J’can Santa preaches about Christ - Says followers of Jesus are like Father Christmas
Unlike other Santas in the plazas and shopping malls with fake wigs and beards, Sterling Ramgeet's silver hair and beard are authentic.
But the gift this Santa brings is preaching about the gospel of Jesus Christ.
"I have worked at the airport and sections of downtown Kingston. I put on my Santa Claus suit and use it as an opportunity to minister about Jesus Christ. I do the whole 'Ho Ho Ho' thing, too, but I am not sure if I will be doing it this year, but if someone calls me to do it I may. My hairstyle helps me to minister. All I do is wash it and leave it and God do the rest and treat it for me," he said.
Ramgeet, 77, is known by some in east Kingston as 'Black Jesus'. The father of five said he got baptised 22 years ago and has been growing his hair since under the instruction of the Lord.
"The first Santa Claus was a woman and she carry her gift in her stomach, and that gift was Jesus Christ, so Santa means 'saint' that was sent on a mission to bring joy to the world. That joy was also a gift and I got that gift. Everyone who have Jesus in them is a Santa Claus," he said. Ramgeet, sitting in his yard in Mountain View, raised his hands and spoke to the heavens before declaring that he was promised eternal life by the Almighty.
"I will live forever. I have to believe what he says because sometimes I feel like I going to die eno, but God say I should not follow my feeling. He keeps telling that his words will not pass away and he promises eternal life," he said.
Faith in the Almighty
So strong is his faith in the Almighty that he does not visit a health practitioner whenever he is sick; he waits on the Lord to heal him.
"I respect all the doctors out there, but Jesus always ask me why would I want to leave him and go somewhere else for treatment. I remember being crippled in the past for about four days and couldn't move. I felt all the energy coming out of my body and I was thinking about death and think I was going to die, and I heard a voice say to me 'What is that you thinking because I did not give you death'. I change my thoughts and I felt the energy coming back to me and I was okay," he said.
Ramgeet said he also possesses the ability to heal the sick.
"I remember hearing about a woman who was very sick at the hospital and her family was very worried that she was going to die. I went there and I touch her on her knee and her forehead. No hocus-pocus thing. She wasn't talking before and when I touched her she bawl out, and that woman is alive and well today. I wasn't the one who healed her, it was God," he said.