Life these past 4 four months

We left our former home in July, and now that mid November is here, what is going on with the Walker’s?

We are resettling in Panama, learning Spanish, and getting rooted and connected here at a local church.

The Lord has continued to bless us. We continue to work on language acquisition, immigration, and seeking out those ministry opportunities that He brings to us.

Since our relocation in July, we have had the following ministry opportunities:

• Preach at our church – 3 services a weekend, televised and broadcast on radio. 
• Attend an Evangelism Conference in Nashville.
• Teach The Evangelism Dunamis in Branson Missouri, and Hartford Connecticut.
• Consult with the the developer of the New Relational Evangelism curriculum for the Southern Baptist convention.
• Teach on Evangelism at the YWAM base in Panama.
• Preach at a church in Atlanta during my layover, focused on Phillip and the Ethiopian Eunuch.
• Visit with the Director for the Doctor of Ministry Degree at Columbia Seminary.

Upcoming Events:

• Teach in Matagalpa and Managua in Nicaragua – Dec 07
• Panama National Children’s Evangelism Conference Workshops – Jan 08
• Dunamis Fellowship International Meeting – Jan 08.
• Evangelism Conference Workshops in San Antonio – April 08

Settling In

We continue to pray for our neighbors and the area of town we are in, continuing to build relationships with the security guards and the building supervisor here.  

We’re slowly getting to meet our neighbors, but more quickly getting to know their domestic helpers (a big social status thing here in Panama is to have an employee in your house who does your dishes, cleans your floors, and watches your children).

We have been a little surprised that we still don’t know most of our neighbors.  They continue to remain somewhat invisible.  We know they are here, as we see their domestic employees, but seldom run into them in person. 

We have also found that it takes a lot more mental energy than we thought.  Living in Richmond for 11 years, we just knew where things were and our mind seemed to make decisions on autopilot. 

Here, we are still having to figure out where things are.  You can’t just go to Home Depot to get a battery for a drill.  You can’t just go to Patient First when your kid is sick. 

When we leave the house, we go by foot, so we try to pile our errands to reflect our destination — that’s a lot of pre-planning we didn’t use to have to do.  Much more mental energy is required to figure out where we need to go, how to get there (walk, taxi, bus), what we need to carry with us, how much we can carry home, and stuff like that. 

On top of that, there is lots of mental exertion involved still in operating in another language — concentration on understanding, and reacting in conversation —  it is tiring.

So, we feel a little more tired than usual. 

When you’ve established a rhythm in life, the flow of life is easy — a lot less mental exertion is required.  Moving to panama — we upset the fruit basket and haven’t yet found life’s rhythm here.  It’ll will come.

Feel free to comment.  Drop a note to say hello.