"Be Filled with the Spirit" Ephesians 5:18.
Harford Battersby said that the Keswick Convention exists to make the article of the Apostles Creed "I believe in the Holy Spirit" not merely a theological forumla to be believed in, but a living reality to each Christian soul. While it is everywhere acknowledged that it is a great privilege to be filled with the Spirit, at Keswick it is earnestly proclaimed that it is a great sin not to be filled with the Spirit. The Spirit in scripture is not presented as an optional matter, but as a holy obligation that rests upon all Christian believers.
The Keswick message in the early days and now, says that the key to this new life of faith, this sense of walking and abiding in the Lord Jesus , is full surrender; not sinless perfection as some have charged in past years. Graham Scroggie once said, "Keswick never did teach, and never would teach, because the bible does not teach sinless perfection. Such an idea in the light of the facts would indeed itself be sin".
Handley Moule at first opposed Keswick, because he thought its teaching to be unscriptural at this point. Then he discovered through a message by Evan Hopkins how the deafeat of which he was all too conscious in his own life could be turned into victory by Jesus Christ.
Thereafter he became one of Keswicks most regular and powerful preachers. At the end of his life he said, "God knows how imperfectly I've used my secret. I repent before Him in great humililation; but I know the secret, His open secret of victory and rest. and I know how different life has been for the secret"
Billy Graham.
A hundred Years of Blessing and Glory, 1975
Harford Battersby said that the Keswick Convention exists to make the article of the Apostles Creed "I believe in the Holy Spirit" not merely a theological forumla to be believed in, but a living reality to each Christian soul. While it is everywhere acknowledged that it is a great privilege to be filled with the Spirit, at Keswick it is earnestly proclaimed that it is a great sin not to be filled with the Spirit. The Spirit in scripture is not presented as an optional matter, but as a holy obligation that rests upon all Christian believers.
The Keswick message in the early days and now, says that the key to this new life of faith, this sense of walking and abiding in the Lord Jesus , is full surrender; not sinless perfection as some have charged in past years. Graham Scroggie once said, "Keswick never did teach, and never would teach, because the bible does not teach sinless perfection. Such an idea in the light of the facts would indeed itself be sin".
Handley Moule at first opposed Keswick, because he thought its teaching to be unscriptural at this point. Then he discovered through a message by Evan Hopkins how the deafeat of which he was all too conscious in his own life could be turned into victory by Jesus Christ.
Thereafter he became one of Keswicks most regular and powerful preachers. At the end of his life he said, "God knows how imperfectly I've used my secret. I repent before Him in great humililation; but I know the secret, His open secret of victory and rest. and I know how different life has been for the secret"
Billy Graham.
A hundred Years of Blessing and Glory, 1975
