While the Trump Administration’s focus remains largely on the war in Iran, the president took some time earlier this week to address the situation with Cuba as well. Hinting that they may be next in line for regime change, he stated, “It may be a friendly takeover, it may not be a friendly takeover. It wouldn’t matter because they’re really, they’re down to, as I say, fumes.”

Trump went on to add, “They have no energy. They have no money. They’re in deep trouble on a humanitarian basis.” As I discussed in the News Worth Knowing section of this week’s Focus, those comments came after he’d previously mused, “They want to make a deal, and so I’m going to put Marco [Rubio] over there, and we’ll see how that works out.”

As we’ve seen with Iran, Russia and Ukraine, Venezuela, and in a host of other conflicts, wanting to make a deal and being willing to give up what it would take to get a deal are rarely the same. And while the president is correct that Cuba is struggling in almost every way, it’s still unclear what any such negotiations would entail.

Cuba does not have a clear successor who could take over, like in Venezuela. They also don’t have the same kind of economic or natural resources that could prove appealing. Instead, it’s likely that any concessions of interest to the administration would center around the country’s relationships with Russia and China.

A report from the Center for Strategic & International Studies found that there are likely multiple sites on the island that China is currently using to spy on the United States. Russia is also thought to utilize Cuba and other Latin American countries like Nicaragua for similar purposes. Reducing our neighbor nation’s ties to these countries would be difficult, but it would also fit well within the administration’s foreign policy focus on the Western hemisphere.

Yet, until a deal is reached, it’s the people in Cuba who will continue to suffer, and it’s crucial that we don’t lose sight of their plight as we consider the broader negotiations between governments.

“You can tell something isn’t right”

While the toppling of former Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro—and, more specifically, the cessation of free oil to Cuba—was, in many ways, the tipping point for the Cuban people, many were in dire straits well before then.

Cuba is one of only two Latin American nations currently in a recession, with Haiti the other. 89 percent of the population lives in extreme poverty, and even their government admits that most live on one meal a day, if that. Moreover, a mosquito-borne illness—easily treated with acetaminophen like Tylenol—has proved difficult to contain and has led to 55 deaths since November due to a shortage of medicine.

A nationwide blackout was triggered recently after the Antonio Guitera thermoelectric plant, the island’s largest power station, failed. Even when the plant was functioning, though, the aforementioned fuel shortages meant many went without power. Power cuts of up to twenty hours are common, while the lack of fuel makes getting to work, transporting food, or simply getting around too great a struggle for most.

And, as Jaob Lesniewski, the Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) regional codirector for Cuba, described, it gets worse the farther you get from the capital:

When you arrive in Havana, you can tell something isn’t right. But it’s nothing compared to what you begin to see as you travel farther east. Entire cities look like ghost towns. There are factories, schools, and hospitals that once functioned but now stand empty and severely deteriorated.

As is often the case, however, God is already at work through his people in ways that are making a genuine difference in the lives of those in need.

“Christian churches have become essential spaces”

Hernán Restrepo has an excellent article in Christianity Today about the work believers are doing in Cuba. In it, he describes how Christians are using whatever means are at their disposal to help those around them. Whether it’s providing food, clothing, hygiene products, or simply comfort, God’s people are giving from what little they have to be his hands and feet to the people the Lord has placed around them.

Moreover, even the government has started to recognize the value of getting help from believers. Ministries like MCC have met remarkably little resistance as they’ve brought in shipping containers of humanitarian relief. Instead, their greatest problems have come from getting that aid to the people once it arrives.

The oil embargo has made it difficult to use trucks to distribute the supplies, and the churches with whom they work are often forced to rely on “underfed horses” and carts instead. Still, they’re doing what they can, and it’s still often far more than the people receive from the government.

As Mayra Espino, a sociologist and researcher in Cuba, points out:

In a country where the state can no longer provide basic services like health care and education, Christian churches have become essential spaces for society—not only to receive humanitarian aid or spiritual comfort, but also to build community.

And it’s been that way for quite a while.

In 2008, for example, Cuba was devastated by four hurricanes in a single year. Espino notes that Christians earned a newfound respect after local churches helped repair the roofs of their non-Christian neighbors before fixing their own. It was a gesture of care that was not soon forgotten, in part because Cuban believers have continued to demonstrate that kind of concern in the years since.

And, in so doing, they offer an important example for believers everywhere.

“The gospel is relational”

Sometimes it can be easy to look at the gravity of the needs around us and feel overwhelmed. And that’s alright. Many of those needs are truly overwhelming and, to put it a bit cynically, there’s a reason Jesus told his disciples that they would always have the poor with them (Matthew 26:11).

But the lesson we should learn from our brothers and sisters in Cuba is that we don’t have to meet every need in order to make a tangible difference. Moreover, seldom will you be called to meet those needs alone.

Cuban believers, at their best, make a difference in their communities by working together. They try to model the kind of fellowship Luke describes at the end of Acts 2, where the believers devoted themselves to the study of God’s word, to sharing meals, to prayer, and to providing for the needs of those around to the extent that it was within their capacity to do so (Acts 2:42–46).

And the result is often the same today as it was two thousand years ago: “The Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved” (Acts 2:47).

As Pastor Carlos Alamino of Proclaim Cuba described when he and his son were guests on the Denison Forum Podcast, “The gospel is relational . . . So if we are able to provide for a person, if we’re able to meet their needs, their hearts are going to be ready to receive the gospel.”

And the key is that they are not doing it alone. Carlos went on to describe how “if I close my eyes and I touch any part of the island, we have somebody there that we can call and do ministry with.”

Can you imagine how much more we could accomplish for God’s kingdom in America if we could say the same? Can you imagine how much more you could accomplish just in your city or your town if you could point to any part of your community and know that your finger would fall on someone you could “do ministry with”?

The best place to start toward that goal is to make sure you are willing to be that someone in your community.

While your role in the Body of Christ is essential, you can’t play that role well if you’re trying to do it by yourself. So don’t try. Instead, take some time today to ask God where he would like you to serve, then pray for people to serve with you in that capacity.

Let’s start right now.

• Note: If you would like to find out more about what God is doing in Cuba and how you can help, I encourage you to visit ProclaimCuba.org. There are a number of organizations doing God’s work on the island, and they’re a great place to start learning more.

Quote of the day: 

“If God only used perfect people, nothing would get done. God will use anybody if you’re available.”—Rick Warren

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A reflection on cultural engagement and personal transformation

NOTE: Iran has apparently conducted a significant cyberattack against a US company, a first since the war began. As more is known, I will provide an update on the war and a biblical response in an article on our website later this morning.

If you live where I live, you waited for the rain to end yesterday for hours on end. But it could be worse: people in the Northern Territory of Australia are being warned to stay out of rain-fueled rivers in their area because, as one official put it, “There are crocs absolutely everywhere.”

Social media in the region is filled with images and videos of crocodiles floating down streets and galloping across roads. Residents are being told to “assume any waterway may contain a crocodile.”

There’s your devotional thought for the day.

If you pay much attention to secular culture, you might feel the same way about the moral issues of our time. It seems you cannot watch a television show without meeting LGBTQ characters normalizing LGBTQ ideology. Advocates for “reproductive healthcare” (abortion) are active on every platform. Non-evangelicals view evangelicals in decidedly negative ways.

Continue reading Denison Forum – “There are crocs absolutely everywhere” →

A surprising discovery about doubt and fear

A potent storm system is bringing a multi-day threat of tornadoes, damaging winds, and large hail to the Plains, Midwest, and the Ohio Valley. This after a tornado with maximum wind speeds up to 130 mph ripped through Michigan last week, leaving a trail of destruction in its path. The mayor of Three Rivers, Michigan, told FOX Weather that the storm damage is so extensive that she does not recognize parts of her city.

I can understand on a logical level the suffering that results from human sin: God honors the free will with which we are made in his image, so the consequences of our moral failures are not his fault but ours. I can even stretch this logic to include the suffering our sins cause others; if God removed all such consequences, we would not have moral agency.

But this is easy for me to say when I am not the innocent victim of such sin. I would be horrified if someone used this logic to explain the Holocaust to the Jewish people or the horrors of 9/11 to those still grieving those who died on that tragic day.

And it is even harder to understand suffering when it has no moral cause. I know that natural disasters and diseases are the result of the Fall (Romans 8:22); in the Garden of Eden, there were no tornadoes or cancers. But God often intervenes in the Bible and across history to prevent such disasters. When he does not, we can easily question his decision and even his character.

A maxim I have heard over the years advises us to “doubt your doubts and believe your beliefs.” That’s fine until our doubts truly threaten our beliefs.

What then?

“First world” problems

I have been dealing with a series of “first-world” problems lately.

I skipped walking outside this morning because of the rain our local meteorologists forecast that never fell. A repair person is coming by later today to replace our modem because our internet provider couldn’t get the existing one to work, through no fault of the existing modem. I am placing my third call to a repair person who keeps promising to fix our back gate but never shows up. Later today, I will place my third call to an insurance representative who keeps promising to look into a missing rebate but never calls us back.

The other day, my wife and I were talking with an older man on our walking trail who told us about the illness their daughter continues to face. He made a statement that has stayed with me: “Everyone has a million problems until they get sick.”

It’s then, in those crises where we most need God, that we sometimes feel that he is least present. This struggle is not sinful: if the sinless Son of God could cry from the cross, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46), so can we.

“But they had no child”

Part of our problem is that our minds are finite and fallen and thus cannot possibly comprehend the character and ways of an infinite and perfect Being. As Elihu noted, God “does things that we cannot comprehend” (Job 37:5). If we could truly understand God, either we would be God, or he would not be.

Another part of our challenge is that we can experience reality only in this moment and thus are incapable of seeing the larger perspective within which God operates.

For example, I read this week that Zechariah and Elizabeth “were both righteous before God, walking blamelessly in all the commandments and statutes of the Lord. But they had no child, because Elizabeth was barren, and both were advanced in years” (Luke 1:6–7). Then came the miracle by which Gabriel appeared to Zechariah, promising that he and his wife would have a son (vv. 8–23). We know him as John the Baptist.

They could not possibly have understood that God’s delay was so that Mary could become old enough to bear the Son of God, for whom their son would serve as a forerunner. We can seldom understand God’s timing at the time, but his omniscience is not limited by our limitations.

However, even acknowledging the finitude of my mind and temporality, I still want to understand why God permits such suffering in his creation. I would like to believe that such doubts are motivated solely by my mind and quest for rationality.

But a sermon I read this week has convinced me otherwise.

“In these times of doubt, look to your fears”

I subscribe to a daily devotional from the Society of St. John the Evangelist in Boston. These brief paragraphs are excerpts from longer sermons the brothers have preached over the years. A devotional I received earlier this week caught my eye, so I opened the sermon it came from.

It was preached by Br. Jack Crowley in January 2025. His message was based on the flight of the holy family to Egypt (Matthew 2:13–15), focusing on the doubts and stress that Joseph and Mary must have felt as they left all they knew for an unknown future as King Herod sought to murder their baby boy.

Br. Crowley noted that we all have similar “flights” and the fears they engender: “In our flight to Egypt there will be times of doubt. Times when we doubt if we have done the right things, times when we will doubt the quality of our own selves, times when we will doubt our ability to find God in any of it, and times when we will doubt humanity at large.”

Then he advised:

In these times of doubt, look to your fears. Ask yourself what fear is fueling your doubt? Do you fear that you are not good enough? Do you fear that you are not worthy of love? Do you fear that you have not done enough with your life?

These fears can drown us in doubt. These fears can make our lives impossible. These fears can paralyze our days. We need God’s help. We can admit it, we are not strong enough on our own, we need God’s help.

We need to bring to God our fears, our doubt, our stress and all the other things that keep us up at night. We need God’s help in our journey into Egypt. There is no shame in praying out of desperation and great need.

When we get to the other side of this thing we will be stronger, we will know ourselves better, and we will be closer to God. Our journey into Egypt may take a long time, but it is worth it. May God help us all.

“Lord, I believe; help my unbelief!”

Br. Crowley is right: My doubts are sometimes birthed by my fears. What if God is not the loving Father I want him to be? What if his omnipotence or omniscience is limited? What if he doesn’t hear my prayers or care about my problems?

Then I realize these fears are less about him than they are about me. I fear that I am not worthy of his love and care. I fear that I am not able to pray effectively or to trust fully. I fear less that he is not enough than that I am not enough.

At such times, I need to remember the cross, where the Father considered my salvation worth the death of his Son. I need to remember all the sins he has forgiven, all the needs he has met, and to believe that he does not change (Malachi 3:6) and that all of God there is, is in this moment.

And then, if this is not enough, I can pray with the beleaguered father, “Lord, I believe; help my unbelief!” (Mark 9:24).

And he will.

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