Florida church invests in gospel work, future leaders in Cuba

CHIPLEY, Fla. — When Pastor Mike Orr returned from Cuba and stood before First Baptist Church Chipley to share what he had witnessed, he presented his congregation with a need.

The Baptist seminary in Havana was growing. More students were coming to be trained for ministry, but space was limited. Offices for the Western Baptist Convention of Cuba had been moved to the seminary after an explosion damaged convention facilities at Iglesia Bautista el Calvario, taking up classroom space at a time when the seminary needed more room, not less.

Convention leaders hoped to add a third floor to the seminary with two large spaces for additional classrooms. The estimated cost was $50,000.

“I really believe God wants us to build this building, so I’m just going to put it out there,” Orr recalled telling the congregation.

Within days, the need was met.

Two gifts of $25,000 provided the full amount needed for the seminary expansion. Then another $25,000 came in, bringing First Baptist Chipley’s total giving to $75,000.

“I just know that was the provision of God,” Orr said. “God stirred the hearts of people to give.”

The church designated the additional $25,000 toward another need: helping Cuban Baptists secure a new property for the Western Baptist Convention offices, which would also free additional space at the seminary.

For Orr and Jennifer Duncan, First Baptist Chipley’s ministry assistant to the pastor and women and missions associate, the generosity is part of something much larger than a construction project.

It is an investment in a growing gospel movement.

First Baptist Chipley’s partnership with Cuban Baptists began as the church sought to develop deeper, long-term missions relationships.

Through Florida Baptists’ partnership with Cuba and an invitation from Florida Baptist missions and ministries lead catalyst Myles Dowdy, Orr and other church leaders traveled to Cuba on a vision trip to see firsthand what God was doing through churches, the Western Baptist Convention and the seminary.

They returned convinced that First Baptist Chipley should be part of it.

“Before even getting back into America, we said, ‘We’ve got to partner here,’” Duncan recalled. “God’s moving there and God’s working there, and we want to be a part of it.”

For Duncan, the connection is especially personal.

Both of her parents were born in Havana and came to the United States as children. Years earlier, while Duncan was a student studying missions, she traveled to Cuba through a missions opportunity connected with the Florida Baptist Convention.

During that trip, she met an uncle she had never met before. On the final day, Duncan shared the gospel with him outside a Havana hotel and saw him place his faith in Christ.

Years later, God brought Duncan back into ministry involving the country so closely tied to her family.

“Cuba just has a very special place in my heart,” she said.

Today, First Baptist Chipley is focusing its partnership on supporting the Western Baptist Convention, the seminary and churches seeking to reach Havana, a city of approximately 2 million people.

What church leaders are witnessing, Duncan said, is remarkable.

“In the midst of incredible suffering and trials … the gospel is still advancing under immense pressure,” she said. “Only the Lord can do that, and we give Him the glory for it.”

“Buildings are collapsing, but the church is building. People are hungry, but the church is feeding. This is a harvest moment, and together we can do it. The best years are ahead of us,” said Bárbaro Abel Marrero Castellanos, president of the Western Cuba Baptist Convention.

The church’s investment in Cuba also includes helping train men called to pastoral ministry.

In 2025, as First Baptist Chipley celebrated Orr’s 25th anniversary as pastor, the church established the Mike Orr Scholarship, designed to fully support a student studying at the Baptist seminary in Cuba.

Its first recipient was Miguel.

Before coming to Christ, Miguel struggled with drug addiction and practiced Santería. Cuban believers had faithfully shared the gospel with him over time, planting seeds in his life. Then, during a visit by an American short-term mission team, another believer shared the gospel with him.

Miguel trusted Christ.

His life changed so dramatically that people throughout his community began noticing the difference. He walked away from drugs, burned his idols, and eventually answered God’s call to ministry.

Now, he is studying at the seminary to become a pastor, and his testimony is helping draw others to Christ.

For Duncan, Miguel’s story is a powerful reminder that short-term mission teams can become part of years of faithful gospel work already happening on the field.

“You may have people in our church right now that cannot go to Cuba, or that probably will not ever go to Cuba,” Duncan said. “But they’re helping to spread the gospel there. They’re helping to raise up a generation of students there in the seminary through their generous giving and through their prayers. This is what gospel partnership and gospel unity looks like.”

During a July visit to Cuba, the church presented its second scholarship to Raul, another seminary student actively serving through house church ministry.

For Orr, the meeting brought an unexpected reminder of how God works through missions partnerships.

Orr recognized Raul from an evangelism outreach the previous October. During that outreach, the team had spent nearly two hours sharing the gospel in a home. Orr left wondering what, if anything, would come from the conversation.

When he returned months later to present Raul with the scholarship, a young woman was sitting nearby. She had been in that home during the earlier gospel conversation.

Orr remembered seeing her leave with her boyfriend and assuming she had not been listening.

He was wrong.

Through that visit, she later trusted Christ and became part of the house church.

“It’s just amazing how God did work,” Orr said.

Those stories are being repeated across Cuba, where Baptist leaders are witnessing people searching for hope and churches responding to both spiritual and physical needs.

During First Baptist Chipley’s July visit, the team stopped at a church during Vacation Bible School. More than 300 children were attending that day. By the following day, attendance had climbed to more than 500.

Other churches are so full, Duncan said, that people gather near windows and balconies because there is not enough room inside.

Churches also are meeting practical needs. First Baptist Chipley teams bring suitcases containing basic over-the-counter medicines because many Cubans cannot easily obtain them. People turn to local churches for food, medicine and other necessities.

And through those acts of compassion, believers continue pointing people to Christ.

Florida Baptists have partnered with Cuban Baptists for decades, and Duncan said Cuban Baptist leaders have repeatedly expressed the importance of that relationship.

The current season, she said, presents an opportunity that churches should not take for granted.

“We do not know how long this door to Cuba will be open,” Duncan said. “But while it’s open, we want to pray, we want to give, and we want to go to support the work that God is doing there.”

The impact could extend far beyond the island.

Cuban believers and missionaries can sometimes enter countries where access for American missionaries is much more difficult, Duncan explained. Training and equipping Cuban Christians, therefore, has the potential to advance the gospel in places First Baptist Chipley may never directly reach.

“An investment in Cuba is an investment in the kingdom,” she said.

Orr hopes First Baptist Chipley’s experience encourages churches of every size to find ways to participate in missions.

Some congregations may believe they do not have the people or financial resources to make a significant difference. Orr encourages them to start with what God has placed in their hands.

“Every church, no matter what we think we can or can’t do, do what you can,” he said. “No matter how small we think our contribution is, God takes it and multiplies it.”

Going on mission, he added, not only strengthens believers serving in another part of the world. It also changes the church that goes.

“It will change the culture of your church,” Orr said. “It will develop you spiritually. It will give you a heart to reach the lost in your own community and help you understand the need to get the gospel to the world.”

For First Baptist Chipley, that lesson is becoming increasingly visible through a partnership stretching from a congregation in the Florida Panhandle to classrooms, house churches and neighborhoods across Havana.

Buildings are being expanded. Future pastors are being trained. Churches are overflowing.

And the gospel continues to advance.

“The building was shaken, but their faith was not,” Duncan said of Cuban believers affected by the explosion. “It actually strengthened them.”