Back Keith's Story cont'd After a while, much as I enjoyed and appreciated the fellowship at St Georges, I found that attending the two churches was causing too many conflicts of interest, so I decided that my calling was with the BB at the Congregational Church, so reluctantly left St Georges and spent more time working with the BB. As time went on the Congregational Church sold its building and we met in a local school for a while until it was decided to amalgamate the 106th  with the 87th to form the 186th Company  based at Brockley Baptist Church. I had come home. I was asked to take over the leadership of the Junior Section as the Life Boys is now known. We also had a new young minister, Morris Munns, who was keen to introduce modern choruses accompanied by the guitar which I played incessantly at that time, but didn't have an amplifier needed for everyone to hear me playing in church. So I teamed up with a young pianist and fellow Junior Section Officer, Valerie,  to practice and play together. 40 years, two children and 2 grandchildren later we are still together. We married in 1971.  We moved first to Norfolk, then over the years to Essex, then Hertfordshire, then in 2001 shocked all our friends by moving to Scotland. Not such a crazy move as our daughter was already living here. There was one period during the 1990s after I qualified as an architect (at the age of 40) after many years of part time study, that I was made redundant so I tried to go it alone. Not such a good idea in a recession, and things didn't work out, causing us a lot of distress, heartache and financial problems for nigh on five years. Throughout this time there was one verse in the Bible that sustained me, Romans 8:28. "All things work together for good to those who love God" It's not easy at the time to see what good will come out of any difficult situation, but it has made us more resilient, more reliant on God, and more understanding of those who are also having a hard time. We also had to cope with our son becoming diabetic at the age of six and being in and out of hospital, and our daughter being involved in a serious road traffic accident when she was thirteen. Throughout it all however, that verse from Romans continues to sustain me. Keith

“All things work together for good to those who love God”

Keith and Valerie, 2009, dressed for a wedding. 

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