School and Service Meeting tonight... in the dark

The circus sideshow that is the Brenneman Family somehow made it to Bocas del Toro.  I will post much more on "getting here" in the next few days. 

Panama City greeted Valerie and Titus with some kind of cough/fever/infection so they have yet to make it to a meeting here in Panama.  Good news is that if you know the right medicine to ask for and the right pharmacy to go to then you can cheaply get the medicine you need.  Both Val and Ty are recovering quickly and expect to be back out in service by week's end.

We will not own a car during our stay in Panama-- gasp!  Instead we have purchased bicycles and will bike everywhere-- to the grocery store, out in service, to meetings, to the pharmacy, to pay the power bill, to get more groceries!  Bicycles are expensive here, this being a touristy/beach/surfer town and all (welcome to Bocas!).  No joke, we paid half as much for 4 bikes as our last car cost us! (Ok, everyone knows our little Honda Civic was cheap... but still!)

Madison and I attended our first mid-week meeting tonight.  Meeting is Tuesdays at 7pm-- no 6:30pm (good thing I ran into that brother on the street earlier today!).  And so about 5:00pm the power went out on the island (welcome to Bocas!) and we got dressed in the mostly-dark, hopped on our new rides, and rode off to meeting.  No power equals no lights, no toilet, no fans, and no music to sing to!  It was so fantastic.  Collectively, we sang our little hearts out to the Kingdom Melodies and used flashlights to provide just a scintilla of light so that the conductors could carry out their assigned parts and call on the friends for comments.

This was my first mid-week meeting, but that does not prevent the brothers from using you-- I was privileged to handle one service meeting part and an interview (welcome to Bocas)!  This is no lie, right at the very moment in my part (Micah's example) when I asked the audience if Jehovah has blessed them in theocratic activities-- the power resumed and the lights came on!  Just in time to finish the final song and just dwell together in Jehovah's house talking, laughing, and being together with the cicadas chirping in the nighttime air behind us.

It's funny.  We are battling some Panamanian scuz. It's hot.  And humid.  We are living out of our suitcase with no long-term place to call home as of yet.  And we conducted meeting in the dark tonight.  But somehow this place just feels like a small glimpse of what paradise might be like as people flock to be taught by Jehovah.  Welcome to Bocas.