The extra expense of his stay in Athens left Buchman flat broke and he had to borrow from a friendly American doctor. His parents hurriedly cabled $150 but were clearly far from pleased. By June, his mother was writing reproachfully, 'I believe the only thing you like to do is travel. You know father's business is not what it was, he is getting older and is not as active as he used to be.'2 Nevertheless, she would send enough money to enable him to stay in Europe until August.

In Germany, still sick at heart despite the outward liveliness, Buchman went to see von Bodelschwingh again. By July he was in Britain and decided to attend the Keswick Convention, an annual gathering of evangelical Christians. His hope was to see the reputed Congregational minister, F. B. Meyer, whom he had met at Northfield and who he believed might be able to help him. Meyer, however, was not there, and Buchman kept himself busy attending meetings and walking the Lakeland countryside.

Then, one Sunday, on a whim, he dropped in on a service in a little stone-built chapel. It was sparsely attended - a congregation of only seventeen - and a woman was leading the service. She was the evangelist Jessie Penn-Lewis, whose husband was a descendant of the family of William Penn. She spoke about the Cross of Christ. It was hardly a new subject to Buchman. He had heard the doctrine of the Atonement expounded on a score of occasions at Mount Airy, taken notes on it, answered examination questions on it, preached about it. This woman, however, spoke so movingly about the Cross that, for the first rime, it became a living and life-giving experience for him. 'She pictured the dying Christ as I had never seen him pictured before,' he recalled later. 'I saw the nails in the palms of His hands, I saw the bigger nail which held His feet. I saw the spear thrust in His side, and I saw the look of sorrow and infinite suffering in His face. I knew that I had wounded Him, that there was a great distance between myself and Him, and I knew that it was my sin of nursing ill-will.

'I thought of those six men back in Philadelphia who I felt had wronged me. They probably had, but I'd got so mixed up in the wrong that I was the seventh wrong man. Right in my conviction, I was wrong in harbouring ill-will. I wanted my own way and my feelings were hurt.

'I began to see myself as God saw me, which was a very different picture than the one I had of myself. I don't know how you explain it, I can only tell you I sat there and realised how my sin, my pride, my selfishness and my ill-will, had eclipsed me from God in Christ. I was in Christian work, I had given my life to those poor boys and many people might have said 'how wonderful', but I did not have victory because I was not in touch with God. My work had become my idol.

30