It was an unexpected treasure…even for Home Missions director of church growth David Crowe, who trolls the Internet like a hungry shark searching for hidden pieces of Free Will Baptist history. His patient search snagged an almost-forgotten letter about the beginnings of Free Will Baptist outreach in Cuba written by late Missouri pastor, Winford Davis.   Mystery Manuscript The 17-paragraph, three-page, single-spaced letter covers the 10-year span when the Free Will Baptist presence in Cuba grew from a dream in Thomas “Pop” Willey’s mind to a robust ministry with its own association, five missionaries, and an 18-acre farm with a mission school and compound. The document was signed by Winford Davis, a gifted preacher from Missouri. Davis played a major role in the 1935 organization of the National Association of Free Will Baptists and was a member of the landmark Treatise Committee. The manuscript is undated, so its exact age remains in question. Even though Davis mostly refers to events in the early to mid-1940s, he mentions the Fidel Castro regime, which means the report was written no earlier than 1959, perhaps later.   Monett Connection For several years, the Foreign Missions Board (now International Missions Board) operated out of … Continue reading Forgotten Days of Early Cuba