It's inside of that net, or encapsulated. They'll pull the ropes and drag it back up, and it'll get caught in that net. But the net, apparently, that he uses here, it's speaking of this seine. And these are huge. Like I say, two boats have to extend them out. I heard in one commentary said that one net can be as long as half a mile long. and it has weights that they'll drop down deep, and then whether it's the two boats or whether they tie it to the shore, it's like a, you know, and then the boat will sweep along like 180 degrees and capture, that thing's like a wall that moves and captures anything in its path. And it will, whatever's there, they'll pull those weights up, the ropes, and they'll encapsulate everything that there is. So you can fish either way, but this is kind of the picture the Lord's given us, this large, like this wall, the net moving along through the sea. And in this picture, you know, the Lord, He may have been, you know, making a connection with several of them because several of the men were what? They're fishermen. So this will ring true. This will make a lot of sense to them and they'll get this. It'll be a very familiar process with them. Well, when we hear about this net, we need to think about what would this net be? What would it represent in this parable? I think it would represent the proclamation of the gospel. This net represents the proclaiming of the gospel. Now notice, there's only one net, right? There aren't a bunch of nets. There's only one net mentioned in this parable. There aren't multiple nets, and that's the way it is with the gospel. There's one gospel, there's one message of the kingdom. Just one. And the net also doesn't capture everyone. The net doesn't capture all the fish in the sea, does it? No, it only captures some that are in its path. Now, when we hear that, when we realize that, We need to be very thankful and immensely thankful of the blessing that there is and even encountering that net. No one deserves to hear the gospel, do they? Do we as human beings, by merit and right, even deserve to hear this, this good news? No, we don't. And that's the thing, not everyone does. There have been, I don't know how many people through the history of the world who haven't heard this message. So I'm just drawing out this point briefly for us to appreciate the reality of being in this net is a great blessing and to have encountered it is a blessing. Jesus said, didn't he, no one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him, draws him. So this picture of a fish being caught in a net is being drawn. It's kind of the idea of that being drawn or like a water, a bucket down in a well has to be drawn up It's not going to get there to the shore on its own. I thought of Romans and how the Apostle Paul said in chapter 10, he said, How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him whom they've never heard? Remember that? How are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they're sent, as it is written? How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news, those who cast the net or lower the net. How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news. Then Paul says, but they have not all obeyed the gospel. And notice, this net is completely indiscriminate. It is completely indiscriminate in what it catches. As long as it's something swimming around in the lake or in the sea and it gets caught in its path, it doesn't matter what it is, it will be pulled in. It will be pulled in. And the Lord says, the net will gather fish of every kind. You see that? Not most kinds, not a few kinds, but fish of every kind. Now, remember, this is a parable, and this is where a parable has flexibility of sometimes getting almost unbelievable or fantastic in what he's saying, because normally a fishing net wouldn't catch a fish of every kind. You have it lowered down into this sea, is it gonna really catch a fish of every single kind? Probably not, but in this parable, it does. This net does. It will pull in men and women, young and old. It'll pull in all ethnicities, all races. It will pull in the wise and the foolish, the rich and the poor. It will pull in people of every kind, from all religious and denominational backgrounds. This net has that power. And this is something Jesus is showing us, that the net is completely indiscriminate. And it's also authoritative and powerful, isn't it? You get caught, you're under its authority, you're under its power. Paul says God commands all people to repent and believe the gospel. This gospel comes to you, you're under its authority and power now. Nothing else in the world, beloved, can ever or will ever operate like this net. It can't do it. Nothing in the world operates with this kind of power and this kind of authority, this gospel message of the kingdom. So, like I said, the fishermen would be very familiar with this fishing technique, but they had no idea that there were hidden and deep spiritual realities in this process. But there were, and there are. That's how a lot of things are. The Lord Jesus would draw things out from nature that had profound spiritual realities underneath it all that he was drawing out for us and letting us in on. So the Lord Jesus is telling us that the kingdom of heaven is like this fishing process. Isn't that amazing? A fishing process or technique with this net, that's what the, yeah, the kingdom of heaven is a lot like this. It's like this. Well, what about the sea? What would that represent? What about the sea? He says it's cast into the sea. I think I just heard it. The world. You know, in the other parable of the weeds, he said the field is the world. Remember? The field is the world. And apparently, he doesn't say it explicitly here or explain it, but the sea would represent the same thing. It represents or includes all of humanity. All of humanity is represented by this sea. And all the people in the world are represented by these different kinds of fish. And it brings us also to someone that's not mentioned as much, but the workers, the men. Who would they be? Who is it that's spreading or casting these nets, this gospel net? It would be other Christians, wouldn't it? Other believers. They're kind of hidden, aren't they? They're hidden. It's the net that's doing all the work and doing only what it can do. I mean, think about it. They need a net because they can't do what the net can do. All they can do, they cannot gather the fish. The net has to do the fish gathering. All they can do is let it down or cast it. All the power All the glory is in the net. It's not in those who let it down. You ever tried catching a fish by your own hands without some fishing device? Whether it be bait or a net, it's not very easy, is it? That's how it is with us. We're not gonna catch men on our own. We have to use the net. We have to use the message of the kingdom. Paul said it, didn't he? He said, Apollos and I, what are we? We're nothing. One of us plants and one of us waters, that's it. It's God who brings the increase. It's God who does all the catching. And so God gets all the glory. It doesn't matter if you heard a great sermon by Jeff Thomas or Paul Washer or John Piper, one of these great preachers. They're nothing really. What's everything is the net. It and it alone can catch the fish, and it will. Sometimes it's lower down and there's schools of fish there. Just swoops them up, massive, massive, like a revival. Or sometimes you see stories, they'd pull it up and it'd just be nothing. And last time I spoke about Jonathan Edwards, remember, with the parable of the weeds, The farmer had his men plant good seed, and then who comes along, the enemy, and plants weeds. And that's how Edwards said, in this time of the great awakening, this great revival, this massive in-sweeping of believers, they had unexpected challenges, and that were the false believers. They had a hard time dealing and sorting out with the false, because the enemy was at work, almost as much as the Holy Spirit was at work, planting his seeds. Well, then we see here, he says, when it was full, when it was full, the men drew it ashore and sat down and sorted the good into containers, but threw away the bad. Now, that's a great blessing to know that he waits until the net is full. He doesn't pull it up empty. Now, one commentator I thought wisely said, He said that the net is not pulled out of the lake until it is full is perhaps intended to emphasize that there will be no premature separation. It will wait until everything is ready in God's good time. God will wait until that net is full, won't he? He'll wait till the gospel, the message of the kingdom sweeps through the sea and until it fills up. And then that's when he'll pull it out in his perfect time. The net will be pulled to the shore and everything in it is coming up to the shore. And, you know, people may think they're free. Well, I've got free will. I'll do what I want when I want. I'm free. But the truth is, you're really being pulled along by this net, by this gospel net. And in the end, you're going to be sorted out by the angels, right? Like you said. Try to picture it in your mind. Try to picture this. You've got this fish swimming along in the sea, and swimming around, and then this great net comes along, this great wall, this great seine net, and the fish swims into it, bumps into it, and it flits and goes the other way. But the net just keeps coming. It just keeps coming. The fish has some liberty, doesn't it? It has some liberty and freedom to swim in the other direction, at least for a little while, because the net's still on the move, and it'll hit it again. It'll flick and flip, and it'll hit it again, and it just keeps coming, until finally, the net's just too powerful. Less and less freedom. And then finally, that thing is totally encapsulated, and it's been lifted up out of the water onto the shore. It's completely under the command and dominance of that net. Completely. And it's lifted out, lifted out of its natural habitat, along with the other fish that it's caught, and then the fishermen will determine if it's worth keeping or if it's worth being discarded. They'll make the decision. You see, that's how the kingdom of heaven works. That's what the kingdom of heaven's like. That's what the kingdom of heaven and the end of the age is like, right there. The Lord Jesus is telling us that. And then what'll happen when it's on the shore, like I said, there'll be this great sorting out, this great separation. The good fish will be separated from the bad. And it says that they sat down and sorted out the fish. It seems to imply that they're being very careful about it, very intentional about it, and they know what they're looking for. A lot of us, we all know our brother and friend here in the church, Josh Young. Right now, he's spending his summer up in Alaska on a fishing boat. He'll be out at sea for about four weeks at a time. He'll live on the boat. And guess what they're fishing with? They aren't out there fishing poles on the boat, trying to catch as many fish as they can, are they? They're fishing with massive nets, a massive net. These trawlers, these big boats are pulling in fish. And Josh said, he told me one of his jobs is to stand in this room when the fish are all being poured down into this room and he's gonna sort out the good ones from the bad ones. And I thought, well, how applicable is this? Like you're a living parable in a way in your job. And he said they're primarily looking for salmon. He called them reds. We got a full load of reds or something like that. So it was red salmon that they're fishing for. So think about that. He's looking for salmon. That's what they're fishing for. And he knows what a red salmon is. And those that aren't, he won't keep. They won't use. And that's how it's gonna be at the end of the age. You get hauled in by this great net, this great fishing net, and when it comes time to be pulled ashore, you're either a red salmon or you're not. You see that? You're either a real Christian or you're not. There is no third option. That's what the kingdom of heaven in the end of the age is like. He says it in verse 49, so it will be at the close of the age. The angels will come out and separate the evil from the righteous. So we have this end of the age language. In a different parable, the end of the age was referred to what? The harvest. The harvest. That's what the end of the age is like too. It's like this harvest. You've got this great field of wheat. And in the one parable he told about the weeds, they'll get the weeds out first, and then they're gonna harvest all the wheat, and the wheat will go to the barn, and what will happen to the wheat? They'll be burned in the furnace, and that's what it'll be like at the end of the age. There'll be this great sorting out, and it's gonna be profound. Incidentally, the Lord Jesus only taught of two ages, didn't he? There's this age and the age to come. Those are the only ages he knew about, or taught about at least. this age and the age to come. I don't know how that impacts your eschatology, but food for thought. And in verse 50, it says, and he's gonna throw them into the fiery furnace. The fiery furnace. He mentions it again. Again, we gotta hear about this fiery furnace. He says, in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. This can be one of those parts of a teacher, a Bible teacher, that you'd almost just prefer skip on by because it's just so horrific. You don't have this idea of a little campfire, do you? It's a furnace. Have any of you been to a blast furnace or seen a furnace? These things melt metal into liquid, and that's just a human furnace. That's the picture we're having of a furnace. Remember in Daniel, they were throwing the guys into the furnace, and the guys throwing them in, it was so hot, they got killed. This is a picture of what the end of the age, what it will be like. It's like a furnace. It's unbelievably hot, a fiery furnace. And these are the exact same words that he used in verse 42 in the parable of the weeds. Verse 50 is almost verbatim with 42. He said, there will be weeping, weeping, or one translation could be loud shrieks, loud shrieks. I can barely tolerate a two-year-old just kind of being upset and you're irritable and crying out. It's like unless the Lord builds into you some patience and tolerance and even that just kind of gets to you after a while. But this is a different level. This weeping, this loud shrieks. It's all you'll hear probably. Loud shrieks and wailing and there will be gnashing of teeth, just grinding teeth in pain. It'll be unimaginably horrific, and it will be forever. It's just, it's awful. The Lord Jesus, in these parables, is being compassionate to us, actually. When he's telling us, he's being honest and telling us there is a real hell, and people will go there. They will go there, and he's issuing warning after warning after warning, and it's in these parables alone. He's just, he's the one who taught on hell more than anyone, isn't he? And it's hard to imagine or even think about very long without just being dismayed and thinking, how, what in the world? But it's so awful. It's as though we couldn't even believe something so horrendous if it weren't him that has established and taught and is reinforcing this truth. Had to be him. He had to be the one who has said, this is real. At the end, there will be this separation, and there's one of two places. There's no third place. It's the barn or the furnace. See, it's into the fishermen's good containers, or it's the furnace. He's not throwing the bad fish back into the sea, back into the lake where they can swim around and be back in their natural habitat and maybe even get caught again. And that wouldn't even work, would it, for the parable? You had the bad fish thrown back into the sea while the good fish are being thrown into the frying pan and eaten and used by the, you know, that doesn't work. And that's not the point, is it? No. You know, even when you catch a bad fish, you don't just necessarily throw it back out in the lake, because you don't want to catch that thing again or anyone else, really. And we're talking about a bad fish, not like a young. but a bad one. You don't want to catch this. You throw it up further off, so it dies. Well, we need to realize this is a compassionate, continual warning of the King of Heaven, of the Savior, that there is a real hell. A lot of this parable is about judgment, isn't it? Well, that brings up a question then, what is the central teaching of this parable? What's the main heart center, the focal teaching of this whole thing? What's this parable primarily about? And I think it's this, it's within professing Christianity, there will be both true and false Christians. There will be true believers who really have saving faith in the Lord Jesus and love Him, and there will be hypocrites and pretenders. And the day is coming in which they will be made known, they will be separated, and their final destination will be settled by the judge of heaven forever. I think that's the heart of it right there. You see, this gospel net brings in, swoops in both kinds, good and bad. It sweeps them in. And evil will remain until the end of the age. Even to the end of the age, good and evil will remain until the final judgment. You see, many people are pulled in. They feel this gospel pull. They feel this tug, but they're not at all truly saved. They perhaps are attracted to the benefits like, you know, this whole idea about paradise or eternal life sounds pretty good to me. That's what I want. They may be attracted to these benefits, but they have no real devotion to the Lord Jesus. They don't really love Him at all. It's all about them. They have no commitment to Him. They have no love for His Word, no love for His people, truly. See that? You see that throughout the Bible, don't you? You've got those who accept the invitation to the wedding feast, but they have no interest in wearing the wedding clothes. We'll get to that one maybe, Lord willing, sometime. He just shows up with no wedding clothes on, and then He didn't, it said when He was confronted, He didn't have an excuse either, did He? I mean, he didn't say, I just heard about this five minutes ago, and I'm sorry, I came in what I'm wearing, or I just came from bearing, you know, or doing some, you know, there could be reasons you show up in inappropriate clothes, but you're there. Noah says he was speechless, because he knew, he did not, he didn't care to put on the clothes. Well, there's good and bad servants. Right? In the parables, there are those who are wise, those who make preparations, and there are those who are foolish and do not. There are those who stay awake, and there are those who go to sleep. There are the sheep, and there are the goats. You see these pictures all through. There are the vessels of wrath, and there are the vessels of mercy. See, there are those who love and bless others, and there are those who take advantage of others. These examples go on and on and on. And the king of heaven and his angels know exactly who they are. And in this great bringing of the net to the shore, there will be this sorting out. He's gonna accurately divide them out. One theologian said, wisely I think, he said, the Lord Jesus warns us again that it is not enough And what is more, it is of little consequence to us to be gathered into the fold unless we are His true and chosen sheep. You get gathered into the fold, that's one thing, by this gospel pull. But whether you're one of His true sheep, that's another thing entirely, isn't it? And in a way, that's how it is. And Paul said in 2 Timothy 2, He said, but God's firm foundation stands bearing this seal. The Lord knows those who are his. And let everyone who names the name of the Lord depart from iniquity. The Lord knows those who are his. So we have this sorting, this separation aspect that will occur. It's going to happen. There are no ifs, ands, or buts about it. It will happen. And that's within professing Christianity. That's within those who have been drawn and pulled along by the kingdom message, by the gospel message. And there'll be this sorting out. And what's gonna be the determining factor of this sorting? What's gonna determine it? He's very straightforward and says, he'll separate the righteous from the evil. The righteous will be separated from the evil. And that's it. That's something for us to take notice of, isn't it? In God's eyes, people are either righteous or they are evil. It's not righteous or not so righteous. Righteous or kind of getting there, or not as bad as some. No, it's a distinct, clear separation between the righteous and the evil. You're one or the two. And that's what we'll decide at the end of the age. You know, there's no neutral ground whatsoever, is there? Jesus made that clear. You're either for me or you're against me. There's no neutrality here. If you're not for me, then he considers it as aggression. You are against me, therefore. And that's the reality, that's true. Now, like I said, that's within the gospel message. Those are within professing Christianity. There's gonna be those good and bad fish. And what does that say about the world then, or the entirety, all the world? Later on in Matthew, in the 25th chapter, towards the end, when we get to this section of the final judgment, listen to what Matthew says here. In Matthew 25, 31, he says, and following, when the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the angels with Him, Then he will sit on his glorious throne. Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. And he will place the sheep on his right with the goats on the left. Then the king will say to those on his right, Come, you who are blessed by my father. Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundations or foundation of the world. In verse 41, he says, then he will say to those on his left, depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. He concludes, verse 46, he says, and these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life. That's profound. That's the world. We were talking a little bit about, there's this little bit of a debate between, you know, when the weeds, you know, the field was the world or the church. And I think that the conclusion that we hold to pretty much is that Jesus says the field is the world. He didn't say the field is the church, but where is the church? It's in the world. So the world you know, the church is in the world, therefore the church will also have some weeds. And it will have, you know, some even bad fish that will be included, right? And the Lord Jesus knows who they are. And then that's within what I would call a true church. I mean, there's some out there that call themselves the church under the whole umbrella of Christendom, that they're almost completely weeds. Right? Not to name necessarily, but some of the health wealth types, or even I would say Catholic. It's that way. But this gospel net will sweep through, and then the good and the bad will be sorted out in the end. So just a few things to glean by way of application for us. I had number one, as I've already kind of emphasized, but there are only two kinds of people in the world. There are the evil and there are the righteous. That's the way God sees it. And if that's the way God sees it, then that's reality. That's the way we need to see it. There are the evil and the righteous. So which one are you? Which one am I? We need to evaluate ourselves, don't we? We need to examine our hearts. How can we stand in the day of judgment? How can we, shouldn't we be asking ourselves that question? We hear this teaching from the Lord. We need to say, okay, this is how it is. Then I don't want to be one in the fire furnace. I want to be one of the good ones, right? So how can we be found to be righteous? There's only one way, isn't there? One way. It's repent of sin and put your faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. He's the King of Heaven, right? He's the Savior of the world. He's the Savior of sinners. You realize I'm a sinner? He's the Savior. I want to bow the knee to Him. I want to commit my life to Him, pledge my allegiance to Him. I want to be under His authority, under His care. I want to be His and Him to be mine. And I receive Him one way. It's by faith. Faith is the key. And the test, when the sorting out occurs, they're gonna be looking for something, aren't they? How do you know the tree is good? By the fruit. You'll know the tree by its fruit. So really, the test we found in the fruit of our lives. Is there any fruit? Is there any fruit at all? Is this thing barren, basically dead, or just barren, or does it have any fruit at all? If you go out to this tree and you discover, let's say, one, what's a good fruit? Plum. One plum. One. One. Will you know what kind of tree that is? Yeah, you will. You will know the tree by its fruit, even if it's one fruit, even if it's not just loaded, weighted down. You'll know it. And the angels, the Lord himself, the angels will know. They will know the counterfeit from the true. So we want to be found right with him. And secondly, this kingdom net, like I said, it will not lay hold of every single person in the world. Of all the fish in the sea, it only lays hold of some. It only brings along and captures some, doesn't it? I dare say there's a lot of parts of this world that have never heard the gospel. Even in this city. I've asked people at my work, I said, if I asked you what the gospel is, would you even know what I'm talking about? Not really. Or couldn't explain it. So this net clearly does not capture every single person in the world. That doesn't mean they have an excuse for their sin. But those who it does lay hold of, it's an exceedingly great privilege. that we do not want to regard lightly or take for granted. And some people from their childhood, from their childhood have been pulled along by this net. Isn't that something? Yet they're still not converted. They're pulled along by this net. And if that's the case, we need to do what the writer to the Hebrews said in Hebrews 2, 3, when he said, how shall we escape if we neglect such a great salvation? It was declared at first by the Lord, and it was attested to us by those who heard. So we who are in this gospel net want to be found faithful and true, don't we? And that's the only way we can, a faith in Christ. And we don't want to take it for granted. What a blessing to be raised in a Christian home. The grace of God to have heard the message at all, much less being raised in a Christian home. We need to realize what a blessing that is. Third thing I have is that judgment is coming, and hell is real. I made that clear, but that's by way of closing application. Jesus is once again telling us, this is what the kingdom's like. This net comes along, catches all these fish. When it's full, it's dragged to the shore, and they're gonna sort them out, the good from the bad, and the bad are gonna be burned in this furnace. Hell is real. And today, there's still hope. As Paul said, I quoted 2 Timothy 2.19, he said, this is God's firm foundation, bearing this seal, that the Lord knows those are His. But then he said something after that, remember? He said, let everyone who names the name of the Lord depart from iniquity. That's an action item. Do that. You name the name of the Lord, you say, Jesus is my Lord, my Savior, then there's something very important you need to do, and that's depart from iniquity. If it's iniquity and you're doing it, depart from it. Now, he doesn't say, if you're in iniquity, then you're bad, you're done for. No, what does it say? Depart from it. And then you've got your hope. Depart from it. So we want to depart from iniquity. We want to repent of our sin. We want to trust in Christ. We want to love him and walk with him and commit our souls to him. And you will be accepted fully, completely in that great day. When that net comes to shore and this great separation comes, there'll be no more hope of salvation, will there? That fish is up on the shore, that's it. There's no more hope. When the age closes, that's it, or you die. You get hit in the car driving home today, and you die. That's it. There's no more hope of salvation. The good and the bad will forever be separate. Someday, someday, those who are Christians will live in this new heaven and new earth. It's a new earth. It's gonna be real. It's gonna be an earth. in which there will be no bad things, no sin whatsoever, in which only righteousness dwells. I was talking to Brother Brian about Hawaii, thinking, wow, you see this beautiful, these waterfalls and these sunsets and this water, and you think, this is a Genesis 3 world? This is a fallen, cursed world under the sin of death, and it's so beautiful, can you only imagine what the new heavens will be like, the new earth will be like, if some place like Hawaii is so beautiful. So, beloved, this is what the Lord Jesus has purchased and prepared for those who trust Him and have faith in Him. Only the righteous will enjoy living in the new heavens and the new earth, where only righteousness dwells. I've got a little bit of time left. You see this throughout the Bible too, in a way. This whole picture of fishing. The prophets mentioned it. Jeremiah 16. Think of this. He said, Behold, I am sending for many fishers, declares the Lord, and they shall catch them. And afterward I will send for many hunters, and they will hunt them from every mountain and every hill and out of the clefts of the rocks. For my eyes are on all their ways. They are not hidden from me, nor is their iniquity concealed from my eyes. But first I will doubly repay their iniquity and their sin, because they have polluted my land with the carcasses of their detestable idols, and they have filled my inheritance with their abominations. Oh Lord, my strength and my stronghold, my refuge in the day of trouble, to you shall the nations come from the ends of the earth and say, our fathers have inherited nothing but lies, worthless things in which there is no profit. Can man make for himself gods? Such are not gods. Therefore, behold, I will make them know this once. I will make them know my power and my might, and they shall know that my name is the Lord. This whole place, the gospel net will sweep up many, but then the whole thing is just gonna be sorted out, isn't it, in the end? A beautiful hymn. Part of it says, Jesus shall reign wherever the sun does his successive journeys run. His kingdom stretch from shore to shore. His moon till moons shall wax and wane no more. Amen. Let me close and we'll have 15 or 20 minutes to fellowship together. Father, I pray now for your truth, Lord, to bless your people. Pray that you would apply it to hearts as I cannot do it. Only you can. Would you, Lord, encourage them and help us see this and believe it and glean from this parable the Lord's taught us. Thank you so much for your word. Thank you for the gospel. Thank you for such a mighty, glorious savior. In his name we pray. Amen.