We’ve seen it so frequently that youngest has given it a name:

Ballerina.

Once, I opened our kitchen cupboard and the thing jumped on my left arm.  Spooked me silly.

However, we’ve not seen ballerina in the last few days. 

It lost its tail in capture attempt by Brandon  

We haven’t seen it since.

Watching a separated gecko spastically dancing on our counter provided great family entertainment.

Here is our pet near some ceiling trim.

©2010 Our Mission in Panama. All Rights Reserved.

I felt powerless to do anything about it.  Not enough language skills to find a police officer or describe the person

Like a shadow, he appeared and it was gone in less than 3 seconds.

Because of the drug trade that runs in our city, I have no knowledge if the robber is carrying a gun, or has other accomplices or what.

Later, I thought of things I could do safely, but I still don’t know if I would be able to do anything.

It happened so fast, so casually. 

The victim left her cell phone in an outer pocket of her purse, and with a swift hand, he lifted it. 

One thing that happens in a big city like ours is this kind of petty thievery.

On New Years eve, a lady was getting a soda at the little convenience store, when a fireworks vendor snatched and grabbed her necklace, leaving the fireworks box on the floor. 

Some of our party guests were witnesses, as they were getting additional ice for our party.

We’ve been picked at least twice and Brenda has stopped one or two trying to get into her backpack.  One of our uncles was picked on a crowded bus.

Well meaning strangers have often warned us if they notice that our backpack zipper is slightly open. We understand the reason why. 

I find that when I walk with my kids anywhere these days, I walk with a level of alertness that we didn’t have before.  I’m scanning the crowd.  During my walk, all are suspect.

We’ve had to learn the hard way.  In the suburban US where we lived, this was never a consideration. 

We’ve now formed new patterns of behavior and new ways of thinking because of our calling to live in this city. 

We pray for this city, we love this city, and it does break our hearts to see this kind of stain in our city.

©2010 Our Mission in Panama. All Rights Reserved.

Requirements to use Skype:
High speed Internet
Computer with microphone and speakers.  Headset is better.
Install from www.skype.com

Video cam is optional but helpful.  We have done video conferences via Skype and multi-national conference calls.

Skype to Skype calls are free.

I also do some long distance coaching via video-cam thanks to Skype.

©2010 Our Mission in Panama. All Rights Reserved.

I prayerwalk the 3 neighborhoods regularly and have discovered a few observations:

• Less than 5 churches in the entire area.
• Condominium towers from 4 stories to over 50 stories.
• Very popular night clubs and restaurants.
• Streets known for hookers at night.
• A smattering of single family houses.
• Lots of office buildings
• Lots of pedestrian traffic during the weekdays.
• Very empty on the weekends.
• Residents generally middle to upper middle class.

Housing

Apartment towers have 24 hour security and access to them is by being buzzed in by a resident.

High density housing even among single family houses means that your next door neighbor’s wall is likely less than 3 feet away if not directly attached as row houses.

Single family houses are hidden behind walls and gates.  Windows and doors are covered with iron bars painted to match the color scheme of the house.  Border walls have razor wire or broken glass in the cement to keep people from walking on them.  Some families have their own private security guard that sits at the entrance.

Privacy and fortress like security is a key description of housing in our neighborhoods.

People

As we people watch in some three or four parks, we see families, lots of children, and nannies.  The parks begin to fill up with people as the afternoon wears on, and the sun starts to set.

Live-in nannies are common in our part of town who are likely receiving salaries of about $300-400 a month.

Some parks seem to attract more children with their parents.  One park seems only to attract the nannies and children.  It’s an observation to keep watching.

Questions in our mind

• How do we build relationships with our neighborhood?
• How can we discover the community needs as we are in the parks?
• What kinds of park-based outreaches can we do to start ministering to the need?

Would you join us in prayer as we seek to discern this?  We are participating in Launching a New Church in the city and this is part of our prayerful discernment about our neighborhoods.

©2010 Our Mission in Panama. All Rights Reserved.

As I meandered my way to my destinations, I spent the time praying for the city, praying for the people, and asking God to show me how to love this city and minister to it’s people.  We desire for God’s name to be glorified.

The question that I’m asking God to show me is “What binds this city?”  “What are its spiritual needs?”

Two events happened today walking home from an errand.

Try to imagine with me

I stopped to sit on a platform and do some people watching and praying on a busy street.

Backpackers, lost tourists, homeless, and street vendors are all common sights.  I am often given a invitation to a over-priced taxi, or to buy cheap pirated CDs from a walking vendor.

Trash overflows from the cans.

Indigenous women and men from the Kuna people sell their molas and other handiwork.

Vendors sell knock off Ray-ban sunglasses and hawk newspapers.

The urban poor search trash cans for recyclables.

Beggars lean against the wall holding out little foam cups hoping for a spare change from a tourist.

This street has erotic shops, an active strip club and massage parlor, and I’ve often overheard male airline passenger share tips that high priced panama hookers are easily available on this street to service the casino and hotel patrons.

“Do you want a young girl?”

A young man, malnourished, tries to scrape a few bucks by managing the parking in front of a busy plaza.

Common practice in the city.  He tries to stop the flow of traffic to help people back out, cross the street, and directs people to park their cars in the stall.  Typically, folks give him a quarter to “watch their car” for his service.

My attention is drawn to him as I watch his efforts.  People don’t respect him.  He takes authority, as if he’s a traffic cop. Some people share their quarters with him.  I watch him also asks tourists for some change as well. He’s working hard. Confident in his steps.

He sees me sitting on my little bench and approaches.

“Friend” he calls me.  I find that I’m assuming he’ll hit me up for money.  Then he begins to say that

“If you want women, young women, I can hook you up.  I know where they are.  18, 19, 21.  They are pretty, they’ll do what you want, and you can have as many of them as you like. . .”

There is an eagerness to his voice.  I am both stunned and humored.  I let him continue to describe the fleshly beauty and the temptations that he offers (though I am not tempted).  He’s selling me the services of young girls.

I hold up my left hand, showing him the gold band around my fourth finger

“A Ha” he exclaims, leaning back to change his tone and sales pitch.

He’s obviously disappointed.

Refining his eagerness, he starts affirming my decision to stay with one woman and how all the hookers in Panama are infected and that’s its not good to use them because I might get a disease. . .

I chime in: “It is God’s perfect will that sex be expressed inside a marriage between one man and one woman.  I want to be pleasing to the Lord and always honor my wife.”

The shift to God’s calling in marriage quickly stops everything.  Knowing that he won’t get a sale out of me for his services, he then says “Friend, can I have some spare change to buy a soda?”

I turn down his offer.  I know he won’t buy a soda.  He’ll simply add it to the pile of change in his pocket he’s earned from parking cars.

Do you want a taxi?  A woman?

I resume my walk, pondering why was this offer made to me.

There is a section of this street where I’m always offered a taxi.  It’s a pattern that happens every time I walk this street.

A slightly overweight driver points to his car and offers “Taxi my friend?”

Looking him in the eye, I smile and decline his offer.  “No thanks.”  Sometime the drivers attempt to make other conversation with a quick follow up question — “Where you from?” or “Where you going?” or something like that.

Today was different.

“You want a woman?  I can get one for you.”

Stunned, I simply hold up my left hand to show him my wedding band.

With a laugh, he says “that don’t mean anything.”

What are its spiritual needs?

I walked home continuing to pray for my city.  In the time that I’ve been here both as a tourist and resident, this is the first time I’ve been offered women and girls.  I’m sure it happens.

However, I’m also certain that God has shown me an insight into some of the spiritual bondage of this city related to prostitution.  He’s answering my prayer.

For now, he’s guiding me to pray for these men, for these women.

While that profession is very old and I can’t do much about it, I can certainly pray that the Church in this country can reach men and women for Christ and bring healing to the bondage that prostitution brings.

©2010 Our Mission in Panama. All Rights Reserved.

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We need intercessors for this particular project who will join the team.  We are compiling email addresses that we can use for this particular project.  You might choose to stay on as intercessors for us, but the call is for this project.

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©2010 Our Mission in Panama. All Rights Reserved.

It was a brief retreat away from the noise of the city, the hustle and bustle, and a chance to see trees, hear birds, and breath cool mountain air.  

We went with our friends and that gave us time to talk about ministry plans for 2009.

Most of all, it was a great place to have a morning quiet time before the rest of the house was up.

Quiet Time with God

I had my morning devotion on this open porch, spending time praying with God about plans for 2009 for our ministry.  

The clean mountain air reminded me of the Appalachian mountains, and the cool morning climate occasionally mentally transported me there.

We have some amazing opportunities in front of us that drive our prayer: invitations from different countries, ministry in Nicaragua, Panama, United States, and inquiries from Columbia, Guatemala, and Venezuela.  

As the Lord opens the doors, we believe He will provide.

We are praying about working with a church planter here in Panama to lauch a new church in 2009 in our walking area.  There are very few evangelical churches in the four neighboorhoods we walk in.  One neighborhood has zero churches.

Playing in the Mountains

Later that morning, we went to a local park with a mountain stream and spent time swimming and having a picnic.

 The coolness of the morning changed into a refreshingly warm day that allowed us to spend it frolicking in a mountain stream.   See our full album at Facebook.

Waterfalls, cool streams, all refreshing sounds before returning to the city.  A little recharged and ready for 2009.

©2010 Our Mission in Panama. All Rights Reserved.

His mission’s work is to call forth missionaries from Panama to go to other countries, and to work with immigrants coming here.  I’m still not yet sure of the name of his ministry because today’s meeting was as much about simply getting to know one another personally as it was me introducing myself and our work to him.  I know that he is connected to several pastors in this country and church planters.

I used the PRMI Dunamis description in Spanish, and gave him the Spanish Language PRMI brochure, plus samples from the material that we have used in Nicaragua and samples of my evangelism material. 

We talked about how a PRMI team could come for a 1x conference to get to be known, like another one of our members did in Guatemala.  He was thrilled with the idea that team members are members of the Dunamis Fellowship and have completed the entire course. 

Quickly, he got into asking me details in terms of a minimum conference size, how the offerings would be processed, and the costs ownership (who covers what) and the like.  I think there will be further interest here.  There will be further discussions. 

We were together last night at a Christmas party where our families got to meet each other along with families from 7 other countries (I love it here)! 

They are pursuing more friendship with us, in that they are taking us to church Christmas eve for a "Traditional" service (see: http://www.missiontopanama.org/2008/12/a-2nd-christmas-in-panama/ for what I miss about Christmas) and spending a Christmas eve dinner with us in our house. 

At breakfast this morning I was simply describing how I missed some of the traditions of Christmas, and this invitation was his family’s response. 

©2010 Our Mission in Panama. All Rights Reserved.

Spending more than 3 decades, but not quite 4, in US, the Christmas season is full of carols, noisy background music, retail shopping, Christmas stories on TV, and then customs like Advent candles, caroling and Christmas eve services.  Mailing of Christmas cards and writing a Christmas letter.

Of course, the cold weather, warm drinks, and the possibility of snow.

I still laugh when I hear songs like “I’m dreaming of a white Christmas” or “Outside the snow is falling and we’ll sing a chorus or two. . “ 

It’s 85-90 and snow is highly unlikely.  There are no chestnuts roasting on an open fire, and jack frost is no where near.

It just feels weird to see Santa in shorts during the Christmas parade.

A musical cantata:

 
However, Sunday night was different. 

We attended “Looking for the Star” put on by Crossroads Bible Church.  In a darkened theatre, I was treated to wonderful performance of costumes, and dance, story telling, carols and worship songs, done in both English and Spanish.  The narrative was in Spanish, but the songs were in both languages. 

The only word I had for it at the end of the night was “speechless.” 

To hear the same familiar chorus well sung in both languages. 

To hear carols and choruses that have been missing for the last two Christmas seasons. 

To feel like Christmas is coming. 

To hear a choir and orchestration that I’ve never experienced before. 

To see the exaltation of Jesus Christ as the true star of Christmas.

Christmas is here.

I realize that I miss some of the trappings of Christmas. 

I miss some of the traditions that support the ambiance of the season. 

But I’m glad I was reminded Sunday night not only of what I miss, but of the Child, for whom we are living in this country and working among this people. 

The proclamation of His forgiveness freely available is what propels us to work here. 

Because of this Child’s birth, we left our nets.  Because of His birth, we have given all. 

Merry Christmas friends.

(parade photo courtesy of Panama-Guide.com)

©2010 Our Mission in Panama. All Rights Reserved.

It took a combination of 4 buses, and because of construction and holiday traffic, about 5 hours round trip.  Traffic volume is a known problem here and this time of year is the worst it gets as people do their Christmas shopping.  Going to the mall on Saturday is a bad idea.  Did that.

I’m not complaining, but simply describing for our friends and supporters a picture of our life.

Near our house, a new interchange is being built as part of a highway project to facilitate traffic flow.  Because of land locking, the only way to rebuild the interchange is up.  This causes all sorts of traffic flow issues during construction, particularly when lanes have to be closed to move these beams or to put the supports in for the concrete forms.

The image here is the new set of bridges being built to elevate a highway around one of the local malls.

You can get a feel of the traffic around it in this picture.

The volume of traffic is heavy though these photos may not show it well.  It moves at a snails pace as several lanes of traffic (I think condense into 3 in front of the mall.  There at the mall are hundreds of people daily being dropped off by taxis and getting on/off buses.  Not a well designed intersection and thus the elevated highways being constructed.

We play Frogger when we cross the streets to walk to church or to the hardware store.  Traffic moves slow enough that you simply take your life into your own hands, step into it and hope you don’t get hit.  It’s like parting the Red Sea.

Most times traffic is a jammed as what you see in this photo from our big window:

Imagine this scene with impatient drivers, lots of horns blowing, and sometimes 3 lanes coming from the two side streets (from the bottom and the top). 

The street from the top is a two way street, but often, impatient drivers will pull into the oncoming lane to rush up ahead of the line.

If someone turns off the main artery (from the right side of the picture) and there is a car there going the wrong way, no one moves anywhere and angry drivers blow their horn.  This time of year, that road stays packed like that almost from 7am through 6pm at night.  If the traffic light at the end of the main artery is not working it might take 30 minutes to an hour to move a few feet, as cops try to their best to faciliate traffic flow.

However, on Mother’s day and on 3 days weekends, the same interchange  looks like this:

One can get around the city quite easily because a great number of people have gone to the interior to celebrate the three day weekend.  This is the second 3 day weekend in a row. December has many holidays here.

Just a glimpse of our life.  Continue to pray for us that we get a car so we too can get out of the city on weekends like this, and to faciliate our work here.

©2010 Our Mission in Panama. All Rights Reserved.