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The River ChurchSermons

Mark Pittenger · 19 Jul 2026

Mark Pittenger · Sunday, 19 July 2026 · 42:31 · 5,886 words

There is no public page for this message yet — the transcript below is the whole of it.

Mark Pittenger reminds listeners that everything in life—relationships, health, finances—comes to an end, but God’s steadfast love endures forever. Drawing from Psalm 136, he points to creation as visible evidence of that love and emphasizes the greatest proof at the cross and the empty tomb. He challenges believers to recognize and praise God’s love each day, and invites those who do not yet know Jesus to seek him as their rescuer from the burning house of sin.

What this sermon is about

Ranked by keyness against every other sermon in the corpus. Each one is a word this sermon actually said — nothing here was written by a model.

endure 30 proof 14 love 75 tend 9 forever 21 evidence 10 burn 11 steadfast 12 filler 4 rescue 10 great 24 academy 5

Topics

Sin 2 Atonement & Sacrifice 2

Scripture referenced 40

Verified against the transcript. A reference the recording does not support is never listed here.

Psalms 136 4:38 Psalms 136 4:45 Psalms 136 6:36 Psalms 136 7:38 Psalms 136:1 7:39 Hebrews 13 12:22 Psalms 136 12:31 Psalms 136:8 12:31 Psalms 136 12:55 Psalms 136 14:53 Psalms 136:4-9 14:53 1 John 4:8 15:42 Jeremiah 31 18:17 Jeremiah 31:3 18:17 Psalms 100:5 18:40 Psalms 136 20:19 Psalms 136:10 20:19 Psalms 136:10 20:19 Psalms 136:10 21:16 Exodus 15:13 21:55 Genesis 12 23:08 Genesis 15 24:14 Joshua 21 25:12 Psalms 1 27:51 Psalms 1:17-25 27:51 Job 20 31:44 John 10 33:46 John 10:28 33:46 Psalms 136 35:02 John 3:16 35:08 John 19:30 35:38 Romans 6:23 36:24 Romans 5:8 36:51 Matthew 28 37:25 Matthew 28 37:25 Matthew 28:5-6 37:25 Matthew 28:5 37:32 Matthew 28:5 37:32 John 3:16 38:41 Psalms 136 40:25

Transcript

Every word, as spoken, with the second it was said. Each word links to its own entry in the index.

Church. How are we doing? A full house. Probably the most people that have been in here since I've

been out here. So if you don't know me, my name is Mark Pittenger. Weirdly, I'm up here on my first

Sunday in the building not on staff. So yeah, they said, oh hey, you're not on staff, but we need you

to preach. So hey, I'm humbled. I am honored that the church recognizes a calling on my life.

So I get to hang out with you guys today. Pastor Justin is on a well-deserved vacation.

So you're stuck with me. To piggyback off of Rebecca and Kyle, I am glad everybody has

survived the smoke, the weather, and the lettuce. I don't know what's going on in Michigan right now,

but God is good regardless. Fun fact about me, I came on staff in 2022. Sounds crazy. I was

leaving the fair last week and talking to my wife, and I'm like, four years on staff. Like,

it don't seem like it's been four years since I was hired. But I've been in Davidson for four

years, and it's crazy that now I'm standing here and I'm not on staff. In 2021, the church asked

me to join the pastor's academy. So the church, it was something that they had kicked around for

about 10 years. They had tried it once before, didn't work out. So then they said, hey, we have

a group of guys that we want to put through a pastor's academy. Would you be willing to join?

So 2021, I started.

Pastors' Academy with five other guys. 2022, I was asked to join the staff. 2023, I graduated

Pastors' Academy with those five guys. Five guys, Bibles and tithes, not burgers and fries.

We all graduated with expectations of someday growing in our ministries, right? We didn't

know what it looked like, but we had to write something about each person. We had to like say,

how do we feel about? We spent two years

Multiple times a week with this group of guys, what do you feel about these guys?

And every single one of them said, hey, I know one day Mark will be a pastor somewhere.

So saying that, coming now to July of 2026, I'm no longer on staff with the church.

I still have aspirations to one day pastor a church. However, that season has ended for me

as children's director here, right? I truly believe that God puts seasons in our lives

to build us for certain seasons coming.

Season has ended. So what does all that mean? Why did I say all that? It brings about a question

for me. What is a career, a relationship, your favorite clothes, your favorite shoes,

your favorite hat, your health, your finances, practically anything you can think of? What does

it all have in common? Nothing seems to last forever. Everything seems to come to an end at

some point. Maybe it's a relationship, you know, boyfriend, girlfriend, best friend, family.

You always seem to mutter those words, I will love you forever.

And then some point it ends, right? At some point, for some reason, it ends. Your favorite shirt,

your favorite shoes eventually wear out. Your favorite hat ends up all sweat stained and dirty

and whatever. It always comes to an end. Your finances. I can speak very recent about finances.

You get your finances built up, you get your finances built up, and your car breaks down.

Or in my case, your daughter's car breaks down. Or something goes wrong with your home,

and there goes all your finances. How about your health? Mental health, physical health,

emotional health?

One point you can be on the mountain, the next time you can be in the valley.

If you have a Bible, you have a device, whatever you choose to follow along with,

it'll be on the screen. We're going to be in Psalms chapter 136. And while you're turning

there, Psalms 136 speaks of something that never ends. Something that will last forever.

I gave you more of my recent history, but to go a little bit further back, say like early 2000s,

I started chasing this career as a rapper. Now, you might look at me and go, yeah, right.

But seriously, I was in the streets. I was running the streets. I was chasing this career

to be a rapper. Getting recognized. I had people asking me for money when I walked in the party

store. It was crazy, right? But what I was doing at that moment in time is I was living for the

moment and I wasn't looking at what is going to happen in the long run, right? Have you ever sat

there and said, what is life going to look like in 10 years from now? What is life going to look

like in 20 years from now? 30 years, 40 years, right? We tend to not think like that,

and I definitely wasn't thinking like that back then. But as I said earlier, we're put in seasons

to learn something, and something I learned from my hip-hop career, I put in quotes, is a thing

called a call and response. I don't know if you're familiar with call and response in music. It was

really big in hip-hop, and now I'm starting to see it in other places. But basically, it's where

you say something and the audience responds. For example, I still do Christian rap every now and

again, and one thing I like to do is I like to sing. I like to sing. I like to sing. I like to

do it as a call and response, is I'll be like, when I say Jesus, you say saves, and then I'm like

Jesus, and then you guys go saves, right? So it's like a call and response. Well, as I'm reading

through Psalms 136, I start reading this as a call and a response, because there's 26 verses in Psalm

136, and all 26 verses end with the same phrase. Just for an example, we'll go with verse one.

Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good. His steadfast love endures forever.

Now, as we go through this, every single verse ends with his steadfast love endures forever. So

what I thought would be fun to do, and this might have turned into a dumpster fire, but let's give

it a try. I want to try a call and response. So I'm going to read all 26. We're going to read all

26 verses. I'll read the first part, and as a congregation, as a body of Christ, I want you all

to reply back to me. His steadfast love endures forever. We good? All right, let's knock this out.

starting in verse one. Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good. For his steadfast love endures

forever. Give thanks to the God of gods. For his steadfast love endures forever. Give thanks to the

Lord of lords. For his steadfast love, to him alone does great wonders. To him who by understanding

made the heavens. To him who spread out the earth above the waters. To him who made the great lights,

the sun to rule over the day, the moon and stars to rule over the night. To him who struck down the

firstborn of Egypt, and brought Israel out from among them, with a strong hand and an outstretched

arm. To him who divided the Red Sea in two, but overthrew Pharaoh and his host in the Red Sea.

To him who led his people through the wilderness. To him who struck down great kings, and killed

mighty kings. Sihon, king of the Ammonites, Amorites. And Og, king of the Ammonites, and Og,

king of Bashan. And gave their land as a heritage. A heritage to Israel, his servant. It is he who

remembered us in our low estate, and rescued us from our foes. He who gives food to all flesh,

give thanks to the God of heaven. Hey, let's pray. Father, we just thank you for your word.

We thank you for an entire chapter that just drives home how serious it is when it comes

to your enduring love. Humbly thank you for placing me up here to deliver this message.

Father, I ask that you deliver this message, that it's your message, and that it's just my voice.

I ask that you work this into the hearts of everybody who hears it, in a way that only you

can. Father, take the lead. Love you, in Jesus' name. Amen. Going back to the very first verse.

Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good. His steadfast love endures forever. There's 26

verses we just went through. I got a feeling you guys are going to be sleeping tonight,

going, his steadfast love endures forever. But something I do with the kids, when I was back

with the kids, whether it was the memory verse or the bright idea, and just real quick, the bright

idea is kind of like a one sentence that kind of summarized the entire lesson, right? So like for

today's lesson, the bright idea would be God's love endures forever, right? So whenever we did

something like that, I always had them repeat it like three to five times, just because science

says if you repeat something, you're more likely to remember it. So I don't think it's just filler

or fluff that the author put that in there 26 times. I don't think it's just filler or fluff that the

author put that in there 26 times. I think God is trying to get our attention, right? It's not

just a filler to meet some criteria, right? Have you ever had to write a report or write an essay

or something, and you got to hit 500 words, and you get down to where you got like 66, 67 more

words to do, and you just start throwing stuff in there just because you've made your point,

but you got to hit the

filler words, right? You just, you got to hit 500. It might seem like that's what the psalmist is doing

here, but it's not. Everything in God's word is there for a reason. In Hebrews chapter 13,

verse 8, it says that Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. So what Psalm 136

is showing us that the same love that was there way back then, the same love that was there time

of Jesus, the same love that is there today, it's all of the same love, because his love endures for

forever, and he is the same yesterday, today, and forever. And in Psalms 136, we can see that in four

main areas, the first being creation. So I want everybody in here to just kind of look around,

just kind of see what's going, what's around you, right? And as you look around, try to find

something that was here when your great, great, great, great grandfather was around. Is there

anything in here that you can point out that says, that was here when my great, great, great,

great grandpa was here? And just for better context, I did the math for you. That's roughly

300 to 320 years ago, okay? So we're talking 1700s. Cell phones. How many of you got a cell phone in

your pocket? Was that here when your great, great, great, great grandpa was here? Nope. Cell phones

weren't a thing until 1973. How about the TVs? Fun fact, these TVs have a life expectancy of five to

10 years. Nope, they weren't here. How about the chairs you're sitting in? How about this building

we're standing in? How about the city of Davidson? Anybody know dates on Davidson? Don't worry, I did

it. Davidson was settled as a station in 1840.

It was incorporated into a village in 1889 and became a city like we know it today in 1934.

So no, Davidson wasn't around. Here's an even better fact. We just celebrated 250 years as a

country. The United States of America wasn't even around 300 years ago. But there is something that

was that we can physically see with our eyes. It was here 300 years ago, 500 years ago, thousands

of years ago. Go into verses four through nine in Psalm 136. It says, to him alone who does great

wonders, to him by understanding made the heavens, to him who spread out the earth above the waters,

to him who made great lights, the sun to rule over the day and the moon and stars to rule over

the night. The sun, the moon, the stars, those are all things that we can see. All have been

visible since day three of the creation. God had this perfect plan in the beginning. God had this

perfect plan to create all of this stuff perfectly. And in this perfect creation,

we are given evidence of his perfect love. First John 4.8 tells us that God is love. So if God is

love, then his love has to be perfect, right? That's why his love can endure forever. The author

here is pointing to nature saying, hey, look at the heavens. Look at the earth, the water. Look

at the sun, the moon, and the stars. This is all evidence of God's love. Creation is a love story.

The sun continues to shine. The seasons, they change, but they come back, and they're beautiful.

Earth remains perfectly sustained in space so that life can exist. And none of this is by accident.

All of this is perfectly created through God's love. Earth was perfectly created with the laws

of physics to keep us all from floating away. Amen for gravity. Earth was perfectly created

so that he could perfectly create us in his image. So knowing that,

creation is a great example of God's perfect love. No matter what we're going through,

if we're having a good day, a bad day, a hopeful day, or a hopeless day, we should be able to look

around and see the evidence of God's enduring love in creation. And guess what? That very same fact

was legit 300 years ago when our great, great, great, great grandpas were around. They could

look out and see the sun, the moon, and the stars and go, God loves us. They didn't float away into

the sky. They stayed on the ground. And that's evidence that God loved them. And that evidence

that we can just look outside and see evidence of God's love, that should make us want to jump

up and worship. I made this guy write 26 verses of praise, all focused on God's love. It made the

prophet Jeremiah write in chapter 31 of Jeremiah, verse 3, says, the Lord appeared to him from far

away and said, I have loved you with an everlasting love. The prophet Isaiah writes in 54, verse

10, the mountains may depart and the hills be removed, but my steadfast love shall not depart

from you. And then in Psalm 100, verse 5, says, for the Lord is good. His steadfast love endures

forever and his faithfulness to all generations, all generations, before and after. So the psalmist

here is giving us a reminder that no matter what we're facing, no matter where we're at in life,

we're on the mountaintop, we're in the valley lows, God's love is still there. But see, we tend to forget that

a lot of times we want to focus on the miracles. We only want to focus on the big things, the stuff

that really stands out. And the psalmist here is saying, hey, the big things are obvious, but it's

the daily things, like the sun coming up. You opened your eyes this morning. You're breathing.

Think about this. God was like, hey, these people are going to need to breathe, so let me go ahead

and make a tree and a bunch of those trees that do this process that creates oxygen so that we can

breathe. All we got to do is look around and have evidence that

God loves us. But we tend to forget that stuff when we're in the midst of the trials. We tend

to forget it. We tend to lean on our own understanding, and that always seems to get us

into trouble. And what we eventually learn is that when we get ourselves in trouble, we tend to not

be able to get ourselves out of that trouble. We get ourselves into a trouble that we can't get

ourselves out of, which is where verse 10 takes us, Psalm 136. In verse 10, it says,

We see that the psalmist now has taken, he's went from creation. He's saying, hey,

all the way back in the beginning, there was evidence of God's love. Now we're going to move

up to the Exodus. We're going to look at where Israelites, God's people, got themselves into a

pickle. They were in trouble, in trouble that they couldn't get themselves out of. Now, there's a

few things in the story that you might be familiar with, how God showed himself to Moses with a

burning bush. The 10 plagues, as you see here in verse 10, it says, him who struck down the firstborn

of Egypt. That's referring to the 10 plagues there, right? The parting of the Red Sea. Once the

Israelites got away from the Egyptians, the Egyptians took pursuit of them to capture them

again, and God parts the Red Sea. And then it says that,

um, after he divided it, Israel passed through it. And then when the Egyptians and Pharaoh got in

there, they were swallowed up by the Red Sea, right? Um, something that psalmists don't go to,

but as part of this, Moses is given the 10 commandments, right? This is all part of the

Exodus, and it all points to an enduring love that God has for us. In Exodus chapter 15, verse 13,

it says,

That word abounding there, meaning plentiful, a lot, or overflowing, never ending. His love,

it just continues, continues to flow and pour out on us. And what we, what we take away from

this is that,

As we see here in the Exodus, it begins and it ends with God. We can clearly see that in Exodus

with the Israelites. They were enslaved in Egypt 400 years. If they could have got themselves out

of trouble, you think they would have done it within 400 years. But it took God stepping in

to deliver them. It was part of his perfect plan. Going back in time to Genesis chapter 12,

we see that, we see that God gives Abraham a promise. Verses 1 and 2, he says,

Then we see that it's passed down to Isaac. And then we see it goes to Jacob, who then his name

is changed to Israel. And then from Jacob, we go to Joseph, who Joseph, if you're familiar with the

story of the guy with the coat of many colors and his brothers, and trap him and sell him into

slavery. And then he goes to Egypt as a slave. He becomes a prisoner. And the next thing you know,

he's the right-hand man to the Pharaoh. He's up there at the top of Egypt,

hierarchy. Then he gets put in charge of distributing the distribution of food.

And wouldn't you know it, the Israelites go into a famine and they have to come to Egypt for food.

And one of them is in power. So then they start coming, they start coming. And then we see that

in Genesis chapter 15, another promise that goes along with that one. God tells Abraham,

your descendants will be as numerous as the stars. So then we see as these Israelites are

flooding into Egypt, they start multiplying and they start multiplying. And then we see that Pharaoh,

sees this and he becomes scared. So what he does is before they grow too big,

he entraps them and turns them into slaves. During that time of slavery, Pharaoh says,

I'm going to eliminate this threat. I'm going to start killing all of the male children.

At that point in time, an Israelite lady has a baby, puts him into a basket, ships him up the

Nile river where he's found by Pharaoh's daughter, turns out to be Moses. Guy's probably familiar

with that name, right? Guys, see how this all ties back together? This is part of God's great plan.

All evidence of God's enduring love for us. Joshua 21 45 says not one word of the good

promises that the Lord made to the house of Israel has failed. All came to pass. Not a single word

failed to come true. Has anybody ever in your life held up to every single promise they've made?

I want to meet that person if they have. I know that I am guilty of failing at that.

And I'm sure we all could raise our hand to that. But God does not. Joshua says,

every single promise has been fulfilled. So when we can't seem to figure it out,

we can have confidence that God is going to take the initiative. Imagine, if you will,

somebody's trapped in a house that's on fire. The house is burning down. Are you going to stand

outside and go, hey, you need to get out? No, they don't need advice. You're not going to stand

out there and go, I believe you can do it. Come on. I'm cheering you on. They don't need

encouragement. What they need is they need rescued. And us as humans in our sinful nature,

in our human condition, we are standing in a house called life where the flames of sin have engulfed

us. We are trapped in this house and sin is burning around us. And we tend to focus on the flames. We

tend to focus on our thirst. And that's where we fall short. See, God's enduring love, it's not

determined or defined by the sins that are burning around us or the entrapment that we feel. God's

enduring love is not determined by the sins that are burning around us or the entrapment that we

feel. God's enduring love is defined because he made a way to rescue us. He says you are defined

by a God that wants to meet you where you are. You are defined by a God who wants to run into the

burning house and rescue you. See, what that does when we allow God to rescue us, what that does

for us is it creates a testimony. And every single testimony points and speaks to God's

enduring love, which leads us to verse 17 through 25 of Psalm chapter 1.

Which points to a provision or a providing of. See, God didn't just rescue Israel, but he also

guided them. He also protected them. He also fed them and provided for them. He didn't just rescue

and then abandon and rescue. Hey, I got you out the fire. Good luck. No, God was like, hey, I'm

going to stick with you through this. His love isn't just witnessed in the big dramatic events.

His love isn't just witnessed in him pulling us out of the fire. His love is also visible in the

provisions that he gives to us. The daily walking with him, the daily commitments that we make,

the little things like waking up, breathing, friendships, relationships, jobs, homes, cars,

clothes, the things we take for granted. These are all evidence of God's love.

The average American, as poor as we may feel, is considered rich in most countries,

most developed countries, not just the third world ones where we see all we see the commercials of

donate $10 to have water. Those guys are really hating us. But even the developed nations don't

have it as good as we have it. And we tend to take stuff for granted because we focus on the wrong

things. Because it's in these blessings that we can see God's enduring love. Psalm 3410 says the

young lions suffer and want hunger, but those who seek the Lord lack no good thing. Psalm 3725

says I have been young and now I'm old, yet I have no good. I have no good. I have no good. I have

not seen the righteous forsaken or his children, children begging for bread. And the apostle Paul

writes in Philippians 419, my God will supply every need of yours according to his riches and

glory in Christ Jesus. God is faithful to supply our needs. Notice he says needs. He doesn't say

our wants, our needs. See, see, see, we, we take for granted the blessing of, of waking up with a

shower and have running water or opening the refrigerator or the cupboard and having food in

there. Now I know teenagers are probably like this food's not good. I don't want this. Why don't we

have anything? There's food in there, right? We take advantage of this stuff. Being able to jump

in a car, being able to go to a job. James tells us in chapter one, verse 17, every good gift and

every perfect gift is from above. See, we, we like to celebrate getting the new job, but do we

celebrate when we're preparing for that new job? Do we celebrate in the new job? Do we celebrate in

the interview process? Are we celebrating in the middle of all the work we're putting in for it?

The sweat, the tears, everything that goes into accomplishing this. Are we celebrating that? Are

we taking it for granted? Like, like, like we praise God for opening the door, but are we praising him

for giving us the strength to walk through it? The stuff that we have to do daily. 20 years down the

road when you're still at that job that you praised him for 20 years ago, are you still praising God

for that, for that job? Or are you like, man, this job, 20 years at this job, I hate coming here. Look, I got

18 at GM and, um, nevermind. Are we still celebrating that job? Hey, one thing I was taught

in pastor's academy is you got to preach to yourself. If you preach to yourself, everybody

else will, will, they're going to pick up on it, right? So are we, are we taking the stuff for

granted? The stuff that we have every day, right? Let me ask you this. Why did we wake up this

morning? Why are we sustained in the hard times? When the times get hard, when we're struggling,

why are we sustained? Why do we still wake up?

When you feel like you can't carry yourself, but you make it through it, who is carrying you? It's

these little things where many of God's blessings go unnoticed because they're our normal routine,

stuff that happens every day. And whether it's the big things that happen or it's these daily

normal routine things that happen, the same truth stands behind them. And that's his steadfast love

endures forever. So I want to challenge you. Look at your life as if it's a book. You may not

understand everything, but it's a book. You may not understand everything, but it's a book.

But as you go through the sentences, as you go through the paragraphs, knowing that everything

points to God's steadfast love enduring forever, you start to see God's fingerprints on every

single word. John chapter 10 and verse 28, Jesus, this is Jesus talking to you. He says,

I give them eternal life and they will never perish and no one will snatch them out of my hand.

Fingerprint is on our, on our, on every page of our lives. We are in his hands. We are in his hands.

How do we get in his hands though? Well, the psalmist points to the answer to that question

in the very last verse of chapter 136, when he says, give thanks to the God of heaven.

See that the key word there is, is heaven. He's speaking to salvation. The psalm goes full circle

saying, give thanks. In verse one, he says, give thanks to the Lord for he is good. But here in

verse 26, we say, give thanks to the God of heaven. How does this point to God's enduring love? This is

the greatest proof of God's enduring love. And what's awesome about this is when Psalm 136 was

written, this proof hadn't even happened yet. John 3, 16, probably nobody in here knows that verse,

but the first part of it says that God so loved the world that he gave his only son.

The greatest proof of God's enduring love is found at the cross because it was at the cross

sin was erased. It was at the cross justice was served. It was at the cross mercy was extended

and it was at the cross.

The cross that God's enduring love was displayed. John chapter 19, verse 30, when Jesus had received

the sour wine, he's hanging on the cross and he said, I'm thirsty. Now think about this. They take

this dirty rag, they dip it in vinegar and they stick it in his mouth. How do you think that

tasted? Horrible, right? But as, as, as he received that, it says he took his final breath

and he said, it is finished. He bowed his head and he gave up his spirit. Greatest proof of God's

it is finished in Greek is a word called to tell us die, which means to bring to a close,

to complete or fulfill or to pay in full. Now Romans 6, 23 tells us that the wages of sin is

death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus. You see the greatest

proof of God's enduring love is that as sinners, we owe a wage of death, but he said, Hey, let me

send you my son to take his, take your spot. Sin requires a payment.

And Jesus said, it's paid in full. As he gave up his spirit. Romans 5, 8 tells us that God shows

his love for us that while we are still sinners, Christ died for us to the cross is the greatest

proof of God's love, the death, but it's only part of the story. It's only part of the proof

because there's another part. As much as the cross proves God love, so does the empty tomb.

Matthew 28 verses five and six. This ranks right up there as, as one of my favorite verses. Matthew 28,

six, but in verse five, the women are at the tomb. They went to, they went to see Jesus and verse five

says, the angel says to the women, do not be afraid for I know that you seek Jesus who was

crucified. He is not here for he is risen. Hey, you guys can amen right there. He is risen because

Jesus is alive because that tomb is empty. Our past is full of forgiveness. Our present is full

of purpose and our future is full of hope and all of it is full of God's endurance.

During love because the tomb is empty. God has made a way to rescue us out of that burning building

because the tomb is empty. We have a way to spend eternity giving thanks to the God of heaven in the

presence of God in heaven. Man, I thought that was going to get a better response. Let me try that

again. We can spend eternity giving thanks to the God of heaven in the presence of God in heaven.

John 3, 16. Again, for God so loved the world that he gave his only son that whoever

believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. The fact that God offers us an

eternity of life with him, man, that should get us pumped because we have the opportunity to

experience this forever enduring love of God that the psalmist speaks of here. So if you're a

believer, you know Jesus is your Lord and Savior. You're sitting here today. I want to challenge

you to strive every single day, every single hour, every single second to recognize the proof

of God's love in your life and praise him for it. Thank him for it. Acknowledge him. But if you don't

know who Jesus is, seek the proof. If you don't know him as your Lord and Savior, seek the proof

and I'll give you a clue. The proof is found in Jesus. Seek God's love. Again, God's love is found

in Jesus. Acknowledge your guilt. See, the whole reason that the house is burning around us

is because we're sinners. But we have to cry out to Jesus. He is the only one who can rescue

you from that burning house. And guess what? When you're in the middle of those flames, when you're

in the middle of the fire and the house is burning around you, you don't know how much time you have

left. Tomorrow is not promised to any of us. So if you don't know Jesus as your Lord and Savior,

I beg you to not leave here today without knowing him. To the message of Psalm 136, it's not that

God has love. It's that God is love. The worship team sang a song and I actually just added this

while they were singing it. But they sang the song, What a Beautiful Name. And there's a line

in there that says,

The message that God is love, that's such a greater. So great. Greater than our sin. And since

God is love, his love is perfect. And it will endure forever. You can call it a forever love.

Will you guys pray with me? Father, we just thank you again. We thank you for your words. We thank

you for your spirit. That your spirit plays such a major role in your building up of us. Father,

just ask that if there's somebody here who doesn't know you, Lord, that they don't leave here until

they seek that proof. Until they find that proof and they accept you as their rescuer. That they

acknowledge the house is burning around them. God, for those of us who are believers, just put it on

our hearts to consciously acknowledge you. Consciously acknowledge the little things in

life. That's where proof is of your enduring love. Fathers, we go about the rest of our day

until we can gather again. Watch over us. Guide us. Keep us safe. We love you. Lift all of this up to

you. In the mighty name of your son, Jesus.

name. Amen. Thank you guys.