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Live from historic downtown Carlisle, Pennsylvania, home of founding father, James Wilson, 19th century hymn writer, George Duffield, 19th century gospel minister, George Norcross, and sports legend, Jim Thorpe.
It's Iron Sharpens Iron. This is a radio platform in which pastors, Christian scholars, and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today. Proverbs chapter 27, verse 17 tells us, iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.
Matthew Henry said that in this passage, we are cautioned to take heed with whom we converse and directed to have in view in conversation to make one another wiser and better. 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, Lake City, Florida, and the rest of humanity living on the planet Earth. We're 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 14th day of June, 2024.
Before I introduce my guest and our topic today, I want to remind you, if you are a man in ministry leadership, we already have our next free, biannual Iron Sharpens Iron Radio Pastors Luncheon arranged for Thursday, October 10th, 11 a .m. to 2 p .m. at Church of the Living Christ in Loisville, Pennsylvania, which is Perry County, Pennsylvania, and we are featuring, for the very first time, our keynote speaker, Dr. Joseph Boot, who is a founder of the Ezra Institute, an author, highly sought-after conference speaker, and I am absolutely thrilled that he has agreed to be our keynote speaker for this special event.
And last week, we were honored to have Dr. Joel Beeke as our first-time speaker at the Iron Sharpens Iron Radio Free Pastors Luncheon, and we broke a record for attendance. We had over 250 men in attendance, so I'm hoping that we even break that record in October, Thursday, October 10th, 11 a .m. to 2 p .m.
Not only is the event absolutely free of charge, but you will also receive, as every man will, a heavy sack of free, brand-new books, personally selected by me and donated by generous Christian publishers all over the United States and United Kingdom.
It's all absolutely free. This is an event that was lovingly designed and crafted by my precious late wife, Julie, in the 1990s. They began on Long Island, New York, and we've been continuing to conduct these Free Pastors Luncheons every year, even after my precious wife's homegoing to glory with Christ for eternity.
We now conduct these luncheons in memory of her and in honor and tribute to her. So if you're a man in ministry leadership, I'm giving you plenty of advance notice this time. Please make it a point to mark on your calendar to be in Perry County, Pennsylvania, on Thursday, October 10th, 11 a .m. to 2 p .m. at Church of the Living Christ in Loisville, Pennsylvania, to hear Dr. Joseph Boot, and please email me your registration, to chrisarnson at gmail .com, chrisarnson at gmail .com, and put Pastors Luncheon in the subject line.
Well, today, we have one of those rare programs, I've done this only several times before, where we are providing an alias for our guest because of the very sensitive and even dangerous activities that he is involved in for the glory of Christ and the furtherance of his kingdom.
So we are going to call our guest today, Carlos Spurgeon, and he is an evangelist to the Cuban people, and today, we're gonna be addressing the challenges of the mission field in communist Cuba, and it's my honor and privilege to have you on the broadcast today, Carlos Spurgeon.
Greetings in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Amen. Well, Carlos, I would like to hear from you. How is it that, first of all, you realized you have been given a burden upon your heart by our sovereign Lord to bring the gospel to Cuba, and perhaps even before that, why don't you go back in time a little bit and tell our listeners how it came about that you became a missionary to begin with in general?
Well, I was blessed to have a mentor, Chris, that took me under his wing many, many years ago, back in the 1980s, that showed me the need that churches had for a true gospel, showed me the power of the gospel and the importance of sola scriptura, and way back in those early days as a single man, there was a great burden for the local church, and then as time went on, I was able to pastor and do other ministry-type activities, and finally, many years ago, we went back into full-time evangelism, spreading the gospel all over the nation, in the public square, in local churches, anywhere we could get in, and just praying that God would open the doors to places we could take the gospel outside of the United States.
Many people go to foreign fields. Many times they take mission trips. Many of the mission trips are a little bit more recreational and probably some helpful things they do, but not a lot of hard work going into some of these trips, and I prayed that God would open the door, and many years went by, and as I traveled the United States, virtually the United States, all of it, preaching in churches, in the public arena, finally, God began to open the door to take the gospel south of the border, to places where there were no churches, to places where the migrant camps were meeting, to places where there was aliens, so-called from other nations, just waiting for different opportunities to come their way, and so we went, assembled a team, and went down south, and went to these people who were a captive audience, and brought them the gospel, hours upon hours of gospel preaching, also being able to share with some of the leaders down there, a true biblical doctrine, what we would not explain to them at that time, but we were really giving them reform doctrine and giving them the doctrine of grace while we were down there, and praying that God would open the door to more opportunities.
Finally, a Cuban national pastor heard of our activities, met some of our team, and asked, would you come to Cuba? Well, we were so excited about the opportunity and the offer to come, and then when we realized the great need that Cuba had, and we realized the fact that there were actually churches meeting legally, we were astounded that we could actually go there and legally spread the gospel in that country.
All right.
Well, praise God for that. And dare I say, Babaluya.
Ha, ha, ha, ha.
But so, tell us about the reception you have received in Cuba, perhaps even before that. Tell us about the religious climate in Cuba, and the relationships between the communist government there and those who are truly Christians, both pastors and your average congregations, and let us know the level of secrecy that is required.
I don't know if it's to the same extent where you have in China underground churches, but tell us about that.
Well, let me give you a little background. Of course, Cuba was an island, really, of what we would call different island and tribal peoples many, many years ago. And finally, as far as the West was concerned, Columbus sailed there.
And then as time went on, Spain ruled in Cuba. And of course, there's lots of drama, lots of conspiracies, there is lots of history from both sides, but many atrocities were performed. And when Spain was holding the yoke over Cuba, they had different upheavals, and the United States finally began to get involved there.
And as the United States got involved, even though Cuba was prospering in many, many ways, being a sugar exporter and other things that they did, they were still very subject to our country. There were rumors even that the United States was just trying to make it a part of the United States and have full control there.
And finally, the day would come, revolution would come once again. And finally, the government would be put down. Spain is already out of the picture. The Cuban government is put out of the picture. And then, of course, the revolution, the revolution comes in the way of Fidel Castro, his brother, Raul Castro.
Then, of course, Che Guevara, the criminal. And then finally, after these men come off the scene, the president today, Miguel Diaz-Canel Bermudez, who is not a Castro, the people you speak to in Cuba will tell you that he is probably just a puppet of the Castro family, and that he's probably just an actor.
He's probably just someone who looks good on camera, gives a good speech, he's in with the party, but he is definitely being given orders from somewhere else. Be that as it may, the nation of Cuba deciding to go communist, perhaps not being a fully Marxist-Leninist type of ideology, but they were a country that wanted total control.
They wanted total control over their own nation, and they wanted to run their nation according to socialist principles. But sadly for them, when the wall fell, and when the Soviet Union totally was transformed in the way they were doing things around the world, the support to Cuba had been cut.
The lifeline was cut. Cuba was so dependent upon the Soviet Union because they had lost contact with the West, they had jeopardized their trade with the West, and so now they were living off of the Soviet Union and any other country that might give them aid or might give them credit.
And finally, when the Soviet Union backs up a little bit with their help for many years, they began to suffer under the regime, the totalitarian regime, even greater than before. We have to remember Cuba is two groups of people.
Cuba is the Cuban people who live day to day, and then there is the regime. There is the civil government that lives in a different level. The higher up the aristocratic steps you climb in the party, the better they live, the better resources they have, and the more money, of course, they have.
The people down at the bottom, the average person, they're the ones that suffer through all the upheaval, no matter what country puts an embargo, whatever they do, those are the people that are actually suffering.
But some years ago, something very interesting happened. Fidel Castro, who was some type of a Roman Catholic when he was just a baby, a baptizer, something like that, he put off all form of religion, but he did not speak against the Roman Catholic Church fully.
And finally, in fact, finally, he allowed several popes to come in, and after the popes came in, he brought Christmas back on the calendar, then he actually allowed certain worship to take place, then he allowed churches to begin to meet.
Well, the good thing for us was that not only the churches who may have been meeting secretly for many years, and I'm sure they were, they finally began to open their doors. And so today, to catch up to your question, today, we have reformed churches and non-reformed churches in Cuba that are actually meeting openly to give some semblance of a freedom of religion to the world because it's very important for the Cuban civil government that the world think highly of them because they need money.
So to tell the United Nations and others, we have freedom of religion here. They do allow churches to meet. Now, there are many different rules and regulations to live in Cuba, but to say the least about this is that the churches do get to meet.
Many of the churches meeting homes, it doesn't matter what stripe of church it is, they usually meet in homes because it's very difficult to buy property, to own property, or to do anything on a greater scale.
We have heard of churches that have regular buildings and that type of thing. Most all of the churches that we have encountered, what you might consider a house church. Now, when I say house church, Chris, I don't mean a church that just meets in the living room.
I mean, you are in a very congested neighborhood area. You walk into an entrance. It could be a dirt floor. It might be a ramshackle building. And suddenly you come into an open room that looks like perhaps a patio that they had enclosed.
And there's enough people seating for maybe 75, 100 people. Now, when I say seating, I mean sitting on pieces of wood that are placed upon bricks, or perhaps chairs that had been salvaged and recycled over and over again, in a plain room, most of the time without any kind of public address system, in a room, of course, it has perhaps just one toilet facility, one place perhaps to get a little bit of water or something like that.
That was the average type of church that we were able to go to, but they met openly. And the reception was amazing because for them to get any type of real theology, any type of real doctrine, any type of help biblically, they have to look to the outside because only a few men in the circles that they're in have been trained in some way that can help get these pastors to the next level.
So let me tell you about the pastors, Chris. These pastors heard that we were having these special meetings. They come from every background. Now, understand, they know that we are coming with reformed doctrine.
They know that we're not coming with a slip, shod, haphazard, easy-believe-ism, weak gospel. They know we're bringing the Bible. And they come, they travel sometimes from an hour away, get to the meeting.
Many of them, we did not even believe on a paper Bible, a handheld Bible. We believe some of them probably just have it digitally on a phone or something like that, but it's very hard to get a Bible. You cannot send a case of Bibles into Cuba.
You cannot order Bibles into Cuba. You could not bring a shipment of gospel tracts or gospel literature into Cuba. Yes, you can travel with a Bible in your suitcase or a Bible in your briefcase or something like that.
You might bring a couple of tracts tucked in between some pages, but they are keenly aware that people may try to bring things in that may run contrary to the doctrine and the teachings of the nation.
Things like abortion. If you were to come in there and have pamphlets against the murder of children, you are violating a human right granted by the civil government. So they would take all that literature and of course dispose of it immediately.
Wow.
What we are told about in Cuba is this. If you resist, you will be arrested. If you go against the regime, you will be arrested. Chris, let me tell you something interesting. We are so spoiled in this country and other countries.
Some superstar gets arrested or some known person gets arrested. So what do they do? They go on social media. They hold press conferences. They have crowds of people around them and it puts so much pressure on the government in this country.
Oftentimes it leads to their very charges being dropped or no one wants to talk about it anymore. They get off easily. That doesn't happen in Cuba. In Cuba, when there are protests, the protesters are arrested.
The organizers are arrested. The protesters might be let out after a time. But just an example, some people were protesting for food. We want more food. Some of the leaders were still in prison four years later, Chris.
Wow. Now, many of us know, especially those of us who are older and fully remember the existence of the Soviet Union before the fall of the Iron Curtain, we may remember that Billy Graham went over to the Soviet Union and was paraded around those puppet churches that existed in the Soviet Union that were really catering to the party line.
They weren't violating any of the tenets of the Soviet Union. And Billy Graham was duped and actually made the public statement that there is no religious persecution in the Soviet Union. And that was much to the outrage of those who had survived the persecution of the Soviet Union, including Richard Wurmbrand and others that had spent time in the gulags and so on.
So these pastors that you are meeting over there, how certain are you that these are not just puppet pastors and churches?
Thank you for causing me to have to clarify this. So let's try to explain the best we can. There are spies in every church.
Wow, in every church.
In every church. Every citizen is suspect. So I have to explain this. Cuba controls its people. One of the very first ways they control the people.
Is with food.
This caused me to get into this subject, but the food situation in Cuba, and I'll get to your question, but I have to start with the food situation. The food situation in Cuba is amazingly terrible. In fact, let me just give you an idea.
Some years ago, about eight, nine years ago, they changed some food policies, giving less food to the people. The average Cuban, and you can Google a lot of the things I'm saying, the average Cuban lost 20 pounds because of malnutrition.
20 pounds. Now, what they have done is they established a ration card system for every citizen in the nation. I could not figure out when it starts at what age, but at a very early age, they begin the ration system.
And by the way, if you have a child, they will be in your home a couple of times a week, Chris, to check on you and the child for many months. And as a toddler, to make sure the child is not being indoctrinated against the state.
Now, so with the food situation, they give you a ration card. Now, when you talk to different people in Cuba, it's hard to get exactly the right numbers, but I got a number from 2018. And this, just to give you an idea, if you're a Cuban citizen, your ration card, you would go, it kind of reminds you of Nazi Germany.
You have to go to your local building. There's every neighborhood has a pickup point that you're able to walk to, and that's important. I'll get to the walking part later. So it's a local pickup point.
You bring your ration card to the pickup point, and once a week, depending on what it is, or once a month, or even every day, but once a week, you might come in and get five eggs, or maybe one liter of cooking oil a month, a pound of spaghetti a month, three pounds of refined or white sugar, three pounds of unrefined or dark sugar, six pounds of white rice for the month, 20 ounces of black beans, some packets of mixed coffee, they call it.
That is the food to give you for the month for that adult in your home. Now, if anyone thinks somehow that's a lot of food, you have to understand that when you have a couple of adults in the house, and perhaps a couple of children, that five eggs does not go very far for the month, much less even if that was for the week.
They have a place that gives daily bread. Now, when they said daily bread, I thought they were giving away a loaf of bread. No, what they are giving away is a small, small pan, a small loaf of bread, perhaps about eight inches long, and you get in line every day, and you can get that bread.
But the reports have given to me is a lot of the times when they get the bread, Chris, it's not even edible. It's disgusting, it's messed, it's no good. And so this is the food situation in Cuba. Meat and fish products are distributed at separate places, and they have a different way of doing that.
But someone told me that perhaps two pounds of chicken per person per month. This is on the ration system. Perhaps two pounds of sausage per person per month. Now, obviously that's not enough to live on.
So this gets to the next subject, the black market. Everything I have researched, and again, I would be happy to be told I'm wrong. Everything I have researched tells me that the black market that exists in Cuba is actually run by the government itself.
In other words, when they import all the food, because most everything has to be imported, when they import all the food, they sell to their own distribution companies, and these companies are actually under the thumb of the government.
They sell to their own companies, and then they sell to black market connections, however that might work. So they run both angles here. They give you the ration, then they sell it to you on the black market, but technically the black market's illegal, but it's an open secret.
They sell food and things all over the place. And here's how it works. Here's the example that was given to us. We had many conferences that were directed toward the clergy, and perhaps after the conference is over, they knock on your door and they say, Mr. Chris, we heard that you were at the special meeting at the church last night.
And you said, yes, of course I was there. Please tell us what they spoke about. What did they talk about in that special meeting? And you say, well, I don't wanna talk about my Christian brothers or that wouldn't be right of me to try to tell you what they said.
I don't remember everything they said. And they said, okay, that's fine. Why don't you let us come in your house and take a look around? And because maybe you have a job and you work and you dig ditches or you have your own little business or something, you have a little money, so you buy food on the black market.
So they come in and they say, well, look at this. Your ration for rice is only six pounds. You have 20 pounds of rice in your home. You have eight pounds of sausage in the freezer. I'm sorry, Mr. Chris, we're gonna have to arrest you for violating the Food Act, four years in jail.
Now tell me, how many citizens could not give into that? That'd be very, very difficult.
In fact, please pick up where you left off there because we have to go to our first commercial break. And if anybody wants to join us, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com. Chrisarnson at gmail .com, give us your first name at least, city and state and country of residence, only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter.
And we'll be right back after these messages with Carlos Spurgeon, evangelist to the Cuban people.
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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.
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God bless you.
I'm Pastor Bill Shishko of The Haven, an Orthodox Presbyterian church in Comac, Long Island. I hold the Iron Sharpens Iron radio program hosted by my longtime friend and brother, Chris Arnson, in the highest esteem.
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It is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast of the Lord's blessing and the knowledge of himself.
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Go to royaldiadem .com and mention Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. We're now back with my guest today, Carlos Spurgeon. And for those of you who just tuned in, that is an alias for several reasons. He wants to prevent being banned from re-entry into Cuba by the government.
He also wants to protect those who are involved in Christian ministry there with whom he labors. And so this is a precaution. And we have another alias being provided by a listener who's sent us a comment.
We have Jose Spurgeon, Carlos Spurgeon's brother. I am a part of the Cuban missions team that had the privilege of serving with Evangelist Carlos Spurgeon. I can verify that what he speaks to is absolutely true.
We witness the fear that the average citizens have of the oppressive authorities. They are constantly guarded in their words and actions, always suspect about others that they are not absolutely familiar with.
We even had an instance while we were there that we are reasonably sure was a government agent observing us in our activities, posing as a van transportation driver. It is definitely an eye-opening experience.
Well, thank you, Jose Spurgeon for that commentary. And before the break, Carlos, you were talking about the food rationing and how if the government officials who are going from door to door believe you have some kind of a connection with Christianity in a level that makes them uncomfortable, they will perhaps arrest you because they are claiming that you are abusing the food rations and perhaps you could reword it more accurately and just summarize where we left off.
Yes, so the best way to explain it is that they're using the food laws, we call them laws, the food laws to control the people. And so by coming in there and asking these questions and seeing you might have some food that you bought on the black market, they will use that to coerce you and force you to be on their side.
Now, because the Cubans are very poor, it is very simple, a very simple thing for them to find people to work for them. As the email you received a minute ago from my brother, Jose, yes, it is exactly accurate.
In fact, probably the most important part of this part of what I'm going to say is this. It is not so much that there are spies, but to us, the most eye-opening thing was that they firmly believe that they are spies.
In other words, it's a constant state of alertness that someone in your midst, someone that sits in your services, or in this case, someone that spent lots of time with us during our travels was actually a paid informant.
And I don't want to say too much more except to say he spent a lot of time with us and he ended up being a paid informant. Now you might ask, what did this paid informant find out? Well, here's what he found out, Chris.
He found out that we prayed. He found out that we sang a lot. He found out that we sang the Psalms and hymns. He found out that we prayed before meals. He also heard us ask questions about the government, but he really never heard us criticize anything.
So he didn't hear much to report back to his superiors about the terrible things that we were trying to accomplish there in the country. Without giving too many details, I will tell you this. Even though it is a small country, and perhaps that's why, they are able to monitor everything.
They're able to monitor who stays in hotels. They're able to monitor the social networking of people in Cuba with people outside of Cuba, if that makes sense to you. They're able to keep track of who the pastors are and where these pastors may be meeting.
So I'm gonna go just a little bit out of my comfort zone, but I want to tell you this. Chris, if you were having, I noticed you have your prayer banquets and you have these banquets where pastors come and they meet and you eat and then someone speaks to them.
Is that correct?
That's exactly correct.
All right. So imagine if right before you have this, that all of the local pastors in that city receive a phone call or a text message or a knock on the door from law enforcement, telling them it is not in your best interest to go to that meeting.
What I'm gonna say is this, and I'll move on from that. That happened to us. So they know what's going on. They know who's doing what. They keep close tabs on many, many things there in the nation. Now, back to your question about these puppet pastors and others.
First of all, the very first thing that comes to mind is this, that we were able to be with men that preach the glorious gospel of Christ. We were able to be with men that actually taught, preach and believe the Bible as the truth of the gospel.
Not only that, but these are men who are preaching a reformed doctrine. And to go a little bit further with this, we also see that they are not asking anything from us. In other words, we did not come there with our wallets open and everyone that said, I'm a pastor, we're just putting money in their hand.
They invited us to come, not so we could spread the word that religion is open there, but that we could come and bring biblical doctrine. This was sort of seminary level, fourth year Bible college, seminary level teaching to those pastors and those preachers.
So their worship services were real. There were biblical songs. There were scripture. Hours and hours of instruction. And then the time spent with these men outside of the services, we could see a love and a hunger for God.
And that just takes me, I guess we'll just get to this subject now. The churches in Cuba, the ones that we have encountered and heard of are strong. Their faith is strong. They are not enamored with multimedia presentations.
They're not chasing after strange methodologies. They want the word of God to be brought to them. We told the people in our meetings, we did not come to fix the Cuban church. We came to help the Cuban church and push your wagon a little bit further down the road.
So we definitely see a hunger for the truth and the gospel. In fact, I'll go a little further here for you without saying which groups they are. There are groups of people and churches that you and I would not agree with.
You and I would not hold to their doctrine. They would call themselves Christian. They would have many tenants of Christianity, but you and I would not join their churches and we would not feel fully comfortable under their preaching.
But Chris, can I tell you that those churches have asked us to come? They have, knowing our doctrine, knowing what we believe, they have said, we don't care. Come here and preach and teach to us because we want to hear the Bible.
And that is an amazing thing.
Amen. Well, let me ask you something. What would the government, the communist government of Cuba, object to in regard to honest and biblically faithful preaching, for instance, the gospel itself, the death, burial, resurrection, ascension and enthronement of Christ, and the deity of Christ, the Trinity, virgin birth of Christ, perfect sinlessness of Christ, and on and on.
What would a faithful biblical gospel message contain that would upset a communist official in Cuba? I can't help but just remember hearing about Christians under the Roman Empire. And when Christians were invited to bow down before a Roman image, their lives could be spared if they would merely take a pinch of incense and put it on the fire that burned in the presence of the image of the Roman Caesar.
The Christians died rather than compromised with a tiny pinch of incense. What is it that they are demanding a faithful Christian pastor do to make his message, for lack of a better term, kosher, or acceptable to the Cuban authorities?
All right, I don't wanna forget the last part of your question, so I'm gonna keep that in my mind as I get to it.
Sure.
First of all, let's remind ourselves this. The Roman Catholic Church operates freely in the nation, even having convents and special places like that for their people. We were told that the Roman Catholic Church also has special dispensations given to them so they're able to get more food and more wine and better treatment of their people in their buildings because of their connection.
So that just reminds me of your question about Billy Graham and the Soviet Union that the Roman Catholic Church is in with the totalitarian government and apparently not bothering them at all, and no one's bothering anyone.
Now, as far as the rest of the people, we do not know if there is anything about the actual gospel message that is a problem. Fidel Castro, in his biography, mentions that many tenants of Christianity and the way people are to be treated was actually something that was very favorable to him, a social gospel, that type of thing.
And so the churches are not bothering anyone while they preach the gospel. We would understand, though, that if there was a regular preaching from the pulpit, that there is no king but Jesus, and that their officials are actually under the reign of Christ, that would probably get some attention in time.
In fact, in one of our meetings, the question was asked, what would you tell the officials of our country? We would tell them to repent and trust Christ. We would tell them to bow at the foot of Christ, of Jesus Christ.
Now, here's what we know as far as giving things up, and you asked that a minute ago, and that'll take me into my next subject. But here's the thing, Chris. Everyone, unless you have a very special little business, everyone works somehow hooked up to the state.
Just a few years ago, that changed to that happening. It used to be they basically ran every business somehow, had their finger in it, oversaw it, but somehow they were connected to every single business.
A few years ago, they changed that where they would allow some business licenses. There's a name for that in Spanish, which I can't recall. Certain small businesses could function at a small level. Actually, one of the ways, the loophole is they use their own home for their business.
That's why many churches meet in homes and not have buildings. Same reason restaurants and other places technically are using their own property to do this. And so they allow the people to have a little bit semblance of what we would call a capitalistic mentality, even though they have to pay high taxes and bow to the regulations.
But again, most everything is run by the state somehow. If you have a job there, perhaps in a factory, or you work in some type of a way that, perhaps in a warehouse or maybe even a construction company, for the most part, you really don't work for the owner of that company, you work for the state.
And so the way it was explained to me was like this. You get a job and that company pays the state your wages and the wages are paid back to you from the state. So they're gonna get their taxes and they're gonna control your money.
In fact, pick up where you left off there because we have to go to our midway break now. But don't forget where you left off.
I will.
And folks, please use this time wisely. Write down as much of the contact information as you possibly can for as many of our advertisers as you can so that you can more frequently and successfully contact our advertisers, keeping in mind that the funds that come through our advertisers are absolutely necessary for us to continue to exist.
And also, of course, sending your questions to Carlos Spurgeon on his missionary work in Cuba. We'll be right back. It's such a blessing to hear from Iron Sharpens Iron radio listeners.
From all over the world.
Here's Joe Riley, a listener in Ireland who wants you to know about a guest on the show he really loves hearing interviewed, Dr. Joe Moorcraft.
I'm Joe Riley, a faithful Iron Sharpens Iron radio listener here in a tie in County Kildare, Ireland. Going back to 2005. One of my very favorite guests on Iron Sharpens Iron is Dr. Joe Moorcraft. If you've been blessed by Iron Sharpens Iron radio, Dr. Moorcraft and Heritage Presbyterian Church of Cumming, Georgia are largely to thank since they are one of the program's largest financial supporters.
Heritage Presbyterian Church of Cumming is in Forsyth County, a part of the Atlanta metropolitan area. Heritage is a thoroughly biblical church, unwaveringly committed to Westminster standards. And Dr. Joe Moorcraft is the author of an eight volume commentary on the larger catechism.
Heritage is a member of the Hanover Presbytery built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief cornerstone and tracing its roots and heritage back to the great Protestant Reformation of the 16th century.
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Chris Arnzen here, host of Iron Sharpens Iron radio. I strongly recommend a church I've been recommending as far back as the 1980s, Grace Covenant Baptist Church in Flemington, New Jersey, pastored by Alan Dunn.
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If you are without a biblically faithful church home, no matter where on the planet Earth you live, send me an email to chrisarnsen at gmail .com and now put I need a church in the subject line. That's chrisarnsen at gmail .com, I need a church in the subject line, and you could also send in your questions to my guest, Carlos Spurgeon, about the challenges of the mission field in Cuba under the communist regime.
If you send me an email, I would love to hear from you with your question for Carlos Spurgeon, which is an alias, that's chrisarnsen at gmail .com. Give us your first name at least, city and state, and country of residence.
And Carlos, please pick up where you left off where I had to interrupt you before the midway break.
Absolutely, good to be back. I just wanna make just a little bit of a plug here. If you do have any questions about this that you can't talk about on the air, some things you wanna ask about that I could not speak of, or perhaps you do wanna know how to help us with our mission to Cuba, as well as our assistance to local pastors there, it is cubamissionsatproton .me.
That's cubamissionsatproton .me. Going on from here, so the final thing I was talking about this was this, Chris, about the sacrifice. That when a man proclaims himself to be a pastor, when a man begins to receive a salary from a church or a denomination, at some point he is coming off of working in a regular job for the state, or if the state finds out, long and short of it is this, when he becomes a pastor, he is removed from the Cuban employment system.
So we would consider bivocational in this country is legally an impossibility in Cuba. He cannot be the pastor of a local church there or work in some type of denominational work and still have a job where the state knows about it.
Now, he can do black market work, work for a neighbor, someone pays him on the side, but he can no longer have a regular job, no regular employment there.
Wow, that sounds even counterproductive. You would think that you would want as many people on the workforce in the nation you govern as possible.
Well, in the words of Dr. Joe Moorcraft, they are afraid of preachers. That is the bottom line. So let me explain as we talk about the money, let me go into this to help us understand how crucial the situation is.
If you Google the Cuban peso today, you might discover that it's 24 to one American dollar. Now that might not sound too bad as compared to some other countries, 24 to one. But in reality, Chris, if you go to Cuba, it is not 24 to one.
It is closer to 300 pesos to one, but it's in the opposite direction. In other words, it is devalued so greatly that it does not help the Cuban at all. In fact, an article from April in the AP News has it now closer on the street to 350 pesos to one.
According to one source, the average government job only pays $15 a month. Now, I'm not sure if this is exactly accurate, but I actually read, Chris, that if you are a member of the armed forces or perhaps a policeman, that you may be paid as little as seven American dollars a month, but you do get some food and housing and that type of thing.
Now, back to the regular citizen. Most websites tell you that the average income is somewhere between 30 to $60 American a month. The average man who may be pastoring a church, if he's receiving $30 a month, that is an amazing amount of money, but he can no longer work on the side.
So now he's just barely making it. I would always err on the lower side of these numbers because some websites have them higher, but keep in mind, whatever numbers you read on the stock market, on the open market, on the petro markets, the numbers that are given to the public are never correct.
The Cuban government does everything they can to make fuel prices look good to the salaries look comparative to the rest of the world. In fact, I read an article recently that said, fundamentally, that private food imports are not even allowed.
So you cannot say, well, my little fishmonger market, we're gonna bring in fish from Japan. No, you cannot import anything all your own. All food coming into the country is imported by the government.
All other food is grown in Cuba. The problem is there's not a lot grown there because the incentive is not there. Many years ago, Fidel Castro said in a big speech, he said, the day will come because of socialism that milk will be freely given away.
Truth is, Chris, there's no milk. All the milk coming into Cuba is powdered milk coming in from imports because the Cuban government is in debt to all the Central American and some Asian countries. Now, the capitalist movement inside Cuba, we call capitalism, has no effect at all in bringing anything in the country.
In other words, some of the little local businesses that operate are still under the thumb of the government. That's why if you go on YouTube and watch some videos about Cuba, and every video will have a different slant left or right, but if you watch any documentaries about Cuba, you'll find people, when they discover the meat market has chicken, or someone says they have beef, which there's almost no beef in the country, or they have something else, they'll be in line for a day, two days, three days, just trying to purchase a little meat.
We asked, it was 100 people that were fed, and one thing I hadn't talked about was the food. Rice is the staple food. Rice is morning, noon, and night, plus perhaps a little tomato or a little garnish, and very, very little meat.
And we asked, is there any way for us as Americans to perhaps give a little more money so you can give all these pastors a little better meal? We'd like them to have a little bit more meat on the plate, because I'm telling you, Chris, what they get on the plate is not very much at all, and here's what the answer was.
They said, pastor, they said, problem is not that we don't have money, because if you have the money, you'd think we could buy the meat. The problem is we can't buy the meat. There's nowhere to find the meat.
We do all we can to scrounge up the food for these people. So many restaurants that are doing well are doing well because they're being supplied by the government. The other family businesses, of course, they have to ask, literally when you sit down in a restaurant in Cuba, you ask this question, what don't you have today?
Because there's always something on the menu that they do not have. Money, the money supply is controlled by the government. Most banks, most ATM machines, there is a line of people trying to get the money.
It's not because there's no money in Cuba. Some people believe that the little entrepreneurs and the business owners are holding cash as long as they possibly can, because even they don't trust the banks, even though they are working with the government themselves.
So it's a terrible system. They control all the finances, and ultimately the pastors are subject to this in one way or another. So what do they do? They bravely step out of the system, and they said, I will trust God to meet my needs, and literally making what those people are able to give in tithes and offerings and any other giving that they can.
Well, we have a listener named Blanca in Mount Charleston, Nevada. And Blanca says, I am totally baffled as to why there is such a shortage of food and of poultry and of beef and other staples in a tropical environment like Cuba.
That's a very good question. That's one of the first questions we asked.
When we came there, when you went there.
Here's the best way I can answer the question. First of all, you have to be able to feed the animals. Almost every animal we saw was undernourished, underfed. The chickens looked amazingly terrible. In fact, we had eggs almost every day, but I couldn't stand it anymore.
I had to stop eating the eggs. Chris, the yolk of the eggs were white. Every farmer I've ever asked about that means that the yolk is, there's no nourishment. The chicken is malnourished. There's nothing in that.
Remember, if they have feed, the feed has to come from another nation. The government has to broker that deal. Out in the farm areas, we did see some animals, but I understand if you're a farmer and you say, I'm gonna raise cows and I'm gonna sell my cows.
As soon as you start getting a little bit busy, the government will swoop in. They'll take your cows away or they will regulate you to the point where it's not worth raising any more cows. So suddenly there are no cows.
And so every type of animal that we would think of that we'd wanna put on the menu, whether it's a pig or a cow or a chicken, someone has to pay to feed them or someone has to raise them, but the incentive to raise them or to have the money to feed them is not there.
So everything just about has to be imported into the country that the communist government ruined the nation as far as production and work ethic. Raul Castro said he was gonna bring up the agriculture market.
All he did was destroy it even further. They have no concept of open market. They have no concept of someone raising a pig and selling the pig, growing the tomatoes and selling the tomatoes. Their hand is in everything to the discouragement of the producer.
Okay, we have Bristol in Aloha, Oregon. And Bristol asks, I don't understand why livestock cannot be adequately fed in Cuba for the very same reason the other listener asked. How could this be possible in a tropical environment?
Again, when someone has any type of business, especially when you're talking about agriculture, when you begin to multiply the animal out, the government swoops in, either steals the animal or takes the money.
So if you know anything about farming, to rear, to raise cattle, to raise chickens or even pigs requires work, it requires labor. Now, problem is when you're doing all this work and labor and the government comes and takes everything you've labored for, how much incentive do you have to continue that work?
Not a whole lot. And the government is not involved in this business very much. In fact, if there is any meat, I will guarantee you the meat is on the plates of the tables of the totalitarian regime. They are eating well.
The people at the bottom of the totem pole, the average Cuban citizen will not get the meat. The meat starts at the top and works its way down. Remember, those in the government, the aristocracy of the government, those people, those families are doing pretty good.
Everyone else is not.
Yeah, that shows you the absolute fallacy of communism, which is supposed to be a classless society. That's no different from the aristocracy and the czars and everything else that that movement claimed to abolish.
It's all garbage.
Well, just to throw one more thing into what you just said, the reports we received was that Fidel Castro himself was actually very racist to the Cubans of dark skin. And so there was actually a racism in the Fidel family, the Castro family, against the Cuban people that represented the more darker skinned Cubans.
Not a shock. Let's see, we have Robbie in Pequabuck, Connecticut. And Robbie says, how severely are faithful Christians and perhaps especially pastors persecuted in Cuba? Are their lives actually threatened or even taken from them?
Are there known murders and physical tortures and things like that happening?
We've heard stories of things happening in the past. So let me explain what we know about today. Because they have said there is freedom of religion, what that usually means is this. As long as your church doesn't get too big, as long as your church doesn't make too much noise, too much of a splash, we'll leave you alone.
And of course, our spies will come back with any reports that you have of dissidents or anything like that. Now, here's what we were told. When the Americans come, if you would like to do anything, street preaching, anything in the public square, this is what will probably happen.
If you begin to cause a stir by preaching the gospel out in public, eventually the police will come and they will say, sir, we are gonna have to ask you to stop doing this. It's causing a ruckus. And then if we do not do that, they will come back and say, we are sorry.
We have warned you. You are an American citizen. Okay, you will have to leave the country. And so within 24 hours, we'll probably put on a plane and sent back to America. Then we will become persona non grata.
They will not let us back in the country. But after that happens, Chris, they will go to the local church that we were involved with and they will lock up the elders and they will close down the church and anybody else that's too close to the situation.
Wow, that's pretty scary. Let's see, we have Reginald in Scutter Hole, Long Island, New York. And I've lived on Long Island most of my life and I've never heard of Scuttle Hole. But Reginald asks, when you mentioned earlier about restaurants being fully stocked with food, are these restaurants that are only for tourists and those who are not residents of Cuba, like some other countries have had that same arrangement?
Yeah, I actually have a friend. I don't even know if he's still there. I haven't heard from him in a long time. But he was a missionary in Vietnam and he had to be there under the guise of an English teacher.
He couldn't be openly a missionary. And he said that there were great restaurants and things, but those are not the places that the citizens of Vietnam or the subjects could dine and frequent. These were reserved for tourists and so on.
But what's your answer in regard to Cuba?
Okay, let's get into the money situation and that'll help us finish what I was talking about, money. So if the average Cuban is making 30 to maybe $60 a month on the high side, here's what we understand about the restaurants.
The Cuban government desperately wants American dollars and they also have the Euro coming in there. So what they do is they back the restaurants. Now, there is a list on the internet of places the American government asks you not to go because the state is running them.
But probably the state is running more restaurants and you realize somehow their hand is in them. You can tell tourists, what we would call tourist restaurants because they're in tourist parts of town or they're in areas where people come.
You can actually vacation there. People come from Europe on vacation and they come from United States because of history and the old cars and different things and the buildings and the Spanish history.
And so there are places in the tourist areas that have lots and lots of food and they're probably being backed by the state. There's other places that are not in the tourist areas that probably are the ones that aren't fully stocked themselves.
Let me just give you an example how this works, Chris. We were in a very small town and we took the elders of this church to a very small town. We took them to eat afterwards and our team was having a dinner.
It was a very nice place as far as the facilities went but it was a very modest meal. A very nice meal, but very modest. None of the meals were very large and we ate for anywhere between $4 and $6 American normally.
After we ate this very nice meal, of course, everyone had rice, the two pastors told us this, thank you for bringing us to this restaurant. It has been years since we have been able to go out and eat in a restaurant.
Because when you spend four or five or $6 and you only make $30 a month, you're not gonna go out to eat. You're gonna buy rice and beans for your house. You're gonna buy fuel for your vehicle. So yes, the restaurants that are more touristy will probably have better food and more food.
The restaurants off the beaten path, on the highways, that type of thing, there'll be a little bit different. See, everything, we talked about the fuel just a minute ago, fuel prices are the same way.
Ocasio-Cortez came back here and said, oh, the fuel prices are wonderful, they have fuel under control. Well, it's a total lie. The globalpetrolprices .com and Reuters and the taxi drivers in Cuba will tell you many different things, different stories.
Fuel is anywhere from $2 to $5 a gallon. Problem is, again, when you make $30 a month, $2 a gallon is a lot of money. They deal in liters over there. But normally, whatever you read in the market is not representative of the real prices on the street.
The black market could be twice as much, and in some cases, five times higher than the prices at the pump. So when we talk to the taxi drivers, we say, so do you buy fuel at the gas station? And they say, what gas station?
And it's true, Chris. We saw just in one trip alone in many cities, we only saw like two or three gas stations anyway because they buy their fuel through the black market using apps like WhatsApp and Signal and these other apps.
They find out where the fuel is and people have fuel, then they go buy the fuel a little bit cheaper. See, most of the vehicles are owned by taxi drivers or people that work in the government. They have a government job or a big job and they supply a car for them.
There's not, most cars are taxis. There's different types of taxis. And the only way to get anywhere is on a taxi. You know, the average church member, they might have to walk an hour to get to church, 30 minutes to get to church.
You could literally plant a church five miles apart, each church, and you would never approach on someone's so-called territory because people can't afford a taxi. If you spend $5 on a taxi, again, that's $5.
It could be used for five pounds of rice. And so the people are walking to church. Sometimes they have a taxi where they're riding on a motorcycle. We've seen motorcycles carrying several people on the motorcycle to pay for the taxi.
We've seen donkey taxis. We've seen horse-driven taxis, large taxis, small taxis, people trying to get around, but normally people walk. They walk a long way just to get to church, just to be with the people of God for Sunday.
By the way, Reginald, thank you for clarifying. He sent me another email saying, Scuttle Hole is a region in Watermill, Long Island, New York. Well, thanks a lot for that clarification. In fact, I would love to visit Watermill again.
It's been a long time. Was at a wonderful event at a catering hall there. Remembering my friend that I mentioned was a missionary in Vietnam, it wasn't just the restaurants that were designated, the nice restaurants that is, that were designated only to tourists, but there were areas, there were specific areas where only tourists were allowed to travel and so on.
Your average person couldn't go there. Is that the same thing in Cuba or no?
We did not sense that at all. It seems that travel and all of that seems to be pretty open. Now, if you were on a highway, it is very common for government officials, the army, to be standing on the side of the road and they might just wave your taxi over and they may ask for passports for everyone in the vehicle.
They might wanna check and see where you're going, but everything seemed to us to be very available, very free. That's why I said the people, the regular Cuban people just seem to exist within the system.
But here's the thing, I wanna make sure I say this. The Cuban people know that communism has failed. They know that. It's an open secret. It's no problem. They get it. They're not buffoons. They're not fooled by anything.
See, in this country, they know they're hungry. They know they can't find fuel. They know they're walking. The Cuban government did a terrible mistake by allowing social media in because social media showed the people there's a world out there where people are not living like they are.
And so the people know that it's failed, but they don't know what to do about it. One documentary said we are like caged animals and we've been in the cage for so long that when you open the cage, you show us the forest.
We don't know what's out there. We don't know how we're gonna eat, how we're gonna drink and how we're gonna survive. We'd rather stay in this cage because we don't know any other hope. We have no way of understanding how to proceed from here.
Was there any existing at all anti-American sentiment from any of the average people with whom you conversed and evangelized?
That's an interesting question. I have to answer that with this very simple thing. A man had a phone and on his phone, and when you click your phone, there's a picture there on your phone. I have a picture of my wife.
When I touch my phone, there's a picture of my wife there. When he touches his phone, Chris, it's a United States flag.
And I asked him, why do you have the United States flag there? He says, because it gives me hope, he said, because it reminds me that there is a free land. There is a free place where people can live.
See, people from Cuba that come here, they're not coming here looking for welfare. They're not coming here looking for a handout. They're coming here for a new life so they can get a job, so they can start a business, so they can have a new existence.
They're not coming here looking for a paycheck. They're coming here because they want to have something that's free. And it's very hard to get here. Thousands of dollars. You have to have an invitation from a family member.
And the whole process costs thousands of dollars. The problem is in Cuba, you can't save thousands of dollars and you can't send money there. Like I mentioned earlier, you cannot access PayPal. You cannot access any credit card website.
You cannot access any type of thing. We understand that American Union functions there, but at a very high, high rate of exchange. And so it's so expensive to try to send money. So people can't get out that way.
So it has to be a very pre-planned way to exit the country. One of the things that they tell the world is that we have medical professionals that are sought after the world over. Now, I am not doubting their credentials.
I'm sure they're trained and I don't know much about it. But what we understand is the medical professionals are being shipped out to other countries in lieu of payment. Cuba owes money to everybody for all the food they get.
So they send doctors and nurses out and those doctors and nurses work. And then the Cuban government makes a situation where they don't have to pay their debt back by giving back to doctors. And by the way, if you're a doctor in Cuba, you might only make 40 to $60 a month yourself.
So it's not some lucrative thing that you're a part of. Medical professionals who might try to do a good thing within the system they live in, live under a very bad system. Healthcare, socialized medicine, is a terrible disaster in Cuba.
And people tell us, if you want rubber gloves in the doctor's office, you have to bring your own rubber gloves. If you want us to have a syringe, you better bring the syringe, go on the black market, find the medicine that goes in the syringe so we can inject you with what you need.
And that's what we've been told by many people. They said, don't go to the doctor unless you're gonna die. The doctors, they say, we apologize, but we have no control over the situation. The average Cuban, again, they know their way of life has failed, their government system, their revolution.
They live in the past, Chris, the huge billboards that show pictures of Fidel that says, I and the revolution, or billboards that show Fidel and Raul and Che Guevara and this new man, Canal Bermudez. And they say, we are the revolution, we are the future of Cuba.
They want you to think that the history of Cuba began with the revolution, not understanding that they, listen, here's what we said amongst ourselves. This is a terrible Testament, but it's true. If you go to Cuba and you see any beautiful buildings, you see any architecture that you say, wow, that is amazing.
The Cubans didn't build it, Chris. Not that the Cubans couldn't build it, but communism is not interested in building beautiful buildings, they're interested in military, exporting communism. They wanted to put down their people.
The buildings the Spaniards have built are beginning to literally fall apart because no one is taking care of them. It was an amazing, amazing situation that they left the buildings up, but the buildings themselves are not built by the commons.
Yeah, that seems to be the opposite story that Tucker Carlson gave when he visited Russia recently. Now obviously Russia is no longer under a Soviet government. I'm not even sure how far removed the current government is from that, but he was raving about how gorgeous the structures were that were obviously erected during the Soviet Union days.
Sure, yeah, I don't know much about that except that when the Soviets came, they probably helped build roads and that type of thing, but when the wall fell, the Soviets backed out and they haven't done much for the infrastructure for Cuba at all.
We've kind of said amongst ourselves, it's interesting, if Cuba had put their wagon to the star of China, they might've been better off because China would have probably come in, brought in their money, brought in their engineers, brought in their scientists.
Cuba might be a different place, but it's very possible the United States would not let that happen even though Cuba is friends with China. It seems like the Soviet Union, the little bit they did for Cuba, they've left them to basically take care of themselves.
Now I know they have ships there in the harbor and all of that, but Cuba again is desperate for money and they're desperate for food.
Okay, we've got to go to our final break. Don't go away, we'll be right back.
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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.
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Puritan Reformed is a Bible believing kingdom building devil fighting church. We're 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 council 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.
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Go to nasbible .com, that's nasbible .com to place your order. Welcome back, and don't forget, folks, that the law firm of Buttafuoco Associates is one of our primary financial supporters. If you are the victim of a very serious personal injury or medical malpractice, please call Dan Buttafuoco of Buttafuoco Associates at 1 -800-NOW-HURT, 1 -800-NOW-HURT, or visit his website at 1800nowhurt .com.
Make sure you mention that you heard about the law firm of Buttafuoco Associates on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. We have Tatiana in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, New York, who says, here in the United States, you have ridiculous people who claim to be Marxists and leftists and are simultaneously homosexuals and transgendered people.
Communist nations have very rarely, if ever, been safe havens for such people, which makes their attitudes and public persona even more moronic. The same goes with those same people promoting and applauding Hamas and other Muslims who would desire to see our nation under Sharia law where homosexuals would never survive.
What is the attitude by the government in Cuba toward homosexuality?
Well, the new president has just brought the banner down and is embracing transgender and many of these things that we call gender perversion. You can Google that and see the new stance on that. But we went by a place when we were evangelizing.
By the way, it is free to, we can evangelize, pass out tracts, pass out literature. Very friendly people, very easy to talk to. We went by a place that actually did have the corrupted rainbow flag outside.
And after a conversation with them and some prayer and activity out there, they actually pulled it down. But this is a place that was promoting that. So it is actually being embraced right now. But quickly, let me just add this to the time we have.
A gallon of milk right now, they're telling us in the black market, Chris, is $20 American. That's hard when you only own $30. Can you hear me there, Chris?
Yes, I hear you. I hear you. Can you hear me?
All right. Yeah, let's find out as long as we keep going. A gallon of milk in the black market is $20. A pound of rice, $6. There's no incentive to do anything. Someone told us they sent a box of Bibles in, distributed a box of Bibles, and they were now banned from the nation of Cuba because they sent a box of Bibles into Cuba.
So people ask us, they wanna know about Cuba. What do we do about Cuba? And I'm gonna tell you, there is no economic hope for Cuba. Economic policy will not save Cuba. Anything they change in the civil government might help them.
Getting rid of the totalitarian state will help them. But the final answer is the gospel. The gospel and the optimistic gospel, a gospel with Christians of Cuba, seeking to advance the crown rights of Jesus Christ is the answer.
Churches and leaders of these churches that we counted hopeful are strong in their faith. They have great faith today that the gospel is the power of God and the salvation. People ask us, why would you go to Cuba?
And this is why I'm on the radio, Chris. This is what I tell them. And this is what we tell the Cuban people when we are there. Since we do believe that the gospel is the power of God and the salvation, we go to Cuba so that in time to come, Cuba will become an ensign to the nations and the islands of the West Indies and the Caribbean that in this place, Cuba, King Jesus reigns and his law is obeyed.
Praise God.
We have great hope. We have great hope because the churches are strong and growing and evangelism is spreading and the churches are getting more people in. And by the power of the gospel, that God can do a miracle in a small country.
A fatalistic eschatology is of no use and of no hope in this nation. The only hope is that even in Cuba, that the strong man is being bound and the Christ church is being established. And that as Jesus reigns in hearts, now he will begin to reign also in the seats of judgment as a totalitarian nation is crushed under the rod of Christ.
Amen.
So with that, Chris, I just wanna remind our listeners, cubamissionsatproton .me. C-U-B-A missionsatproton .me. I would be happy to answer any questions that we could not talk about on the air. If they'd like to help us to help these pastors, they can't print Bibles.
They can do hardly anything. We have to bring paper into them. They can put Bibles on the Xerox machine. They can print literature on the Xerox machine. We go to your prayer meeting. We get a box of books, a bag of books.
They come to a conference. We're able to give them maybe an inch full of pamphlets. That's the best we can do. So pray for us. Pray that God would continue to bust Cuba open and that the leaders would bow toward King Jesus.
Amen. And don't forget that email address for more questions to our guests that you couldn't ask on the air or to financially support his labors in Cuba. Cubamissionsatproton .me. Cubamissionsatproton .me.
I wanna thank you, Carlos Spurgeon, for doing such a wonderful job today on the program. I look forward to your return with more updates on your mission trips there. I wanna thank everybody who listened, especially those who took the time to write in questions.
And I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater Savior than you are a sinner. I hope you all have a very blessed, safe, happy, and healthy weekend and Christ-honoring Lord's Day.
God bless.