By David Dickson

The last several years have been characterized by the influx of an increasing number of immigrants to the United States, in large part from Mexico and the countries of Central America. Among those who immigrated from Central America are the Garifuna people group who represent a small percentage of the populations of Honduras, Guatemala and Belize.  Garifunas are descendants of Africans forcibly transported to the Americas and the Arawak Indians of St. Vincent. 

Although Garifunas speak the language of the country where they live (Spanish or English), their heart language remains their own unique language. Those who have immigrated to the U.S. tend to end up living in larger cities of the country in close proximity to other recent immigrants who share their language and culture.

Bro. Cherry Gamboa, former co-pastor of a BMAA Garifuna language congregation in San Juan, Honduras, recently immigrated with his family to the Bronx, New York. He was immediately able to connect with a number of folks who had attended our churches in Honduras before moving to the U.S. The problem they all mentioned to him was that there are no Garifuna-language Baptist churches in the area . . . at all.  (Actually, none in the U.S.)  Although there are a handful of Garifuna congregations in the U.S., none are Baptist.  

With the authorization and support of the church in San Juan, Bro. Cherry has begun holding services in the basement of a dwelling in the Bronx and is already packing their small meeting area to its maximum capacity. Bro. Cherry supports himself and his family with a secular job, and receives no salary as a missionary/pastor, but that has not slowed him down. With the participation of his family in leadership roles, services are conducted in Garifuna/Spanish, and the Lord has already blessed with professions of faith. 

Several of those who attend are “transplants” from BMAA Garifuna churches in Honduras and were active in their congregation before they immigrated to the U.S. They are overjoyed to find a church that is doctrinally sound and preaches the same doctrine as the churches they left in Honduras.  

Of course, the pressing problem is finding a larger building for their meetings. Because most of those attendees work in low-paying jobs, locating a meeting place they can afford is a daunting task. But as you would expect, Brother Cherry is optimistic that God will soon provide for them a new meeting place, adequate for his growing congregation. 

Keep this missions effort in your prayers: the first and only Baptist church plant among the Garifuna people in our country.