Messages by Gertrude Dekock Keehn

Messages spoken at various Camps Farthest Out by Gertrude Dekock Keehn.

Gertrude Dekock Keehn

About Gertrude Dekock Keehn

Gertrude devoted her life to sharing what she had personally discovered about God as a loving and accessible Heavenly Father…

Gertrude devoted her life to sharing what she had personally discovered about God as a loving and accessible Heavenly Father. She came to know God not as distant or severe, but as deeply caring and eager for a genuine, personal relationship with every individual. Having experienced this reality herself, she felt compelled to encourage others to seek and know God in the same living way.

As others observed her quiet confidence and distinctive way of life, curiosity naturally followed. People began approaching her with questions and seeking guidance. What started as simple conversations gradually grew into counseling, teaching, and public talks. Many were drawn by the freedom, peace, and joy she spoke of—qualities she attributed to a personal relationship with Jesus Christ grounded in Scripture.

Born in London in 1893, Gertrude was raised in a Christian home. As a child—energetic and often mischievous—she struggled with the idea of a God who was everywhere and knew everything. Yet even then, she felt a deep fascination with Jesus and a desire to be like Him. Years later, living in Cape Town as a single mother raising three children, the pressures of life began to mount. Though familiar with Scripture, she realized that the peace and joy it described were largely absent from her own experience, prompting her to ask why.

That question led her back to Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. After reading it many times over the years, Gertrude felt led to approach it again, this time with the intention of living it fully. She resolved to test the promises of God by placing complete trust in Him and surrendering her life to His will. This commitment required an ongoing willingness to let go of pride, self-reliance, and the habits of her former way of life.

With determination and reliance on the Holy Spirit, Gertrude persevered in living according to the teachings of the Sermon on the Mount, even when circumstances were difficult. In doing so, she began to experience increasing wholeness, peace, and joy. Through everyday life, she proved for herself God’s faithfulness, provision, and guidance, confirming the reliability of His Word in practical ways.

As her message spread, Gertrude became well known and deeply respected, though she initially faced resistance from established church leaders. Over time, she was led to speak and teach not only in Cape Town but also in Johannesburg. Reflecting on what she had learned, she often remarked that when God is trusted in life’s small details, He will also be present in the larger ones.

Her work eventually extended beyond South Africa. Gertrude was invited to speak in the United States, beginning in New Jersey and New York, and later traveling throughout the country. She spoke in settings ranging from private homes to churches and large public halls. Many of these talks were recorded, and the recordings circulated widely, reaching audiences far beyond those who attended in person.

Alongside her ministry to adults, Gertrude had a deep love for children and a strong desire to teach them. She conducted classes for children in South Africa, England, and the United States. One of her most notable efforts involved nearly a year of persistence to gain permission to teach at the Westville Reformatory in Indiana. With the assistance of a Catholic priest, she was eventually granted access. Though the young inmates were initially resistant, her simple lessons on God’s love and freedom brought about remarkable changes in their lives.

Throughout her life, Gertrude remained independent of any denomination, sect, or religious organization. She also lived entirely by faith, trusting God to provide for her needs. She never charged fees, took offerings, or solicited financial support. Her conviction was simple: since God’s love is freely given, it must also be freely shared.

In addition to her speaking and teaching, Gertrude authored several books, including “Read and Live!” and “Live and Prove!”, as well as numerous booklets drawn from her talks. She also wrote a children’s book titled “Gran’s Bedtime Talks”. Tens of thousands of copies of her writings were distributed without charge, each bearing the inscription, “This book is free to all.”

Messages Given By Gertrude Dekock Keehn

Two Feet Making a Single Track

Gertrude Dekock Keehn opens Revelation’s warning to the church that has “left thy first love.” She tells how she quietly coached her own daughter back into closeness with her husband after a new baby had come between them, without either one learning she was the one who prompted it. She warns campers at the 1966 North Florida CFO that the same drift into “broad road” distractions, from psychic messages to claims of past lives, can pull any Christian from that first love just as easily.

The Man Who Let His Breakfast Go Cold

Gertrude Dekock Keehn unpacks Jesus’ words “I am the way, the truth, and the life” for the camps. They were spoken from an overcoming spirit, she argues, not from ego. A man in a coffee shop once sat so absorbed in his book that his breakfast went stone cold, a moment she says taught her to judge rightly rather than by appearances. Finding that same inner way, rather than chasing psychic proofs or past life claims, is what lets anyone say those words for themselves.

I Felt Two Inches Taller

At the 1958 Ottawa, Canada CFO, Gertrude Dekock Keehn traces Jesus’ full technique of prayer as he taught it on the mount, moving from his warning against hypocrites who pray to be seen to the call to “enter into thy closet” and pray in secret. She illustrates it with the paper controller who granted her all the paper for her book once he learned it had convinced him “there is no death.”

A Portion of Your Artistic Temperament

Gertrude Dekock Keehn examines Jesus’ teaching in Matthew 7 that “ask, and it shall be given you.” As a child, she recalls, she ran upstairs to ask God for what her parents had just refused, and a missionary once told her that loving beautiful things was “a portion of your artistic temperament” from God. Asking is an infallible law, she says, and it works whether or not what is asked for is wise, a warning she gives often across the movement.

A Pillar That Goes Out No More

Gertrude Dekock Keehn preaches on Revelation’s promise to “him that overcometh,” and recounts how she once asked God for roses for a sick woman. A florist she stopped to comfort along the way handed her the bouquet. She gave the talk to the Oklahoma Ardmore CFO in 1963.

The Orange, the Peel, and Love

Teaching children at the Oklahoma Ardmore CFO in 1963, Gertrude Dekock Keehn uses a peeled orange, whose segments are held together by the peel as love binds people, to picture the wholeness of God. She pairs the lesson with Psalm 119’s cry, “Oh, how I love thy law.”

Would You Still Be Michelle?

When her granddaughter Michelle asks, “Gran, is Jesus God?”, Gertrude Dekock Keehn answers with a question of her own: would a girl who grew up to look and sound exactly like her mother still be herself? She brings that same picture of oneness to the movement’s deeper question of why tragedy strikes good people, insisting it is never God’s doing.

The Dark Cupboard Where Satan Lived

Gertrude Dekock Keehn tells the camps how her mother warned her that a dark cupboard held Satan. The warning left her afraid of pitch dark rooms well into adulthood, until she finally named the buried belief and laughed it loose. She urges listeners to hunt down their own unexamined childhood beliefs the same way.

The Boy With the Bag of Marbles

Gertrude Dekock Keehn shares a Sunday school story about a small boy playing with marbles, who suddenly blurted out “why don’t you tell them how God made light,” the very answer she had silently prayed for. She challenges her listeners at the Alabama CFO to truly mean it when they sing an old hymn’s pledge of “my life, my soul, my all,” rather than just enjoying the tune.

The Ones Who Bring Their Mistakes

Gertrude Dekock Keehn urges listeners at an Alabama CFO gathering to bring every hidden grudge or lie to God to be dissolved, calling such a thing a “false creation.” She illustrates it with a doctor whose rage at an abusive father broke only once he chose to forgive him.