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Day 179 or June 28. Some things really do last forever. Our thoughts today are rooted

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in Psalm 136 verse 1. His love endures forever.

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First the big picture surrounding this verse. There is a psalm included in our selection

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for today that became very famous amongst popular music lovers of the 1970s. Jeremiah

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possibly wrote the original before members of a Jamaican reggae band rewrote it as a

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Rastafarian song. Interestingly, the Jamaicans didn't choose this psalm by accident, as

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Rastafarians broadly reject Western society, which it calls Babylon. Then a group called

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Boney M. recorded it, and it became a big hit as a single called By the Rivers of Babylon.

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The psalm before this one is the most repetitive psalm in the Bible. It has 26 verses, and

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every one ends the same way.

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And now today's action step. When you try to return a defective piece of electronic

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equipment these days that you bought a year or two ago, you are often greeted with the

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phrase, Nothing lasts forever. Sadly, that's true, because every electronic item that is

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made is automatically improved, within months, and so rendered obsolete. The anonymous psalmist

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who wrote Psalm 136 anticipated this, and to make his point par excellence, he wrote

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26 verses and repeated the same phrase 26 times.

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His love endures forever. What a word of comfort knowing that our God's love endures forever.

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In some older versions of the Bible, this is translated, His mercy endureth forever.

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Whenever you have to replace or update something, send a quick thanks to your Father in heaven

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for never needing to be replaced or updated. Many scientists tell us that the universe

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is about halfway through its life, and should last about as long again as it's already

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existed. Then they add, of course, Nothing lasts forever, even the universe. To which

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I always add, except of course the God who made the universe, because He lasts forever,

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and so does His love and mercy.