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Sabbath Webcast: Cincinnati PM - June 12, 2021

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Cincinnati PM - June 12, 2021

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Sabbath Webcast: Cincinnati PM - June 12, 2021

MP4 Video - 720p (1.56 GB)
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United Church of God Sabbath services: Cincinnati East, Ohio PM congregation - June 12, 2021

Sermonette: Clint Porter
Sermon: Victor Kubik

Comments

  • Wisdom7
    Re Clint Porter's sermonette on 12th June. I am wondering WHY (about 14mins in) he omitted mention of the Holy Spirit when speaking about baptism. Only mentioning (in the name of) "the Father and Jesus Christ." That is not the full statement Christ made, recorded in Matt. 28:19. Also - I thought it very odd when he taught that; "we should look at the third Commandment as the HYPOCRISY Commandment."
  • Clint Porter
    To respond to the second question (about thinking of the 3rd commandment as addressing hypocrisy), I'm not going to try to persuade you directly—I don't think that will be the most enjoyable or fulfilling way to go at it. It wouldn't have been for me! Instead, let me suggest this: The next time you read through the whole Bible, make a point to notice each time a human and God have a conversation involving God's "name" (including God's instructions through Moses and the prophets) and stop for a minute each time to think about the significance and relevance of that discussion to the immediate story. It's a subtle but persistent theme. I think most first-time readers of the New Testament wonder at some point why Jesus spent so much time talking about the hypocrisy of the Pharisees and Sadducees. I believe if you come into those stories aware of this ongoing Biblical theme as a backdrop, it becomes a lot more obvious how this particular focus of Jesus fits perfectly into the overall story of the Bible.
  • Clint Porter
    Thanks S! To answer your first question, you're right: God tells us to be baptized in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. I avoided mentioning the Holy Spirit in this case, because connecting it to this Biblical theme of "God's name" can be misleading. I was hoping to avoid a distraction (but perhaps I created one instead!) Depending on what religious background you come from, you might tend to read Matthew 28:19 as "…in the name of the Father, and [in the name] of the Son, and [in the name] of the Holy Spirit." If you read it this way, and then you trace the theme of God's "name" through all of Scripture, you find a strange thing: Biblical authors frequently write about the "Father's name" and "the name of Christ" (and in the Hebrew Scriptures the name of YHWH) in ways related to this Third Commandment theme, but they almost never discuss the "name of the Holy Spirit". That's an idea that just doesn't seem to be on their radar in the same way. In fact, Christ told His disciples the Father would send the Holy Spirit "in My name" (Jn 14:26). UCG.org has some excellent resources to dive deeper if you're interested in going further with this topic of how the Holy Spirit relates to the Father and Christ. I was focused particularly on this "name" aspect, so I chose to highlight the Father and Christ for whom this theme burns brightly across Scripture. In a sermonette you have a narrow focus and limited time, so you can't always include every useful parenthetical discussion. Thanks for the opportunity to clarify that!
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