second big problem is whenever they find it, then a lot of things are just available in U .S.
dollars. And that's American dollars are not available.
It's something that the government do not pay with that. So now a lot of things that are available in Cuba, the stores like Primera Setenta, that's a big store in Havana and all of that, you need to go there to buy with American dollars.
The gas for the cars is in American dollars. And that's something that the government do not pay people with that currency.
So whenever you spend like almost the whole day finding what you want, then again, you need to buy things with a currency that you don't have.
So it's really, really complicated. That's bizarre. I mean, how did this come about in a country that, unless I'm misreading the dictatorship of Cuba, but I've always viewed it from what
I see and hear in the media, the leaders hate this country, the
United States. I'm not saying that the citizens do or the average people. I'm not even sure if you have citizens there or subjects, but how did this come about?
Where these stores are only accepting
American money. I don't even understand that. Well, the premise that they just aim to see that in a way to have things to sell at the stores.
And then later to be able to go outside and buy again, they need to have American dollars to purchase everything in American dollars.
But that's a currency that they don't pay with. Like a salary for a medical doctor is like $20 right now per month.
Wow. $20 for a month for a medical doctor is like $15 or $20 per month for a teacher.
But just like a package of 10 pounds of chicken is like 10 or 15
American dollars. So it's like you're working the whole month to buy just a package of 10 pounds of chicken.
So that's a little bit of an idea. You already brought up the amazingly low salary of the average doctor there.
How easy or difficult is it to get medical care there, either from a local general practitioner or in a hospital?
Well, there's a lot of medical vouchers and nurse and all of that. And all of that is free.
But at the same time, there's no medicine. When you go to see a doctor, a doctor will see you.
The doctors are really good. They will check on you and do everything.
But then when they finish talking to you, they tell you, okay, what you need to have is this. Where are you going to get it, in the
U .S. or in Spain? Where are you going to get your medicine from? But then depending on that, then they will suggest to you what you can find in other countries.
So like for a person that do not have the possibility of getting that, then you can see or imagine how difficult it is for a
Cuban just to get the medicine that they need. So that's why then like the pastors or the churches, people just come to us and say, hey, my kid is sick.
Can you try to get this in the States? Because they don't have the way how to get it.
So we just need always to be bringing some cases with medicine, antibiotics or whatever just inside of Cuba because the doctors will tell you what you have, but there's no medicine.
There's zero medicine right now. How about more emergency procedures that are needed to set broken bones or cancer surgery, those kinds of things?
It is the same. Like my wife, my mother -in -law, my wife's mother, she has cancer and there's nothing that they can do there for her.
So if a person just get a bone, a break bone, they will go there. They will tell you what's the problem or the issue, and you just need to try to go everywhere or to ask somebody to get whatever is available for that.
Like my dad at one time, like six years ago, he had a surgery, prostate surgery, and everything we had to bring from the
States, like it was so good from a pastor in Dunlin Blood and Russell Johnson, a pastor in Miami.
I called them like three hours ahead and I said, my dad is pretty bad and he's going to die if we don't get for him this antibiotic and this thing.
And they found that here in the States and I came, they pay a ticket.
So I had to come to the States to get the medicine and return back to Cuba with the medicine just to save my dad's life.
So that's normal for Cubans. Everybody's always asking to somebody in the
States for help because there's no medicine, there's anything for emergency in Cuba.
Wow. Okay, we have Jasmine in Great Neck, Long Island, New York.
And Jasmine says, how does the communist government in Cuba perpetuate the lie that they have a superior system of government than countries like the
United States when things are as horrible as you have described and how they still need to receive the benefits of what
America has to offer? It makes no sense to me that anyone who lives there could possibly believe that their system of government is superior to what others enjoy in free countries.
I'm talking about the average citizens, not those in government leadership. Well, first of all, for probably like 50, 55 years, people didn't have internet.
So they didn't know how was everything outside of Cuba. So whenever they start to send
Cubans into missions to other countries, like to Venezuela, some others, then the people start to see how was life outside of Cuba.
But the other problem is that then the people in Cuba, now they have internet and some access to some things, but they don't have a way how to get out of Cuba.
So in the past, Cuba had to grant you permission. My dad was 13 years without a possibility of getting out of Cuba.
I was counseled like two years without granting the permission to get out of Cuba.
Right now, it's a little more easier for Cubans to get out of the island, but they need to pay a lot.
Tickets are really expensive and there's no way for them how to get out and sponsor outside of Cuba to travel.
So it's just a matter sometimes of they don't have any option and people are just like, they don't speak because you can go to jail or you can get in trouble just because of speaking.
And has the government made any effort to prevent the average
Cuban from even having access to the internet? Oh, yes, they do that all the time.
And they block a lot of American websites and news and everything.
But Cubans always try to find a way how to know the reality going on in the
States. But yes, they block a lot of the things. And whenever there's a protest or something, they just shut down the internet.
And blackouts in Cuba right now, there are 20 hours, 25 hours of blackouts in Cuba.
And whenever there's a blackout, the cell phone system, all the power is just, they're not working.
Is that by design or is it just because of overload of power or whatever?
It's just by design. They will close everything and they shut down electricity and the internet for people whenever there's a protest or something, they just shut down everything.
Just people don't get internet access. And I interrupted you. You were in the process of saying something, but you remember what you were saying?
Oh, yes. Sometimes I try to text my dad and my mom or some pastors.
And after 20 hours, then they send me the text, 2 o 'clock in the morning, 3 o 'clock in the morning.
Oh, here is the answer. So they get 20 hours, 18 hours, 25 hours without electricity.
Now, have you ever met people in Cuba who actually believe in the government, who are loyal to it, who believe the lies that it is a superior form of government and all that kind of a thing?
Well, yes, but those people receive benefits from the government or they are just really thankful because they have somebody in power.
I met a couple of persons that they were really, really poor, but they were so thankful to the government because their kids got to study in universities and to travel to some other places.
And they just are really thankful for that. Now, why were they given that liberty?
Are they related by blood to government officials or something? Oh, it's just because, you know, they give benefits to poor people.
So they will tell people, OK, come and just get this privileged study and then travel for us, for the government.
And then they just want to keep those privileges. So they are really being given freedom to travel to be a mouthpiece in favor of the government,
I'm assuming. Yeah. And, OK, let me see.
We have another question that I wanted to ask. We have
Jared in Toronto, Canada. And Jared says, what is the average reaction if there could be such a thing of a
Cuban when they hear the gospel preached? Do they just think that you're nuts? Or are they thrilled to hear something that is so new and different?
Yes, for them, the first thing that I always tell people is people in Cuba, they don't have hope.
You know, like prosperity gospel in Cuba did not flourish really well because, you know, when you go and you tell it to a
Cuban, tomorrow is going to be better. Next year is going to be better. They have been there for 60 something years and nothing has been better.
So they don't have any hope. So when you come and you talk about Christ, a
Christ that will give you hope, that for them is something that everybody wants to listen.
Every time we just go to the streets with tracts and with Bibles and all of that, people will come to us to ask for literature.
They will come and ask for Bibles. So Cuba is not like here that people don't want tracts.
No, in Cuba, people are really, really hungry for a tract, for a Bible, for a book.
That's something that people will walk a long, long distance to go. And I received that.
So, for example, part of our ministry that Pastor Don in Blood and many others, we do in Cuba Chapel Library, is that we print a lot of materials in Cuba.
We print books. And people will walk long distance to go to get a book, to go to receive a tract.
Whatever is printed, because in Cuba, there's no free printing press or something like that.
So people, everything that they will have is whenever you give something to them and for them, that's like really good.
So hope is something that people don't have. And, you know, one of the biggest things from God is hope.
God will give us hope in Him to believe in Him. And that's why, you know, people will want to hear about God.
They are really tired of listening to a government saying many things that they will promote many things and they fail.
They don't accomplish what they promised. Well, we have to go to our midway break right now.
And once again, if you would like to submit a question of your own to Jotniel Perez about the gospel of sovereign grace in Cuba, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com.
chrisarnsen at gmail .com. As always, give us your first name at least. City and state of residence and country of residence.
If you live outside the USA, you may remain anonymous if your question is personal and private.
Don't go away. We'll be right back with Jotniel Perez after these messages. I'm Brian McLaughlin, president of the
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Only remain anonymous if your question is personal and private. And we have, let's see here.
We have Jude in Omaha, Nebraska. And Jude asks, since it is a communist country, what is the most predominant religious belief in Cuba at this moment?
Well, the predominant one is communism. Really? More so than Roman Catholicism.
Oh yes. Really? Roman Catholicism, yes. Roman Catholicism, what they have done is they have taken syncretic beliefs.
So what they have done is to bring many saints from different, like voodoo and everybody under them.
But if you go to a church in a Roman Catholic in Cuba you will find out that evangelical churches are bigger than them.
Wow. Yes, people will go more to evangelical churches than to Roman Catholic ones.
Yes. So if you see a Roman Catholic church, they don't get a lot of persons.
But whenever there's a day for one of the saints like from voodoo or something like that, the
Roman Catholic have brought them into their churches. So people will go there because of the syncretism that they have done in Cuba, but not because of the
Roman Catholic belief. So Roman Catholicism in Cuba is not a big, big thing. Wow, that is surprising, just because it's a
Latin country. Yes. I wonder, do you know if it's the only
Latin country in the world that is not predominantly Roman Catholic when it comes to any religious belief?
Of course, communism is atheistic and has some kind of a stronghold prohibiting the unfettered belief and practice of religion.
But you would think that the religions that exist would be predominantly
Roman Catholic in a Latin country. But do you know if your country is the only
Latin country that is not predominantly Roman Catholic? I don't know for sure, but that's what is happening in Cuba.
Now you put me, like, I'm going to check that after I finish this interview here.
But I know that Cuba, because of the syncretism they put together all the
Santeria organizations under Roman Catholicism. And that's why if you check like that all the
Santeria organizations like Bodo and all the other, many of those, if you put all of them under the
Roman Catholic Church, well, yes, they will add numbers. But if you just check
Roman Catholicism and then divide them as is divided in Cuba, Roman Catholicism is not the biggest one.
And I'm wondering if you're the only country in the world where Calvinism is the predominant evangelical faith.
That seems pretty remarkable. Well, it's not like reform is not, but it's really, really popular right now, yes.
And how about the cults? Mormons, Jehovah's Witnesses, other cults that may be existing there and being a rival to the true gospel?
No, they are really small. Really? Jehovah's Witnesses probably is the largest one.
But one of the things that they have been doing in Cuba is that they have been controlling really, really careful all the religions in Cuba.
Like, for example, something that happened, I think it was now in December, they eject out of Cuba a
Roman Catholic priest because he was just ringing the bells.
It was a protest now in December or a blackout and people were just protesting and he rang the bells of the church.
And just because of that, the government called the Roman Catholic Church and eject that priest out of Cuba.
Now, what was he protesting, that priest? People were protesting because of electricity. Well, not the priest, but the people of the town were protesting for electricity and lack of food.
And the priest, just to be with them in the middle of the protest, he started ringing the bells of the church.
And because of that, they eject him. And the Roman Catholic just stayed silent. How about Islam?
What kind of presence does Islam have there? The same.
It's small. They let them to have a mass kid there in Havana, but they try to control them a lot.
So, they always control everybody. So, they don't let near religions going into Cuba.
They really attack them a lot. Now, you said earlier on in the program that sometimes pastors contact you and basically beg you to stop being so bold and honest about what you believe and what you believe the
Bible teaches. Even you get contacted from professedly
Reformed pastors. Do you have any idea of how many churches are just boldly proclaiming the truth with zeal and not allowing fear to in any way hinder or to dilute the message of the gospel there?
Many of the churches that they do that, they are churches that are legal with the government.
So, they receive benefits. They receive containers of food. They receive a lot of benefits traveling.
They receive permissions to build buildings for the church and they get a lot of benefits.
So, what they do is they want to have us. So, we will advertise like a conference and they want us to be with them.
And then as soon as they start to know, you know, hey, have Neil come, bring the pastors, have the conference.
So, then later I will receive a call from them saying, hey, no, we cannot have it.
We receive a phone call from here and there just to let us know that if we have that, we will lose this and this and this.
So, it's more about the legal churches. We are a non -recognized church in Cuba and that's why, you know, we don't care, but we receive a lot of this from legal churches in the island.
Now, this is not nearly as important a question as anything else
I've asked or my listeners have asked, but I'm dying to know what your favorite Cuban foods are. Well, it's just the
Cuban, right. I like cassava, rice and beans, and roast pork.
That's a Cuban meal. And I have many fond memories of dining with my late wife in Manhattan at a place called
Victor's Cuban Cafe, which I think still exists, and I really loved their
Cuban cuisine. I've never been to Cuba, so I don't know how accurate it was or faithful to the true recipes of Cuba, but what you just mentioned, actually, seems to be things that exist in other
Hispanic cultures. Is there anything unique to Cuba that you can't find anywhere else?
No, it's almost we share a lot with other countries, but Cuba before 1959, so 1959 marks the time for Cuba.
So before 1959 and after 1959, 1959 was the year that the revolution started in Cuba, Fidel Conqueror and all of that, so many of the things disappeared after 1959.
We always speak like that. A lot of changes in Cuba was after that, that a lot of persons came to Miami and they brought with them a lot of recipes and ways how to cook and all of that.
So we share a lot with other countries. For us, something really funny, and we always have fun with that, like the tortilla for us in Cuba is an omelette, and tortilla for the
Mexican people is that corn thing. So if you go to Cuba and you ask for a tortilla, they will bring you an omelette.
They will not bring you the Mexican tortilla. So, but for a
Cuban, it's a big, big thing to have rice and beans, roast pork and like a salad.
By the way, we're just trying to help right now because how bad is Cuba? We're just helping right now.
Like in Cuba, always at the end of the year, people gather together, families or churches and always have a meal to give thanks to God.
And that's what they do. For probably the last two or three years, because of the really bad, bad, bad situation, people here are donating some funds for us to help some churches to have that kind of meal where they can remember, number one, to be a
Cuban and number one, to give thanks to God for giving another year their proclaiming
God's grace in that island. Hallelujah. We have
Jamie in Texarkana, Texas. How close are you to that area of Texas as far as your
Texas home? I don't know. I'm in Dallas. I don't know. I'm still in Dallas.
Okay. Jamie says, please forgive me if I missed your answer to this, but I was interrupted listening momentarily and I've rejoined the program.
You said earlier that you were threatened by the communist government of Cuba, but what do they threaten you with?
Well, my wife and I would have been like in three or four car accidents.
They had been trying to kill us in car accidents. Wow. So these were orchestrated car accidents?
Yes. Really? How do you know that? Well, because of how they treat the person who were chasing us and trying to take us out of the road.
So that's one. We know how they operate. So it has been by car accidents.
Another one, it has been, they were trying to get our kids out of us.
So because of our belief that we're not communist, because of that, they have been trying to get our kids out of us.
And that was the final part, to try to get our kids to stay downstairs in the school in Cuba.
That is for those special cases. So they just make your kids go to that school because they will say they have a bad behavior and then they will take them out of you.
So we had to get out of Cuba. But yes, they have been threatening us, my dad, everybody, in many ways.
Bringing us to the police. If you check on my Facebook, there's a lot of, every time they were calling me to the police station,
I had more than 20 or 30 of those citations to go to the police station when
I was in Cuba. Now, when was the last time this orchestrated car accident happened to you?
I mean, basically, you're talking about an attempted assassination. Yes, well, the last one was, so I came here in 2022.
It was like in February 2022. Yes, 2022. So why haven't they done anything like that since then, to your knowledge anyway?
Well, the problem is that, you know, now I'm here in the States, now I am an American resident, and they don't want to mess with the
States. So we go to Cuba, and we just try to do many things in the best that we can, just not to put pressure on the
Cuban pastors. Many persons just ask me or to some Americans, why don't you just go there and speak and try to overtake everything?
The problem is that the worst that can happen to me or to any other American pastor is that they will put us in a plane and send us to the
States. But then the pastors in Cuba will suffer. So everything always goes to the pastors in Cuba, and that's why we don't want to put that extra pressure on them.
And we just try to, you know, just to try to focus in helping people to get to know the gospel.
And we know that Jesus can change many sins, and we just try to preach freedom in God.
And, you know, everything against communism is
Christ. Christ is the only way, the truth, and the life. And communism has been just trying to take that out of the church and trying to bring everybody to them in the place of Christ.
And we just teach that there's no solution in communism. The only solution is in Christ, not in communism.
And I know that you, as you said earlier, that you travel there every month. Does your wife also join you?
Because of my kids were just going, like my wife and my two kids, they come to Cuba just once a year.
Wow, your kids still go, even though they threaten to take them away? Well, but now we're
American residents. So we go there like under the category of tourists.
But openly with your name, though, with your real name. Oh, yes, yes, yes, yes. They just let us go in, but we're not tourists.
So we need to go into Cuba under that category. We'll lose by law. After two years out of Cuba, you lose your residence in Cuba.
So now we just need to be under a different category. And so it's interesting.
It seems that the way to be protected, at least in some measure, from persecution in Cuba is to get out of there and become an
American citizen. Yes, yes. And they're that intimidated by the fear of retribution from America that they pretty much leave you alone to certain.
Well, actually. When you were the assassination attempts, were you an
American citizen at that point? Oh, OK. So they haven't happened since you become an
American citizen. No. Wow. That's pretty amazing stuff.
Let's see here. We do have Reggie and I'm not sure how to pronounce this.
Hamtramck, H -A -M -T -R -A -M -C -K,
Michigan. And he says, what are the most popular translated works in the
Spanish language among the Calvinist believers in Cuba?
There are different ones, because the problem is that to bring something into Cuba is hand -delivered.
So everything that people have been trying just to bring in and some guys from Poland or something have been sending into Cuba is
John Calvin. And the other one is Birkhoff.
So the systematic theology by Birkhoff. There are some others that people have been trying to bring in.
So we have been printing in Cuba probably around 60 different titles, by God's grace.
Chapel Library have been giving us the permission to print in Cuba. Father de
Gracia Wayne Anderson, when he was alive, he gave us a lot of permissions to print in Cuba their books.
Editorial Peregrino from Spain, they gave us the right to print a lot of their materials in Cuba.
So we have now like around 60 or 70 titles that we print inside of Cuba.
We have to print the covers here in the States. We bring the covers into Cuba. Then in Cuba we print in a printer.
We print the pages and then we put the book together inside of Cuba. And then in that way we can distribute the books.
And do you have a name for this publishing ministry? It's like Librería Clasero.
Okay. Well, that's pretty wonderful to hear. Who are the country that is sending the most biblically faithful missionaries?
And of course you and I would say that would be Sovereign Grace Believing Reformed Baptists. But what country is sending the most missionaries over there?
Would it be America or you just mentioned Poland? Who else is doing this? It's the
U .S. The U .S. is the one who is sending the most biblical and the biggest quantity of missionaries into Cuba.
Well, pastors and people going into Cuba, yes. But you do have, as you said,
Poland and any other countries that you want to mention who are helping? Well, yes, like Holland, Spain, England.
Some of the pastors in Cuba, they receive studies in England. They go and they study
Greek and some of that in England. But those are the biggest countries working around the gospel in Cuba.
Now, do most churches, I don't know how you would actually know this, but is it commonly known that many churches at least have spies in their midst, plants from the government?
That's common, that's normal. Are they easily spotable or are they doing a good job deceiving everybody?
Well, at some point they want people to know. Really? Yes, because in that way they can control.
So like persons will come to me and they will say, Hey, I don't like doing this and this, but I'm here and I'm watching.
And I'm like, okay, no problem. Yes, we know a lot of the persons that are just around listening and reporting.
Now, have you ever experienced what you believe would be a genuine conversion to Christ, people who started out with sinful motives to spy for the government?
Yes. Wow. Well, praise God for that.
Yes. How about other government officials that weren't necessarily spies? How successful has the evangelism with those folks coming to Christ been?
There's not a lot in those high, high places. But yes, we know about some of them.
And everything started because, you know, by the government, they sent them to study to know how to stop those religions.
And then they had to start studying them and reading and checking and going and this and that.
And then after that, they just turned to be Christians. And then they go to the government and try to say, no, but we're doing it wrong.
We need to stop doing this and this and this. And then they just take them out of their places in the government.
And many times they just need to leave the country. They tell them, hey, it's better if you just leave. Because, you know, people just get confused.
And then they just go to churches and then they just try to listen about God's word.
Yeah, I have a friend, Jeremy Volo, who at one time was pastoring in Laredo, Texas.
And he is now working for the Master Seminary, I believe, the seminary founded by John MacArthur.
But he was at one time pastoring in Laredo, Texas, which borders Mexico. And there was a gang member, one of the prominent gangs down there,
Mexican gangs, who got saved. And the gang sent a member to visit the church to see if he could verify if this conversion was genuine.
Because apparently, if they are convinced, and I don't know if this is always the case, but at least with this one gang, if they're convinced that a person genuinely converted, they'll leave them alone.
But if they think it was just a way to escape the wrath of the gang, they will, you know, they will attempt to do whatever they can to silence the person and perhaps even kill them.
But the person that they sent to spy on him in the church also got saved. So it's always amazing to hear about God's grace working out in that way.
Well, we're going to be going to our final break. And if you do have a question,
I urge you to send it in immediately because we are rapidly running out of time.
That email address, again, is chrisarnson at gmail dot com.
chrisarnson at gmail dot com. As always, give us your first name at least, your city and state of residence, and your country of residence, if you live outside of the
USA. Only remain anonymous if your question is personal and private. Don't go away. We'll be right back after these messages.
I'm Dr. Tony Costa, professor of apologetics and Islam at Toronto Baptist Seminary. I'm thrilled to introduce to you a church where I've been invited to speak and have grown to love,
Hope Reformed Baptist Church in Corham, Long Island, New York, pastored by Rich Jansen and Christopher McDowell.
It's such a joy to witness and experience fellowship with people of God, like the dear saints at Hope Reformed Baptist Church in Corham, who have an intensely passionate desire to continue digging deeper and deeper into the unfathomable riches of Christ in His Holy Word and to enthusiastically proclaim
Christ Jesus the King and His doctrines of sovereign grace in Suffolk County, Long Island, and beyond.
I hope you also have the privilege of discovering this precious congregation and receive the blessing of being showered by their love, as I have.
For more information on Hope Reformed Baptist Church, go to hopereformedli .net.
That's hopereformedli .net. Or call 631 -696 -5711.
That's 631 -696 -5711. Tell the folks at Hope Reformed Baptist Church of Corham, Long Island, New York that you heard about them from Tony Costa on Iron Sharpens Iron.
Pastor Bill Sousa, Grace Church at Franklin, here in the beautiful state of Tennessee.
Our congregation is one of a growing number of churches who love and support
Iron Sharpens Iron Radio financially. Grace Church at Franklin is an independent, autonomous body of believers which strives to clearly declare the whole counsel of God as revealed in Scripture through the person and work of our
Lord Jesus Christ. And, of course, the end for which we strive is the glory of God.
If you live near Franklin, Tennessee, and Franklin is just south of Nashville, maybe 10 minutes, or you are visiting this area, or you have friends and loved ones nearby, we hope you will join us some
Lord's Day in worshiping our God and Savior. Please feel free to contact me if you have more questions about Grace Church at Franklin.
Our website is gracechurchatfranklin .org. That's gracechurchatfranklin .org.
This is Pastor Bill Sousa wishing you all the richest blessings of our
Sovereign Lord, God, Savior, and King, Jesus Christ, today and always.
I'm Simon O'Mahony, Pastor of Trinity Reformed Baptist Church in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.
Originally from Cork, Ireland, the Lord in His sovereign providence has called me to shepherd this new and growing congregation here in Cumberland County.
At TRBC, we joyfully uphold the Second London Baptist Confession, we embrace congregational church government, and we are committed to preaching the full counsel of God's Word for the edification of believers, the salvation of the lost, and the glory of our
Triune God. We are also devoted to living out the one another commands of Scripture, loving, encouraging, and serving each other as the body of Christ.
In our worship, we sing psalms and the great hymns of the faith, and we gather around the Lord's table every
Sunday. We would love for you to visit and worship with us. You can find our details at trbccarlisle .org.
That's trbccarlisle .org. God willing, we'll see you soon.
I'm truly grateful for many things that the Trump administration has ushered in, but here's something that seriously concerns me.
On July 18, President Donald Trump signed the Genius Act into law.
This new law allows financial institutions to convert your hard -earned dollars into stable coins, a digital token backed by $37 trillion in national debt.
They will not need your approval. You hand over your dollars, and they give you a trackable, programmable, freezeable token.
This sounds like something out of a science fiction movie. They get control, and you get surveillance.
Stable coins are not freedom. They're a digital leash. This is one step away from a full -blown digital currency.
How stable is a stable coin? If your account is hacked or if the power grid goes down for a period of time, you can instantly be locked out.
It is time to get some of your hard -earned money outside of the traditional banking system and the
U .S. dollar. If you want to have a better understanding of stable coins and the future of money, then please call my friends at Gold Wealth Management and request your free report.
This report is a must -read. Call or text Gold Wealth Management today at 623 -640 -5911.
That's 623 -640 -5911. The report is free, and there's no obligation.
Again, call or text 623 -640 -5911.
Tell them Chris from Iron Sharpens Iron Radio sent you. Puritan Reformed is a
Bible -believing, kingdom -building, devil -fighting church. We are devoted to upholding the apostolic doctrine and practice preserved in Scripture alone.
Puritan Reformed teaches men to rule and lead as image -bearing prophets, priests, and kings.
We teach families to worship together as families. Puritan is committed to teaching the whole counsel of God so that the earth will be filled with the knowledge of God as the waters cover the sea.
We sing the Psalms, teach the law, proclaim the gospel, make disciples, maintain discipline, and exalt
Christ. This is Pastor David Reese of Puritan Reformed in Phoenix, Arizona.
Join us in the glorious cause of advancing Christ's crown and covenant over the kings of the earth.
Puritan Reformed Church. Believe. Build. Fight. PuritanPHX .com
Greetings. This is Brian McLaughlin, president of the SecureComm Group and supporter of Chris Arnzen's Iron Sharpens Iron Radio Program.
SecureComm provides the highest level of security systems for residential buildings, municipalities, churches, commercial properties, and much more.
We can be reached at SecureCommGroup .com. That's SecureCommGroup .com.
But today, I want to introduce you to my senior pastor, Doug McMasters of New High Park Baptist Church on Long Island.
Doug McMasters here, former director of pastoral correspondence at Grace to You, the radio ministry of John MacArthur.
In the film Chariots of Fire, Olympic gold medalist runner Eric Liddell remarked that he felt
God's pleasure when he ran. He knew his efforts sprang from the gifts and calling of God.
I sensed that same God -given pleasure when ministering the word and helping others gain a deeper knowledge and love for God.
That love starts with the wonderful news that the Lord Jesus Christ is a savior who died for sinners and that God forgives all who come to him in repentance, trusting solely in Christ to deliver them.
I would be delighted to have the honor and privilege of ministering to you if you live in the Long Island area or Queens or Brooklyn or the
Bronx in New York City. For details on New High Park Baptist Church, visit
NHPBC .com. That's NHPBC .com.
You can also call us at 516 -352 -9672.
That's 516 -352 -9672. That's New High Park Baptist Church, a congregation in love with each other, passionate for Christ, committed to learning and being shaped by God's word and delighting in the gospel of God's sovereign grace.
God bless you. And folks, don't forget that this program is also paid for in part by the law firm of Buttafuoco &
Associates. If you're the victim of a very serious personal injury or medical malpractice anywhere in the
United States, call my longtime very dear friend and brother in Christ, Daniel P.
Buttafuoco, attorney at law, at 1 -800 -NOW -HURT, 1 -800 -NOW -HURT, or visit his website, 1 -800 -NOW -HURT .com,
1 -800 -NOW -HURT .com. Please make sure you tell Daniel P. Buttafuoco, attorney at law, that you heard about his law firm,
Buttafuoco & Associates, from Chris Arnzen of Iron Trip and Zion Radio. I also want to remind all men in ministry leadership, whether you're a pastor, elder, deacon, parachurch ministry leader,
I'm inviting you all to my next free biannual
Iron Trip and Zion Radio pastors' luncheon, which is scheduled for Thursday, March 5th, 2026, 11 a .m.
to 2 p .m. at Church of the Living Christ in Loisville, Pennsylvania. And we are featuring for the second time as our keynote speaker, my very dear friend since 1996,
Dr. Conrad Mbewe, pastor of Kibwete Baptist Church of Lusaka, Zambia, Africa.
He is one of the most highly sought -after conference speakers across the globe, really, and he is the founding chancellor of African Christian University.
I personally believe he is the most powerful preacher alive on the planet Earth, and that's no exaggeration.
If you'd like to attend this free event, and not only, by the way, is the admission free and your lunch free, your opportunity to hear
Dr. Mbewe preach free, but every man that attends will receive a heavy sack and possibly two heavy sacks of free brand -new books personally selected by me and donated by generous
Christian publishers all over the United States and the United Kingdom. Everything is absolutely free by strict orders of my late wife,
Julie, who designed and helped me launch these pastors' luncheons way back in the 1990s when
I was still living on Long Island. But if you'd like to attend this free event, if you're a man in ministry leadership, send me an email to chrisarnson at gmail .com
and put pastors' luncheon in the subject line. Also, the night before the luncheon,
Wednesday, March the 4th, 2026, at 7 p .m.,
Dr. Mbewe will also be preaching at Trinity Reform Baptist Church of Carlisle, Pennsylvania.
That event is open to everyone, men, women, and children. You don't have to be in leadership. And if you'd like to find out more about Trinity Reform Baptist Church and how to get there, go to trbccarlisle .org,
trbccarlisle .org. And we have another listener for you with a question,
Hot Neil. And let's see, I'm trying to find that. I was just looking at it before we returned from the commercial break.
We have Jacob in Largo, Florida.
And Jacob said, you originally, in the beginning of the show, spoke of how you and your father started out as fundamentalist
Baptists. I was wondering how rampant, if at all existent, is vehement anti -Calvinism coming from the pulpits, recordings, and writings of Cuban pastors and theologians trying to discredit and dissuade people from attending
Reformed Baptist churches and listening to your preachers? Yes, in Cuba, the movement is really, really hard, like really strong.
All the Baptist denominations, like the Eastern and the Western denominations,
Baptist denominations, they are connected to SBC in the States. These denominations in Cuba, they are like that.
So we have like three or four pastors in our association. One of them, Frankie Abad, he was ejected from the denomination.
Arian Macias was ejected from those denominations just because of being Calvinistic and before.
So those denominations, they are really hard against Calvinism. They don't let the pastors to come to study with us in our seminary.
They don't let the pastors to come to our conferences. So, yes, it's really, really hard, and they go really, really hard on that.
By God's grace, in the last year, probably, it has been a little bit of a change, just in personal relationship.
I had the privilege of meeting some of the presidents of these denominations, and we just started talking a little bit, like, why is that a problem?
So let's see what God is going to bring out of that. But for the moment, the
Baptist conventions, the Eastern and the Western, they are really anti -Calvinistic, and they don't let that to go, or they don't let the people to be reformed
Baptist inside of those denominations. But from what you said earlier, you still outnumber them as Calvinists, right?
Those denominations, no. Oh, I misunderstood you earlier. I thought you said Calvinists are the largest evangelical group in Cuba.
Maybe I'm wrong. No, no, sorry. No, evangelicals are the largest group in Cuba.
Oh, okay. For some reason, I thought you were intending to mean
Calvinism. Sorry. And if you could, just summarize what you most want etched in the hearts and minds of our listeners today.
Well, number one, pray for the church in Cuba. They go through a really bad time and situation.
Pray for them. Pray for the pastors. They don't have a really easy anything.
The oppression is really big. But God is bringing from all of this a good understanding for people about God, and the pastors are just preaching the gospel and just getting really out there, just speaking, and they just want to preach the gospel.
Pray for the pastors to be willing to continue preaching and opening more churches.
Pray for all the work going on in Cuba. Every time that you listen about a church plant in Cuba, you need to know that that will make them like pastors.
They cannot have a job. They just only can depend on God and the donations that people will do.
So, pray for the church in Cuba. It's really, really hard, and the government makes that harder because of the beliefs that they have.
So, pray for all of that, and pray for the work in Cuba. Amen. And I'm assuming, since you told me earlier, the best way for individuals to support what you're doing financially or otherwise is to go to the website of Trinity Reformed Baptist Church of Kirkland, Washington, which is trbcwa .org.
Is that also where people should go if perhaps a pastor is listening and he wants to invite you to speak at his church at a conference or something?
Would that also be the best way to do it? Yes, and if they just want to contact me direct,
I don't know if you want to share my phone number. Of course. So, if my phone number is 520 -497 -7272, they can just text me or something.
All right, great. And if anybody didn't have a chance to write that down, email me, chrisarnson at gmail .com,
and I'll get you that information. It has been an utter joy to have you on the program for the first time.
Hot kneel, and I look forward to many more interviews with you, God willing.
I want to thank everybody who listened today, especially those who took the time to write in questions.
I hope you have a very safe and happy and joyful and healthy and Christ -honoring weekend and Lord's Day.
And I want you all to always remember for the rest of your entire lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater