Panama City Skyline at Night
The lights of Panama City, Panama, shine brightly at night as seen from about 38 stories up, during our Panama 2024 trip.
When you saw the title, you might have thought that this was from the Panama City in Florida. However, this is from the original Panama City, the one in the country of Panama, the city that sits at the Pacific end of the Panama Canal, and the city for which the one in Florida was named.
On the last night of our trip, after our work was done, we went to eat in a restaurant in a tall building. After we ate, we went up to the roof level to check out the view. And what a view it was! If you are wondering, the two colored lines at the left are zip lines, if you want to zip across from one part of the building to another.
Another View
If the zip lines are too distracting for you, I took another photo that did not include them, just to get a slightly different perspective on things. And as usual, because I could not choose between the two photos, I have included them both here.
I have to admit that I was surprised by the number of tall buildings in Panama City. I knew the city was big, but I did not know that it was that kind of big. We could first see all the skyscrapers from the airplane as we were flying in. And then we got to see lots of them as we drove from the airport to the area where we worked and stayed, too. All of the tall buildings added lots of character to the skyline, as you can see. And the bright light near the center is a digital screen for advertisements. It was bright!
Here We Are
And here we are with the city behind us. We couldn’t go to a place like that without getting a photo of us, could we? No, we could not. Someone in our group offered to take the photo for us, but for some reason I like these arm’s length selfie photos. And since we already have several of them from several locations, why not keep the trend going?

See more from our Panama 2024 Trip!
Shine Your Light
Scenes like the one in the photos above are interesting to see in the daytime. But to me at least, they are even more interesting in the dark. No one these days designs a tall building such as these without including some way to light it up in the dark. Because a really tall building that is dark at night is not interesting at all.
In the same way, we are to shine as lights in the world1. But instead of of shining as lights so that people can see us, we are to shine so that people will see God. In the darkness of the world, our lights will stand out and be noticeable, just as the lights of these buildings are.
If we love one another, then we will definitely be shining a light in the dark world that often seems so full of anger and hate. People will notice the difference, and God will get the glory.
Shine as lights of the world by loving others!
Do all things without grumbling or disputing, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world, holding fast to the word of life, so that in the day of Christ I may be proud that I did not run in vain or labor in vain. - Philippians 2:14-16

About the Photos
The two skyline photos were taken with my camera. There was a railing there to keep us from falling off the roof, although some in our group who do not care for heights never made it that close to the rail. But I used the rail to steady the camera. Because it was a round rail instead of a flat rail, it was not ideal for setting the camera on it, but I did the best I could. A tripod would have been ideal, as it would have been more steady and would have allowed for a longer exposure. But because I did not have a tripod with me, the rail was the next best option.
And then selfie photo was taken with my iPhone as is usual for these types of photos.
Photo: Each photo is a single Raw exposure, processed in Raw Therapee and GIMP.
Camera: Sony Alpha A7 II, iPhone 14 Pro
Lens: Rokinon 35mm f/1.8
Date: October 10, 2024
Location: Panama City, Panama

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Yes, I mentioned letting your light shine in a post not very long ago, but I thought it was definitely worth mentioning again! ↩︎