028 - How Mighty His Wonders #2 - Don Gossett

[00:00:00] I thought it good to show the signs and wonders that the High God has wrought toward me. How great are His signs and how mighty are His wonders. His kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and His dominion is from generation to generation.

[00:00:17] I've just shared with you a verse from Daniel chapter 4, and I want to just give my own testimony on the Lord's wonderful working and how mighty are His wonders.

[00:00:28] I'm grateful for the mercy of God that came to my life when I was just a boy and I heard the gospel for the first time. And what a delight it was.

[00:00:38] It happened at a Baptist church one Sunday night. I was invited by neighbors to go with them to these meetings.

[00:00:46] And as I heard this evangelist share how Jesus died for us, he would very dramatically portray the death of Christ by carrying a chair across the platform,

[00:00:57] like unto Jesus carrying his cross up Gotha. I mean, the evangelist vividly portrayed the story of Christ's substitutionary sacrifice.

[00:01:08] And even as a 12 year old boy, the message of the gospel made a deep impact and I was no longer going to resist the call of the Holy Spirit,

[00:01:17] but I accepted Him that night, my Savior and my Lord. And shortly after that time, we moved from that farm community where I lived,

[00:01:27] I loved so much to another town and there I was not under the influence of the gospel as I'd been back there on the farm.

[00:01:36] And as just a young teenager, I lacked teaching or spiritual guidance and very feebly I followed the Lord.

[00:01:45] I realized later likely very few of my friends would ever thought of me as a Christian.

[00:01:50] I remember one time a dear classmate, a young woman said to me about something. He said,

[00:01:58] Don Gossett, you'll go to hell for that. And I thought, no, I'm not going to hell.

[00:02:04] She doesn't understand that I have received Christ, but I never shared with her about that.

[00:02:09] And it was a misdeed on my part to fail to tell people that I was a born again Christian.

[00:02:17] And I had a great deal to overcome of being so man stricken, fearful.

[00:02:23] And I praise God for how he ministered to me.

[00:02:26] I remember so well that when I was later in my teen years, I had a resurgence of my faith.

[00:02:33] And I was baptized in water at another Baptist church and became a member of that church.

[00:02:40] And however, I was actively involved in high school athletics and I would neglect the things of the Lord seriously.

[00:02:46] So let me now go back to that incident in the French West Indies.

[00:02:52] Let me just remind you of the experience I'm sharing firsthand of what happened in my travels.

[00:02:59] We had, I had been in Anguilla, an island called Anguilla.

[00:03:03] We conducted an open air crusade there in the park.

[00:03:07] And we then had a day or nightly television program that reached all those islands.

[00:03:14] And as our plane pulled in beside the Air Guadeloupe Plain, I noticed a friend of mine was there at the airport to meet us.

[00:03:22] Her name was Mrs. Charles Wells, the gracious French Christian lady.

[00:03:26] And she asked if I would go with her to her home and that she lived out on the plantation.

[00:03:32] Her daughter-in-law had just been drowned that afternoon in a flash flood.

[00:03:37] The water had come down from the mountain so rapidly that the family was in sorrow about the drowning of this dear loved one.

[00:03:46] And they wanted me to come to minister to that family.

[00:03:49] And when I got to that home, I was introduced to two little boys, a boy named Michael who was 11 and a boy named Joy who was 7.

[00:03:58] It was their mother who had been lost in the flood waters.

[00:04:01] And I prayed tenderly as I embraced these sweet little boys that our Lord might minister comfort to them in the loss of their mother,

[00:04:10] that they might find the Savior precious to them.

[00:04:13] Well, both boys told me they had watched my nightly telecast every night during the previous week,

[00:04:19] and their hearts were opened to the dear Lord Jesus as I prayed for them.

[00:04:24] It seemed that this mother and her friend were coming from work when suddenly the waters from the flood began to rise in the road,

[00:04:31] and their motor of the car was killed.

[00:04:34] And when the two ladies were forced out of their car,

[00:04:37] immediately the rapid waters coming down from the mountain engulfed them.

[00:04:41] The one lady threw her arms around a tree and held on until she was rescued.

[00:04:46] But the mother of Michael and Joy, these two little boys,

[00:04:50] she was quickly carried into the tide of the flood waters and was drowned.

[00:04:55] And as I had this experience there in the French West Indies,

[00:04:58] my mind went back to another time in the home of another bereaved family.

[00:05:04] When I was just 17 years of age, a year classmate of mine, a young lady named Bonnie, was drowned.

[00:05:12] And it was a sad event that I could never forget.

[00:05:14] And I remember so well how hearing the terrifying scream and Bonnie's mother pointing

[00:05:22] and trying to get help for her daughter in raging flood waters.

[00:05:27] Well, Bonnie's body was found the next morning.

[00:05:30] And since I was a close friend of the family, I spent part of that night with them in their mourning.

[00:05:36] My heart was deeply stirred by the fact of how uncertain life could be and how one has no knowledge in advance of when the time of death is going to come.

[00:05:50] And the uncertainty of all of this.

[00:05:52] I know that that particular event happened in my life and heart.

[00:05:57] I hardly slept that night as I wrestled with the thought.

[00:06:01] What if that had been me?

[00:06:04] I said, Lord, I know I'm saved by your wonderful love.

[00:06:07] What if my life had ended in that flood like that?

[00:06:11] What if I had been drowned tonight?

[00:06:13] And yet, I know I'm saved, but I have done nothing for you, Lord Jesus.

[00:06:19] I've not borne any fruit for you at all.

[00:06:21] I've never attempted to win a soul to Jesus.

[00:06:23] I had let few people know that I even had a personal experience with the Savior.

[00:06:29] And the question in my heart and mind, what if my life had suddenly ended that night?

[00:06:36] I was so deeply stirred by this incident that I could not enjoy in the natural course of events.

[00:06:42] I was at Paul Bear at this girl's funeral a few days later.

[00:06:46] And it seemed the Holy Spirit was using this tragedy to minister deeply to my own heart.

[00:06:51] I decided I wanted to make my life count.

[00:06:54] I'd observed so closely how quickly life could end.

[00:06:58] What would I do with my life that would now count?

[00:07:01] This set me in a new realm of seeking the Lord in prayer and the reading of His word to find answers.

[00:07:07] I graduated from high school about that time,

[00:07:10] and I was glad to get away from my old worldly friends and join my family who had moved elsewhere.

[00:07:16] I was anxious to get a new start and a new place to have a different life than I had known in the last years of high school.

[00:07:25] I remember how my brother Dick was disappointed that I was no longer interested in carousing with him or going to worldly places where he would find such satisfaction, it seemed.

[00:07:36] And week after week passed that summer, and I was seeking the Lord for His guidance for my life.

[00:07:43] I wanted to find purpose, objectivity that would count.

[00:07:48] And the glorious climax of that summer of spiritual pursuit took place when in a nighttime visitation the Lord definitely called me to preach the gospel.

[00:07:57] Gladly I answered that call, and I made plans immediately to enroll in a Baptist college where I would prepare for ministry.

[00:08:07] And very soon I was preaching the gospel in small country Baptist churches.

[00:08:13] And I was thankful that I was in the Lord's service.

[00:08:16] My life was counting for Him.

[00:08:17] And I continued my studies of the word at the same time actively preaching in these small little churches.

[00:08:26] I was happy to be a preacher, but still I had this heavy burden for my own unsaved family.

[00:08:33] I remember my personal anguish of sitting at a table having a meal with my family.

[00:08:38] And I look across the table into their faces and think,

[00:08:42] Oh, without Jesus Christ, my family faces eternal separation from the living God.

[00:08:47] What a tragedy that will be.

[00:08:49] And I made it my purpose how I would be used by the Lord to win my family.

[00:08:54] It seemed this was the most essential thing of all, more than anything else, was to see my own family come to the Savior.

[00:09:02] And hardly could I have conceived how the Lord had a plan to use to answer my prayer and bring all my family to salvation.

[00:09:10] It was my mother's critical need of healing that brought them under the sound of the gospel with me.

[00:09:16] I took them to meetings where they prayed for the healing of the sick.

[00:09:19] This was all something brand new to them as well as me.

[00:09:22] And praise God, that preacher shared the gospel.

[00:09:25] And when my mother and dad heard him, both of them, it seemed, had always been unmoved by the gospel.

[00:09:32] But when they heard the power of the gospel, it caused them to submit to the Lord.

[00:09:38] And my mother, first of all, was saved by God's grace.

[00:09:41] Wow, what a night, what a time.

[00:09:44] And then I, having taken my parents to those meetings where they prayed for the sick, I had made an investigation among my friends about the subject of healing.

[00:09:55] Now, can I share with you the varied viewpoints that my friends had about the subject of healing?

[00:10:03] Their views on the subject of healing varied.

[00:10:06] One said, God can heal, but he won't.

[00:10:09] Another said to me, God can heal, and he might.

[00:10:14] However, it was the dear people who embraced the full gospel of Jesus Christ that encouraged me by declaring emphatically,

[00:10:21] God can heal, and God can heal your mother.

[00:10:25] Well, when my mother and dad attended those meetings with me,

[00:10:28] they sensed the great reality of the Lord's miracle-working power present.

[00:10:32] And they were touched deeply.

[00:10:35] Very surprisingly, they wanted to return.

[00:10:38] And each night, about the third night it was, my mother went forward to receive the Savior.

[00:10:44] What a hallelujah event that was!

[00:10:46] What a tremendous miracle when my own sweet mother went forward to accept the Lord and was born again.

[00:10:53] The next night, my mother was in the prayer line.

[00:10:56] When this evangelist prayed for my mother in Jesus' name,

[00:11:00] the power of the Lord went through her body.

[00:11:03] Her afflicted body had been given up with any hope or help.

[00:11:07] And in a moment's time, she was made every whit whole.

[00:11:10] It was a beautiful miracle that greatly affected all my family.

[00:11:14] And when they saw how my mother was totally well, and yet how real Jesus was,

[00:11:21] and how he had manifested his loving concern for my mother,

[00:11:25] all of my family was eager to accept the Lord, and thank God they did so.

[00:11:31] I can never forget that night.

[00:11:33] And my friend, if you are one that has an unsaved family, that they seem to be stubborn, rebellious,

[00:11:41] who are totally against, it seems, the gospel, let me unite with you in a prayer.

[00:11:45] Father, your word is said in Acts 16, 31.

[00:11:49] Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved in thy house.

[00:11:53] Lord, I pray with every person listening to me who has unsaved loved ones.

[00:11:58] Lord, this is your promise, clear cut.

[00:12:01] And Lord, you did it for me.

[00:12:02] You did it for my family.

[00:12:04] You did it for all the gossers who were so godless, so wicked, so defiling people,

[00:12:10] delivered from alcoholism and infidelity and crime and all the other things.

[00:12:15] By your grace, Lord, thank you, thank you.

[00:12:17] I pray for all the Dinge, I pray for you, to hear the grace of your Christ how to bless him,

[00:12:25] Lord, my heart, and glory, and Lord.

[00:12:31] And I pray for all the gifts, through harm and Rachel.

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