Day 4 & 5: July 5-6
By Mandy Cloninger My shoulders were shaking as I prayed, tears streaming down my face, and I looked around, and several others on the team looked just like me. Last night we worshipped again with Pastor Guillermo at the Central Havana Methodist Church where we’re serving this week. This service was a little different; a community service focused primarily on prayer. We began with a few praise and worship songs, and my favorite one was back in the mix, and all of us were a little more comfortable this time in worship so we were definitely getting into it, including our dear friend Belinda, who spontaneously had busted out in song with Pastor Guillermo while passing rocks on the staircase, and then he introduced her to the whole congregation as we sang Si Senor, and as you can tell, Belinda had a lot of fun with it! If you’ll recall earlier this week, she said that Pastor Guillermo reminded her of David who was willing to dance like a fool for the Lord, no matter what anyone thought. As you can tell, what the Lord is doing here in Cuba is contagious! Yes, yes, God, yes, yes, God, Si Senor, Si Si Senor. (I am praying the video works when you click the picture!)
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| From Cuba |
This is the chorus that we can’t seem to get enough of, because even today after lunch, we got a little crazy and had our own little mini-concert with Pastor Guillermo, his wife, and Orlian, on drums, playing our theme song: “Loco como yo.” “Nunca pense que Jesuscristo transformara mi corazón era algo imposible para un loco como yo.” I never thought that Jesus Christ would transform my heart, it seemed impossible for a crazy person like me!
After a couple praise songs, we settled into prayer, which began individually, each person on his or her knees if able or in the pew, and Pastor Guillermo leading the prayers; however, what was dramatically different was all the prayers were said aloud in chorus. No one’s prayers were anonymous; you could hear your neighbors prayers being lifted up. I imagined that this was very pleasing to God’s ears, because it was quite beautiful to mine. I couldn’t help but think of the scripture that says, don’t worry about anything; instead pray about everything.
The service progressed as we turned to our neighbor and began praying for him or her. Rebecca was seated next to me, and I know Rebecca pretty well – she was the one who invited me to Hyde Park a couple years ago in fact, but praying aloud for her, seated next to her, was a moving experience. I settled into praise, things on her heart that I knew, prayers for the use of her very special gifts like language, apostleship and ministering with children (all things I’ve been able to observe of her on this trip) and things unsaid, and just kept lifting up all the prayer and praise I could think of. I have never quite prayed like that for anyone especially with her next to me. It was an experience I will not forget, and I am pretty sure, I am going to have to find someone to practice with when I return home!
Then, as if the intimacy of prayer with another person wasn’t enough, we progressed into small group community and prayer with a small group. Rebecca and I joined the praise and worship team up front; we wrapped arms around one another and began lifting up prayers for the group and each person within the group. My Spanglish, Rebecca’s very good Spanish, and all our brothers and sisters in Cuba’s voices in Spanish calling on el espiritu santo was truly like the music of prayer. Imagine this with a room filled with a couple hundred people and the power of prayer that could be heard from the streets in Central Havana; it was very powerful. An experience like no other I have ever had. I wrote in my journal, all of those prayers being lifted to the heavens must be like sweet, sweet music to the Lord’s ears.
The construction has continued well, and we’ve made progress with moving supplies up three flights of stairs, paint scraping, cleaning, begun painting, tearing down walls and building relationships with all our brothers and sisters in Cuba. Pastor Guillermo shared that several members of the church prayed through the night for the work that the church is doing, and I have to believe that many of the things we have observed on this trip, the blessings, the random coincidences and the tremendous successes of just the right thing getting to the right person at the right time are the direct result of prayer.
As Rebecca sat down with me this evening, we hunted down the scripture from Philippians that I referenced earlier, Philippians 4:6-8: “Don’t worry about anything; instead pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus.”
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