Donald gives his testimony about his journey with Jesus.
[0:00] We have to be obedient, and especially in the work of the Lord.
[0:15] And when the minister spoke yesterday morning, if he had asked me to speak of any other event that happened, over forty years ago, I would have held my breath.
[0:39] But when he mentioned testimony, I don't think I could refuse. Of course, there are a lot of things that have happened over forty years that I can't remember.
[0:55] But I can't remember. When I realized that there was something within me that wanted to change.
[1:07] And the things that I liked most, and things that gave me great pleasure, I started to turn my back on them.
[1:26] I didn't want to hear about them. All I wanted was to be in the company of the Lord's people. As we all remember at communion times, Friday was the men's day.
[1:49] When I was born in the church, and we had brethren come from other parts of Lewis and Horace, spoke to the question.
[2:02] And most of them, who spoke to the question, knew the very exact time when it happened, where it happened, and everything that they were doing that day happened.
[2:23] But I can't say that. I can't say that. Definitely, I know how it happened. But to put my finger on the day or the time, I couldn't go into it. And I think that it held me back too. Because I was losing ground when I could hear these great men, speak about their own closeness with God and how they knew what they were.
[2:43] And I could hear these great men, speak about their own closeness with God and how they knew what they were happening.
[2:59] and how they knew everything and how they would quote from the Bible. Not that I had a knowledge of the Bible, but not to the extent that I would start quoting it.
[3:17] So that kept me sitting on the fence for a while. And I was praying to the Lord to reveal to me.
[3:29] That was in the conversion. I had the first communion go by, and then the time of the next communion, I was wondering then.
[3:47] I wasn't speaking ten very about it, not even Rachel. She had come forward to the festival a year before that.
[4:27] And when he preached on Mother Boothat, he called up to Lodebar and sat at the king's table. And he preached for a while.
[4:42] And before he finished his service, he said, When Mother Boothat sat at the king's table, We all know that Mother Boothat had infirmities, and he was lame in both legs.
[4:58] And he said, But when he sat at the king's table, all his infirmities were hidden. And he spoke of Christ as the table, hiding our infirmities.
[5:18] None of us were perfect. None of us were perfect. None of us were perfect. But Christ was perfect. And I came out that evening from the church, and nobody would convince me that I wasn't from the church.
[5:37] Jesus was a new person to me. And how could I not remember when David spoke to me yesterday?
[5:52] But I couldn't speak. And go back forty years in my memory, to that very time that things started to change in my life.
[6:04] And since then, the Lord has revealed himself to me in many, many times. I could stand here the whole evening and talk about the goodness of the Lord.
[6:20] As most of you know, I was a fisherman all my life. And fishing was a profession like every other profession.
[6:34] It was a challenging profession. But we were very happy at it. We had ups and downs like every other profession.
[6:45] And the first boat I bought, I was very fortunate with it.
[6:58] We did a good living out of it with six of us aboard. And then the second boat, I thought it would go to a smaller boat.
[7:11] But I went to a smaller boat, and into much trouble. And then, yeah, I started with it.
[7:23] I couldn't do a thing right. And as I told here before, I went into great empty debt.
[7:34] And I couldn't find a way out of it. I wasn't a person that took my work home with me. But I couldn't leave my work at that time.
[7:50] I had to take it home. And we prayed to the Lord. And I used to say in my prayer, Lord, if you see a way out of this, you opened the way for us.
[8:05] And we kept on praying and praying. And it wasn't a short period either. And we were dredging for scallops.
[8:18] We came ten miles away from scallop me one evening. As we were dredging, we were picking up a lot of things. Old Wellington boots, ice cleanses, sea-wake, everything.
[8:34] But this morning, when we hauled up, we noticed a length of cable. It was about three feet in there.
[8:48] And it was thrown aside. Thrown into the toolbox. And it lay there. And it was a light here.
[8:59] And we were still struggling with the boat. One day it was fine. Next day it opened up. And my cousin, who was aboard with me, had a child who was attending hospital in Glasgow.
[9:16] And he was at one uni watching a programme on television where they were selling gold and silver.
[9:32] I don't know what else it was. He noticed that one person was selling something similar to what we had on the boat.
[9:44] So we went to the boat and took it with him to Glasgow. They advised him in Glasgow to go to some other place. And they told him it was a very expensive light we had in his hands.
[9:59] When he came home, he told me about it. But to make a long story short, we sold it.
[10:13] And he said, we paid it. At a very good price. We shared the money. And my share of the money paid all my debt. The very last way. The Lord had worked in such a mysterious way. And the thing was, the Lord answered our prayers. And he gave us that.
[10:47] And he said, it was gold anyway. I don't remember what type of gold. And it was lying in the toolbox, amongst old shackles, and rusty, Spanish and everything.
[11:04] But still, he didn't lose his life. And I always think now, how Jesus came into this world.
[11:17] And he was trampled under feet. And I trampled under my feet. The same as I did with that, what the Lord sent me to pay my debt.
[11:31] And I did. But still, he didn't lose his life. And whatever I did to Jesus, Jesus didn't lose his life.
[11:42] And he is still as precious and will be. I hope the Lord will keep me and guide me, so that I'll never lose my faith, while the Lord gives me my authority.
[12:01] And that we shall be diligent to him. In many, many ways, he has shown himself. When he looked at us, each one of us came short of his glory.
[12:16] But none of us has gone so far away, that he can bring back to the place that we were born for.
[12:32] Our own chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy forever. Thank you.