History
The first gathering in Keswick, England took place in 1875. This convention, lasting about a week, was preceded by three similar meetings in other places during 1874-1875. The first convention involved 300-400 attendees and was held in a tent. Although there had been some camp meetings in the USA and one meeting in England, Keswick made such Christian gatherings popular and they multiplied. My knowledge of details on the Keswick Convention primarily comes from a book written in 1952 by Steven Barabas, Assistant Professor of Theology, Wheaton College. His work is based on extensive research, as indicated by the bibliography. Barabas writes: “ . . . today [1952] there are probably hundreds of Bible conferences in the two countries [US and Britain]. Yet, with a few exceptions, there is a fundamental difference between them and Keswick. They aim to impart Bible knowledge and to give some spiritual inspiration. . . . Keswick, on the other hand, is more like a spiritual clinic.”[1] So, the usual five days of meetings (with about six meetings per day) format was designed to help believers deal seriously with sin and all aspects of the self-life, be restored to fellowship with the Lord, and learn how to live a sanctified and dedicated life by faith. A great deal of the spiritual work was done outside of the meetings in personal dealings between the attendees and the speakers.
Although the Keswick Convention continues today, with counterparts in other countries, my knowledge covers the earlier years, which laid the foundation of its original classic teaching on experiencing a deeper walk with God. There had been scant literature prior to this convention helping believers with the “Higher Life” or a deeper spiritual life with God. There had been a stirring for more personal holiness as a result of the revival in Britain and America during the period of 1858-1860. A few names associated with the first few decades of the Keswick meetings should reflect its spiritual quality: A. T. Pierson, F. B. Meyer, Evan Hopkins, Andrew Murray, Handley C. G. Moule, W. H. Griffith Thomas, and Hudson Taylor. Amy Carmichael attended the meetings and heard Hudson Taylor speak in 1887. This incident gave impetus to her calling as a missionary, and she was the first missionary to be supported by the Keswick Council. “Dr. Hudson Taylor gave as his reckoning that two-thirds of the missionaries in the China Inland Mission were there as a result of Keswick.”[2] Regarding much later years, Billy Graham was introduced to Keswick in 1946 by Stephen Olford. Graham later wrote in his autobiography (Just As I Am) that the Keswick teaching was like a second blessing to him.
The banner over the entrance to the meetings states: “ALL ONE IN CHRIST JESUS.” The unity of the Spirit has been a distinctive feature of the convention from the beginning. Attendees come from many denominations and backgrounds. The speakers lay aside all doctrinal differences to teach only on the truths regarding scriptural holiness of life.
The teaching
The teaching developed in a purposeful way in the 5 days of meetings:
- Day 1: The Christians are helped to see the awfulness of sin before God and encouraged to let the Holy Spirit and the Word of God search their lives.
- Day 2: God’s complete provision for sin.
- Day 3: Consecration.
- Day 4: The fullness of the Spirit.
- Day 5: Christian service to the Lord.
We will spend some time giving an overview of each of these points of Keswick teaching.
Keswick Ministry
Day 1
“On the opening day of the Convention the topic dealt with by the various speakers is the exceeding sinfulness of sin. It is a day of deep heart-searching, when the searchlight of God’s Word is turned upon the inmost recesses of the soul, and sin is laid bare.”[3] “A large part of the Church, says Keswick, has come to the place where it takes sin for granted; indeed, where it does not call sin sin any more. Its eyes are blinded to its own sin, and it is not aware of God’s uncompromising attitude towards sin. Christians need to be wakened to a sense of the awfulness of sin. They need to see sin as God sees it.”[4] “It is understood, of course, that there are two parts to this phase of the Keswick message; the first being an uncompromising exposure of sin in all its loathsomeness and heinousness, and the second a challenge that it be confessed and put out of the life immediately.”[5] “And so Monday at Keswick is not infrequently a painful day, a day when with broken hearts and penitential tears we seek for that readjustment of our lives with God, apart from which there is no fullness of blessing.”[6] Consult additional readings from a booklet by A. T. Pierson (The Keswick Movement: In Precept and Practise; 1903). His booklet gives some good thoughts on sin and doubtful matters in our lives.
What can we do to let this “Day 1” message work in our lives?
Day 2 - “God’s provision for sin.”
Here we are speaking of the problem of the sin principle within, not dealing with individual sins. Individual sins must be dealt with through confession (Day 1). Some wrong ways that have been taught for seeking sanctification: (1) Regarding sanctification as a matter of course; (2) Regarding sanctification as a matter of gradual growth; (3) Eradication of the Sin Principle. What is the right way of victory over the power of indwelling sin, which causes defeat and sins? Note: “Sanctification is never a state; it is always an experience — an experience that is the fruit of abiding in Christ. It is not a state, but a maintained condition of purity—a condition of life maintained moment by moment through living fellowship with Christ.”[7]
“It is the teaching of Keswick that an important reason for the defeat and failure of so many Christians is that they try to suppress the old nature, like the ‘wretched man’ of Romans vii; but there is a way of deliverance—through Jesus Christ, by the counteracting power of the Holy Spirit of God. Sanctification is therefore not by works but by faith. Victory comes by accepting the method of divine provision. That is the distinctive message of Keswick.”[8]Various points regarding the topic of Day 2, “God’s provision for sin.”
Keswick teachers do hold to the normal threefold aspects of sanctification: positional, experiential, and ultimate sanctification. Yet, they also note other characteristics which apply to our experience of sanctification: sanctification as a process, as a crisis and as a gift.
A process: It is the progressive and gradual transformation of believer by the Holy Spirit into the likeness of Christ (2 Cor. 3:18).
A crisis: Sanctification does begin at regeneration. However, many believers do not progress in sanctification as they should. Often some crisis causes the believer to be more earnest in seeking after sanctification. The crisis may arise from a vision of spiritual resources in Christ, or from a more acute realization of God’s expectation upon them, or a willingness to surrender some sin or selfish desires for their lives. This aspect of crisis is covered on Day 3 — “Consecration.”
A gift: The gift of sanctification is what we are given in Christ. “This is the same as positional sanctification, and, as was said above, is that sanctification which was wrought by Christ on the cross for every believer. [1 Cor. 1:30; Heb. 10:10] According to Keswick, we are not sanctified by self-effort or by works, but by faith in what Christ has done for us at Calvary. Sanctification, like justification, is by grace alone. Sanctification as a gift is . . . central in Keswick teaching.”[9]
Sanctification as a gift:
God’s provision for sin: “Before we can experience sanctification as a process, we must know what it is to receive it as a gift.”[10] This means that what we have in position, can and should be ours in experience, by faith. “The Word of God tells us that Christ ‘is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption’ (1 Cor. 1:30). Christ must be definitely accepted as our sanctification; and as we had to give up our own self-righteousness when we were regenerated, so, if we wish to make any progress in holiness, we have to give up belief in the value of self-effort in holiness. The gift of holiness must be worked out in our daily life, but we work from holiness, not to holiness.”[11]
• The believer’s identification with Christ in His death to sin is the ground of his sanctification.
“Calvary . . . is God’s answer to man’s problem of sin, as well as his sins.”[12] On the cross we died with Him to sin. “By our union with Him in His death we were freed from the penalty of sin and emancipated from the power of sin.”[13] “The cross of Christ is the efficient cause of deliverance from the power of sin. Freedom from the dominion of sin is a blessing we may claim by faith, just as we accept pardon.”[14]
Romans chapter 6 is the most important chapter on this subject and one prominent in Keswick teaching. Romans 6:6 is a key verse. In an address on this verse Evan Hopkins (the main leader in the early years of Keswick) expounded the verse as follows: “’The old man’ [v.6], he says, is our old unregenerate self — the man we were before our regeneration. The ‘body of sin’ is not the totality of sin, nor the substance or essence of sin, but our natural body as used and claimed by sin. . . . He says that it states a fact — that we as sinners died with Christ. It is judicially true of all believers without exception that they were identified with Christ in His death to sin. The result of this fact is that our bodies are now free from sin’s claim, and we need no longer serve sin. But it is not enough to know that historically all believers died with Christ; we must appropriate that truth if it is to be real in our experience. God reckons us dead to sin because of our union with Christ in His death to sin. Now by faith we must enter into God’s reckoning. This is not a matter of feeling but of faith. We must claim by faith the freedom from sins’ authority which has been secured for us in virtue of Christ’s death and our identification with that death. Experimental freedom should follow legal deliverance. . . . We begin by seeing in Scripture . . . that we died with Christ and were identified with Him to this very purpose—that sin should have no legal claim upon us. Then by the reckoning of faith we must claim our freedom and present our bodies to God for His service. In proportion as we fix our eye upon God’s fact, and enter into God’s reckoning, and act upon it, just in that proportion are we brought into the blessed experience of deliverance. Deliverance from the power of sin is not an attainment, any more than pardon of sin is. It is a gift of God’s grace. Deliverance is not attained by struggle and painful effort, by earnest resolutions and self-denial, but through the cross. It is stepped into by simple faith.”[15]
Hopkins’ famous illustration of the workings of faith at this point is as follows: “’Do not wait for feeling,’ he says. . . . Here are three men walking in procession—Mr. Fact goes first, Mr. Faith follows him, and Mr. Feeling follows Mr. Faith. Supposing the middle man turns around and looks at Mr. Feeling, everything goes wrong. His business is to fix his eye upon Mr. Fact, and Mr. Feeling follows him. Get hold of the fact, first of all—free in Christ, free on the cross. There is the fact. Do not reverse the order.”[16] (I prefer to designate Mr. Feeling as Mr. Experience instead. We do not look for feelings, but we do anticipate spiritual experience by the Holy Spirit.)
Faith in the stupendous facts of Romans six — that we died with Christ to sin and have been raised up to walk in newness of life — seem difficult at first to believe and grasp. The solution to this is simply to keep focusing on these facts. “Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ.” (Rom. 10:17) Memorize and mediate on Romans 6:1-14. Use some verses from Romans 6 often in your little prayers to God as you walk along life’s path daily. Add other key verses to your memory bank of positional or key life truths to claim and use as a supporter and a shield of faith every day (examples: 1 Cor. 10:13; Gal. 2:20; 6:14; Col. 3:1-4). As you memorize, meditate and use these verses they will become real truth to you. You will believe with your heart that they are true and apply to you.
• The Holy Spirit.
“But the Scriptures also make clear, Keswick declares, that the Holy Spirit has a part in sanctification so important that it cannot be over-estimated. If the cross is the ground, the Holy Spirit is the Agent of our sanctification. It is the office and work of the Holy Spirit to make true in our experience that for which Christ died upon the cross. . . . That freedom [from the dominion of sin] is only potential. It must be progressively realized in daily experience, and this is done by walking in [or, “according to”] the Spirit.. . . He renders real and operative our death to sin and our life to God.”[17] “Because of the Spirit’s personality, and His intimate relationship to the believer, the process of sanctification of necessity must involve personal contact between believer and Spirit—intelligent co-operation of two persons, rather than blind resignation to an unknown force. There is no lack of power or of ability on the part of the Holy Spirit to bring Christ’s victory into the realm of human experience. Whatever failure there may be in the Christian’s life is sure testimony of a lack of co-operation with the Spirit.”[18]
“Counteraction” The Spirit works by counteracting the power of the law of sin in our members. Romans 7 describes the believer’s self-efforts at suppressing or combating indwelling sin. It ends in demoralizing defeat. Romans 8 unveils the power of the Spirit’s counteraction: “For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus as set you free from the law of sin and death.” (Rom. 8:2, NASB). Actually, I think Dr. David Anderson has a better rendering of this verse: "For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus sets me free from the law of sin and death." (Anderson translates the aorist verb as “gnomic,” showing a timeless principle.) The law of sin within us is like the constant pull of gravity downwards (the “law of sin”) upon a 2 pound weight (picturing our life). However, this downward pull can be offset if we attach a well-filled helium balloon (picturing the law of the Spirit of life) lifting the weight by a more powerful counteracting force!
“The rest of faith and conflict.” When a believer accepts sanctification by faith, his own self-efforts cease and there is a “rest of faith.” We see the conflict in Ephesians six. So, we must “be strong in the Lord and 5in the power of His might” for the conflict. The believer must identify himself with Christ in His victory. He “must by faith plant his feet on the victorious position which Christ has obtained for him.”[19] For the conflict, the Word tells the believer: “take up the full armor of God, so that you will be able to resist in the evil day, and having done everything, to stand firm” in his position of victory. In practically, a lot of this “standing” involves standing on the facts of the Word of God so that the devil’s temptations, accusations and lies are defeated by the truth. Jesus resisted the devil’s temptations with the Word
The place of faith in sanctification:
Although we see God’s way is sanctification by faith, this should not be interpreted to mean passivity in the pursuit of sanctification. Bishop Handley Moule states: “The Scripture doctrine of Sanctification teaches no effortless passivity. No will is so fully constituted for work as the regenerate and surrendered will. And in this matter of inner sanctification . . . the will has abundant work to do, in watching and prayer, in self-examination and confession of sin, in diligent study of the divine Word, in the spiritual use of sacred ordinances, in holy contemplation of Christ, in attention to every whisper of the conscience. But these works will all be done with a view to maintaining and deepening the sacred practical contact with Christ by faith which is the one ultimate secret of spiritual success. They will be helps and guides to faith, not substitutes for its divine simplicity. The temptation of the hour will be met less by direct efforts of the will then by indirect; through and ‘in Him who enableth.’”[20]
In his book, Victory in Christ, Charles Trumbull makes these helpful comments: “We used to think that the more we studied the Bible the more victorious we should be. We used to think that the more time we spent in prayer the more victory we could have. We see now the even these good works cannot accomplish our victory, but that simple faith in the sufficiency of God’s grace is the secret. Very well, then, we are tempted to think, we need not be careful now to take the same amount of time for our Bible study, or for our prayer life, because ‘Christ is doing it all.’ And down into defeat we go the moment we have been deceived by that lie of Satan. True, victory is by faith; but faith must be fed; and faith cannot be fed apart from daily nourishment from the Word of God, and daily time alone with God in prayer. Never, never, NEVER during this life dare any Christian neglect the written Word of God.”[21]
Union with Christ:
Sanctification by faith is possible because of our union with Christ. We share in His death and His victory in resurrection. “It is this union with Christ which provides the basis for a duplication of Christ’s triumph within the believer’s own experience. By virtue of this union he is forever considered by God to be one with Christ, and the beneficiary of all of Christ’s triumph.. . . But what theologians have been only recently discovering, that the heart of Pauline theology is the doctrine of our union with Christ, Keswick called to the attention of the world seventy-five years ago, and has been stressing ever since.”[22]
The three conditions for consistent progress in sanctification:
- Proper knowledge of the truth. “The believer must have a sufficient understanding of the triumph of Calvary, the union of the believer and Christ, and the scriptural method of progressive sanctification.”[23]
- “But mere apprehension of the truth is not sufficient. There must also be proper faith—and faith is not a mere mental assent to the truth of the Gospel, but is a resting on the truth of God. . . . He [the believer] is to reckon himself to be dead unto sin and alive unto God (Rom. 6:11).”[24]
- “The third condition of consistent progress in sanctification is the believer’s consent to die to every fleshly desire in him. . . . He is to hand over the fleshly deeds of the body to the Spirit for mortification. ‘If ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.’” (Rom. 8:13)[25]
Day 3 - “Consecration.”
Faith must be perfected by the obedience that a life lived by faith implies and requires. Thus, there must be a consecration, a surrender of life to do God’s will.
The need for sanctification is seen in the basic nature of sin. “The essence of sin then, according to Keswick, is for man to live independently of his Maker, and to make self the centre of his life.”[26] Man wants to direct his own life. Consecration places one’s life in God’s hands, for His management and direction. One Keswick speaker says of consecration that it “’implies that the powers of the body, the affections of the heart, and the possessions of the offerer, are put in the hands’ and held out before God as an offering to Him . . ‘it means the entire transference of rule, choice, decision and selection in life from self to God.’”[27]
Evan Hopkins, the primary leader of Keswick in its early years, spoke about “crisis and process” as follows: “’Sanctification in the sense of conformity to the life and character of Christ is a process, a gradual process, a continuous process, an endless process. But, sanctification, in the sense of a definite decision for holiness, a thorough and whole-hearted dedication to God, the commital of the whole being to Him is a crisis, and the crisis must take place before we really know the process. Before you can draw a line you must begin with a point. The line is the process, the point is the crisis.’”[28]
“We will seriously misunderstand what Keswick means by the word ‘crisis’ unless we realize that it refers to the decision by which a believer commits himself wholly to his Lord, pledging himself henceforth to be obedient unto Him in all things; a decision which initiates, not the process of sanctification, for that begins at regeneration, but sanctification in earnest.”[29]
Keswick acknowledges that one’s consecration can grow stale. What matters is this: Is your life yielded to God now? (My own take is that consecration should be renewed daily and definitely [Lk. 9:23]. I suggest using Rom. 6:13 or Rom. 12:1-2 in prayer to God with a whole heart every morning.)
Consecration has two sides to it. One side says “yes” to Christ and His will. Thus the other side says “no” to self and its will. “Self-denial does not consist in saying ‘No’ to something we like, but in saying ‘No’ to ourselves.”[30] The example of Christ’s own life shows us this pattern: “I can do nothing on my own. As I hear, I judge, and my judgment is just, because I seek not my own will but the will of him who sent me.” (John 5:30). And he who sent me is with me. He has not left me alone, for I always do the things that are pleasing to him.” (John 8:29)
Consecration involves carrying out he demands of discipleship: “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.” (Matt. 16:24).
The effect of consecration
“The effect of a thorough and whole-hearted consecration is that the ground is cleared for sanctification as a process. . . . In consecration there is an adjustment of the will that ensures sanctity.”[31]
“Consecration sweeps away all barriers between the believer and God, and clears the ground for the Spirit’s control of the personality. As long as the barrier of an active self-life stands between him and God, he is not in a position to claim the power of the Holy Spirit, for God will not allow the Spirit to fill an unconsecrated heart; but with self put out of the way and the Holy Spirit given His rightful place at the seat of controls in every phase of personality, there can be a consistent walk in the Spirit and continued progress in the development of Christ-like character.”[32]
Day 4 - “the Spirit-filled Life.”
“It is these two facts—God’s provision of the Holy Spirit for the Church, and the failure of the Church to avail itself of this provision—that are responsible for the emphasis that Keswick puts on the subject—the Spirit-filled life.” [33]
The nature of the blessing:
- All Christians have the Holy Spirit. Keswick teaches that the “baptism of the Holy Spirit” happens to a believer at regeneration. It is not a separate experience to be sought after following conversion. All believers have the Holy Spirit.
- Not all Christians have the fullness of the Holy Spirit. Clarence H. M. Foster said that not all believers experience the fullness of the Holy Spirit, and “’It is largely true to say that it was a recognition of this fact on the part of Christian people that brought the Keswick Convention into being so many years ago.’”[34]
- The significance of the fullness of the Spirit. The book of Acts shows that spiritual fullness was the state of certain Christians. It should be the normal condition of the believer. This fullness “means that they [the early believers] were controlled by the Spirit and guided by the Spirit, so that He was able to use them as His instruments.”[35] The fullness of the Spirit “is needed “for holiness and service, which are impossible without it. The power of the Holy Spirit is needed for living a consistent Christian life. A Spirit-filled Christian will not necessarily be used of God to perform miracles . . . but he will lead a normal, consistent Christian life; and without the Spirit that would be impossible.”[36]
Keswick teachers taught that there is a difference between being “full” of the Spirit and being “filled” with the Spirit. Evan Hopkins. Bishop Handley Moule and G. Campbell Morgan all taught this. Hopkins stated that being “full” “’indicates an abiding or habitual condition, . . . [yet, being filled is] a special inspiration or illapse—a momentary action or impulse of the Spirit for service, at particular occasions.’”[37] “What Christians should seek is the habitual condition—always to be full of the Spirit, and then they will find that as special difficulties arise there will always be that filling, or momentary supply, which will enable them to triumph, to serve, to witness, or to bring fourth fruit, as the case may be, according to the will of God.”[38] (Examples of being “full” of the Holy Spirit: Lk. 6:3; 7:55; 11:24. Examples of being “filled”: Luke 1:41, 67; Acts 2:4; 4:8, 31; 13:9). - The reception of the fullness of the Spirit is a definite experience. Such a reception is an act of faith. Yet, this experience, per Handley Moule, need not always be one that can be written down and described. It need not be a separate experience from regeneration, but “in the experience of the great majority of Christians, a personal knowledge of the power of God comes only at varying intervals after regeneration. [39] Although “Keswick regards the fullness of the Spirit as a definite experience, so that every Christian either is or is not ‘full,’ nevertheless no pattern is laid down to which it is expected that all Christians must conform.”[40]
- How this blessing becomes experiential. What are the conditions for this filling? Andrew Murray explains the truth simply: “Your own life and the life of God cannot fill the heart at the same time. Your life hinders the entrance of the life of God. When your own life is cast out, the life of God will fill you. So long as I myself am still something, Jesus Himself cannot be everything. My life must be expelled; then the Spirit of Jesus will flow in. . . . So long as a Christian imagines that in some things—for example, in his eating and drinking, in the spending of his time or money, in his thinking and speaking about others—he has still the right and the liberty to follow his own wishes, to please himself, to maintain his own life, he cannot possibly attain the full blessing of Pentecost.””[41] [emphasis added]
Barabas’ book further summarizes Andrew Murray’s thoughts:
“At the Fall man’s whole life and individuality were perverted and withdrawn from the control of God, that he might seek and serve himself. That is why we must hate and utterly lose that life, before the Spirit of God can be ours. Unless always and in everything, to the minutest details we deny that self-life, the life of God cannot possibly fill us. A primary condition of the fullness of the Spirit is a deep conviction of the entire corruption of our nature, manifesting itself in the fact that even the Christian still pleases himself in many things and is not dependent upon the Spirit in all things.[42]” [emphasis added]
“There must be “a surrender of faith to Christ for the death of the cross of all of the self-life. The self-life sets itself in the place of God; pleases and honours itself more than God. It must be hated as our worst foe and as the foe of God.”[43] [emphasis added]
We may summarize some of the key points of various Keswick preachers as to how to possess the fullness of the Holy Spirit:
- Remove all known sin and hindrances in our lives.
- There must be a self-emptying and abasement, showing our need and our helplessness to live for God without the Holy Spirit.
- There must be a willingness to obey God, as the power of the Holy Spirit is given to those who will obey God. “Power is always according to purity.” (citing Dr. J. Stuart Holden)[44]
- It can be received only if we intend to employ His power for God’s glory, not for power, success, fame or popularity.
- Ask God for this fullness and receive it by faith, not looking for experiences or feelings. Trust God to manifest its blessings in His time.
We should realize that “’ possession of power for service is dependent on unceasing reliance on the Holy Ghost. God never gives us a store of power to be used when and where we think fit.’” (C. H. Macgregor)[45] “Part of the price of power is time spent in prayer and in study of the Word of God.”[46]
• The results of the blessing.
“Andrew Murray puts it very simply and succinctly, ‘The fullness of the Spirit is simply the full preparation for living and working as a child of God.’”[47] “In other words it enables us to be what God wants us to be, and to do what God wants us to do. We are not to expect that we will perform miracles, but simply that we will be able to lead a normal Christian life.”[48] W. Graham Scroggie teaches that “if we have the fullness of the Spirit, we shall be at rest. Feverish service will be at an end. Not that we will cease to work, but there will be rest in toil, so that we may accomplish even incredible things quietly and restfully. Then we will have joy, for ‘the fruit of the Spirit is joy.’”[49]
I might conclude that Day 3 calls us to total consecration to obey God with our whole being, Day 4 equips the believer to carry out this consecration by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Day 5 - Christian service.
A Keswick meeting on missions and service was not added to the schedule until 1888. Before that time, Keswick concentrated on holiness of life, with the thought that if that was achieved service would follow. Yet, some felt that there was a need for more specific presentations on service and missionary work. Hudson Taylor was among those who felt this way. So Day 5, Friday, became such a time. “The great missionary meeting on Friday morning is given over almost entirely to missionaries themselves, who in brief addresses present the needs in their fields and show how God has been working with them. As they speak, they do not represent particular societies, but the world and its need of the Gospel, especially the spheres in which they themselves labour.”[50]
Remarkably, “Hudson Taylor gave as his reckoning that two-thirds of the missionaries in China Inland Mission were there as a result of Keswick”[51] (At its zenith, over 900 missionaries served in China with this mission.)
“But it must not be thought that undue pressure is brought upon Christians to offer themselves to the foreign mission field. Christians are not told that the need constitutes the call, and that all should go if they are physically able to. It is made clear that God’s workers are called by Him, and are appointed by Him to specific tasks in particular spheres of service. Every Christian is needed somewhere in some sort of work in the vineyard of God, and every Christian has been ordained to some task by God. No one—not even the weakest or apparently most incapable—is left without his share in God’s work.”[52]
The response to presentations on service at Keswick “will not necessarily lead to the mission field, whether foreign or home. But it will lead to sacrificial service of some kind, even though the field of service be restricted to the kitchen and the home. Christian service, moreover, will be viewed not as a charity, but as a debt. Loyalty to Christ can never be maintained without service. Salvation in its fullness means service as its outcome. Discipleship implies service.”[53] (Emphasis added.)
“The whole life of Paul after this event [Acts 9 encounter with Jesus] shows that it was a life guided and directed by the Spirit of God. His going into missionary work was not the result of his own desire to be of service to the non-Christian world, but was the result of an unmistakable call by the Spirit of God. The Holy Spirit guided him both negatively and positively, checking him when he was about to make a mistake, suggesting the right course to him.
Keswick holds firmly and teaches without equivocation that Christian service can never be effective unless it is guided by the Spirit of God in the same way that Paul was. This applies to all Christians alike, not alone to Christian workers. . . .
There are four ways, Keswick tells us, in which our Lord guides us in our life and work. First, He guides by the revealed truth of His Word, where we see what His mind is, so far as general principles are concerned. In the second place,, He guides by our circumstances—by His outward providences, which indicate what is and what is not possible. In the third place, He guides by our conscience, when it is educated and informed by the Spirit of God, and readjusted by His written Word. Finally, He guides directly and immediately by the Holy Spirit. These four ways of guidance must be checked against each other in order to eliminate the possibility of mistakes. If they unite in testimony, we cannot go wrong if we are abiding in Christ—permitting the cross to operate on the desires of the flesh, and determining to do the will of God at all costs when it becomes known. God does not treat us as mere machines, and His guidance is assured only if we are willing to pay the price for it.
Such guidance by the Holy Spirit can alone save us from projects that appear to be good, but are not really His directive will for us.” [54]
