From the Preface: Every year, during the month of July, thousands of Christians from all parts of the world gather for a Convention for the deepening of the spiritual life, lasting one week, in the little town of Keswick, which nestles at the foot of Skiddaw mountain and beside beautiful Lake Derwentwater, in the Lake District of northern England, a region famous by association with the Lake poets - Wordsworth, Coleridge, and Southey - and for picturesque and fascinating scenery unsurpassed in all England, if not in all Europe. Since 1875, when the first of these Conventions was held, the influence of what is taught there has been increasingly felt in the Christian world, until Keswick teaching has come to be regarded as one of the most potent spiritual forces in recent Church history. The 'Keswick movement' has become historic.... Here, then, we have the teaching of Keswick, one of the most interesting religious phenomena of our time.

This volume introduces researchers to the leaders, ideas, and institutions of the Keswick Movement, a strand of holiness teaching that was embraced by many evangelicals who came from the more Calvinistic wing of Protestantism, especially Anglicans, Baptists, Congregationalists, and Presbyterians. The Keswick Movement is the most difficult of the three main holiness traditions to delineate. Unlike the Wesleyan Holiness and Holiness Pentecostal traditions, the Keswick Movement has not gone through a definitive period of careful theological refining and institutional boundary setting.

Keswick was one of the earliest expressions of Christian unity and a major force in the world missions movement. John C. Pollock, a widely acclaimed Christian biographer, unravels the story of how the convention began and how it grew, and of the many great personalities who have figured in its history.