Well folks, we’ve been quiet for a week, and there’s a good reason for it.

We just got back from the Keswick Convention up in the Lake District. The theme this year was “Strong in His Strength,” and I tell you, you could really feel that in the atmosphere. Not a lot of noise or hype, just a whole lot of hungry hearts sitting under the Word of God.

We stayed in a little camping pod on a working farm called Gill Head Farm. Real farm life, sheep, cattle, all the smells that come with it, and these guinea fowl running around helping keep the bugs down. Yes, there were flies, even in the toilets as I read from narky reviewers online, but that’s just farm living, and we took it as it came.

No internet, no television. Just switched off for a week, and it was wonderful.

In the mornings I stayed with my son Roddy and stepson Ben, both on the autistic spectrum, at the Count Everyone In group, while my wife went into the main tent to hear Andy Robinson teaching through Matthew chapters 8 to 12.

In the evenings we all went together to the big tent, and Ben Slee was leading the worship, simple, congregational, and full of the Word, and they had a series called “Defeating Satan’s lies.”

We heard Mark Ellis talk about the lie that “God doesn’t really like you,” Eric Ortlund on “God can’t be trusted,” Ste Casey on “Prayer is useless,” Bob Marsden on “You can do this on your own,” and Angus MacLeay on “You won’t make any difference.”

On the Monday my stepdaughter came to visit us for the day, so instead of going to hear Amy Orr-Ewing on “God isn’t altogether good,”

I went for a run up Blencathra. It was a good way to stretch the legs and clear the head.

We had to head home before the last evening with Graham Albans, “You shouldn’t enjoy God’s gifts”, but we caught it online later. Watching online was picture perfect and had great sound.

On the Wednesday night we also went to Ben Slee’s concert; you know it was just beautiful. Three young ladies standing behind us were singing, and it felt like the angels were right there with us, almost a three-dimensional sound.

My boy Roddy loved it. Music is one of those things that really touches his heart with his autism.

What blessed me most was just being among people who genuinely love Jesus and love His Word.

Over three thousand folks in that tent and out on the grass. You could sit down on a bench or next to a stranger in the tent and strike up a conversation like you’d known them for years.

I met a lovely brother named Nigel and we swapped phone numbers. People from all over the UK and from other countries too, different backgrounds, but the same hunger for the Lord.

I know some folks at home get a bit nervous about Keswick. They say it’s too ecumenical. That concern has been around for a long time.

But what I found that there was not any type of compromising of the gospel. It was just Bible-believing Christians gathering around the Scriptures, encouraging one another to stand strong in the Lord. It felt like a little touch of heaven.

We came home tired, the good kind of tired, but refreshed in our spirits.

That theme, “Strong in His Strength,” wasn’t just words on a banner.

In the teaching, in the worship, in the concert, in the conversations, and even in the quiet of that little farm with no screens, you could sense the strength that only Jesus can give.

So we’re back in Scotland now, back online, and just grateful.

Grateful for the week, grateful for the Word, and grateful once again that our strength is not in ourselves, it’s in Him.

Keep bible Strong

Philippians 4:13

Peter