Soon after his conversion, J.I. Packer became acquainted with Keswick theology through his involvement in the Inter-Collegiate Christian Union. The central theme of Keswick thinking is the promise of a deeper spiritual life: complete deliverance from sin and closeness to Christ. The teaching takes various forms, but its dominant theme is that Christians, in a moment of crisis, realize they cannot live victoriously over sin in their own strength. In this realization, God assures them that through surrender to Christ, they will be empowered to have complete victory over sin. The slogan capturing this understanding was simple: “Let go, and let God.”
Packer knew the Keswick position was lacking, for it trained believers to expect too much and too little—Too much in terms of freedom from sin in this life and too little in terms of the need to mature spiritually. The corrective to Keswick thinking came through a providential encounter with the Puritans, who gave him theological balance, a spiritual corrective to Keswick pietism, and a spiritual trajectory toward knowing God, to which he vigorously committed himself. Consequently, offering a theologically robust, historically informed response to Keswick theology became a dominant theme of Packer’s life and writing.
This paper is an examination of Packer’s commitment to dismantling Keswick teaching on sanctification and an encouragement to the modern reader to take his slogan to heart instead: “Trust God, and get going!”