As you may know, the Riley family packed up and left the United States to go to the King's Lodge , a YWAM training base, in Nuneaton, England .  The Crossroad Discipleship Training School (CDTS) in which we are participating is amazing and overwhelming.  It seems we are in class from sunrise to past sundown, learning about who God is, His nature and character, His desire for intimacy with us, how He speaks to us, hearing His voice, and how to pray.  These are just a few of the things we have been discussing in the past two weeks.  We have joined 18 other students in our CDTS, from 7 other countries, and several staff leaders who add a couple of additional countries to the mix. 

 

Meanwhile, our children have begun school in a different country, we have work duties on base, we have regular times of study and prayer alone and with others, we have book reports to do, we are learning a new culture, and we must maintain a journal of our adventure and education here.  Even as I write this I am tired, but I can also say I am being refreshed by an increasing understanding of how much God loves me.  I keep hearing Him call me "my beloved."  And that is powerful and energizing.

We are preparing for a two-month outreach to the Philippines, where we will minister to a community built on a garbage dump, a boys' prison, a home for abused girls, and numerous villages through door-to-door evangelism.  We will also spend many hours in intercessory prayer for the Filipino people.  God has taken our lives and shown us what it means to walk with Him and we have been amazed at what an awesome God He is as we begin to lay down our will to His.  Please pray that we will follow after Him as Caleb did in Numbers 14:24:  "But because my servant Caleb has a different spirit and follows me wholeheartedly, I will bring him into the land he went to, and his descendants will inherit it."