Rushing around the Keswick Convention by Annie Try

We are home from week 3 of the Keswick Convention - notice the 'We' at the beginning of the sentence.  My husband, Ken, has never been to anything like this and thought he would hate it, but we had an excellent sermon three weeks ago about trying new things.  So Ken only needed to say 'Perhaps I should try Keswick' and I was finding us accommodation. There wasn't much left apart from a specially set-up campsite where we could take our motor-home and our dog with all meals provided in the modest cost.  It sounded perfect!

Ken enjoyed his week.  He loved the teaching and felt he learnt a great deal - I did too. Enthusiastically, I embraced the theme; 'Becoming like God's Son'. During the week, I wavered a little in this aim when problems arose with the motor-home electrics, I stood in mud queuing for the shower or the rain soaked through my raincoat to my underwear when struggling back up the hill to the campsite with a swollen, aching ankle. Time was tight, the communal meals and washing up seemed to take forever, so we were always rushing back and forth into town to go to seminars.

It is the first convention/conference when I haven't had a role as a counsellor or youth leader.  This was strange, I felt slightly out of kilter. I had anticipated that I would have spare time, so took my desperately needy novel with me to respond to the copy-editor's comments. This task was not to be. Despite charging the battery fully before embarking on the journey to Keswick, the laptop allowed me to go through the first chapter, then the screen went black.

Praise God!  He knew I needed a little time to look up at the beautifully majestic surrounding hills, to thank Him for his greatness, to reflect on all that I had heard in the Bible talks and seminars and to breathe more slowly again.  I was still hurrying around to be in the right place for the right teaching, but somehow I was getting the message, 'Be still and know that I am God'.

Was I becoming more Christlike?

'After Jesus had dismissed them, he went up on a mountainside by himself to pray.  When evening came he was there alone.' Matthew 14:23

Back in Norfolk, I'm a bit short of mountains, but I am sure a path through the fields, a walk in the woods, the quiet of the garden or an empty room will help me spend more time with the Father, to become more like his Son.

Annie Try is the pen-name of Angela Hobday, Chair of ACW. Her first novel 'Losing Face' is published by Roundfire Books and her second one, 'Trying to Fly', will be launched in January 2017, published by Instant Apostle.